When Detectoves Came Calling This Summer At The 25-acre ranch of Lucio Avianeda, outside Minatitlan in southern Mexico, their mission was to arrest Avianeda and his alleged partner in crime, Constantino (Coty) Andrade. But before the lawmen got to the ranch house, they heard voices coming from the stables. Inside they found a dozen undocumented Central American migrants who had been locked up for three days with no food or water. Some lay unconscious in the stifling heat while horses munched hay a few feet away. The cops were not completely shocked: Avianeda and Andrade are reputed people smugglers. Police say the two recently gained trafficking control over a large swath of Mexico's southern isthmus―an unavoidable corridor in the perilous odyssey from Central America to the U.S. that hundreds of thousands of desperately poor migrants make each year.
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