(NewsNation) — Officials with the Texas Department of Public Safety and the U.S. Border Patrol continue to see a surge of minors after they said they have encountered more than 100 unaccompanied minors along the U.S.-Mexico border over the past week.
Among the children who have been found in the United States is a 4-year-old girl from Honduras who officials said they found alone after she was smuggled by coyotes throughout South America.
The mother of the girl told NewsNation that she is still waiting for a phone call from U.S. immigration officials about when her daughter will be released. The toddler has been in the custody of border officials for more than a week.
The girl’s mother said she was provided photos of her daughter by Mexican smugglers who were responsible for getting the girl into the United States. At times, the smugglers allowed the girl to communicate with her mother by FaceTime.
The woman told NewsNation that the smuggler eventually stopped answering her phone calls regarding her daughter. She said that she believed that her daughter was kidnapped and was unaccounted for before she received confirmation from border officials that the young girl was in their custody.
Sources told NewsNation that the surge in unaccompanied children is taking place in Maverick County, Texas, along with neighboring Val Verde County. Maverick County is an area known to be controlled by criminal smugglers despite not having a heavy presence of Mexican cartel members.
Surveillance footage has shown a young girl being smuggled into the country across the Rio Grande River. A girl matching the description of the child seen in the footage was later found in a vehicle that was pulled over by police.
The girl’s mother, a Mexican national living in North America, told police that she said $8,000 to a smuggling organization to have her daughter brought into the U.S. Officials have charged a man in the incident and told NewsNation that the girl’s mother could also face criminal charges.
