Coast Guard cutters intercepted dozens of migrants on the high seas as they tried to reach US soil — and shipped them to the Dominican Republic or turned them over to US Border Patrol, officials said.
The migrants were cut off in three separate operations over the past week off the waters of Puerto Rico and repatriated them over the past few days, the agency said in a press release Tuesday.
“The daily work accomplished by our watchstanders and responding Coast Guard and partner agency units is instrumental to stopping unlawful migration voyages at sea and removing migrants from a very dangerous environment,” Coast Guard Commander Matthew Roman said in a statement.
“We urge anyone thinking of taking part in one of these voyages to not entrust your lives to human smugglers,” Roman said. “Don’t take to the sea, these voyages are extremely dangerous and most often take place aboard grossly overloaded and unseaworthy vessels that are taking on water and have no live saving equipment. Instead seek safe, orderly and lawful migration pathways.”
In the most recent interception, a Coast Guard air crew out of Miami spotted a migrant boat off the coast of Mona Island in Puerto Rico on Saturday and dispatched the Cutter Paul Clark.
The cutter crew took 27 migrants — 22 men and five women from Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
Friday morning, a 25-foot migrant vessel was spotted south of Mona Island and intercepted by the same cutter, with 17 men and six women who claimed to be Dominican Republic nationals.
Four of those were taken into custody and were transferred to the US Border Patrol for prosecution but details of that case were not immediately available.
In the first operation on Oct. 23, the Coast Guard Cutter Joseph Napier stopped a 26-foot “makeshift vessel’ north of Aguadillo, Puerto Rico, and nabbed seven Dominican natives.
One of the migrants was turned over to US Border Patrol the following day, the release said.
