Fourteen people were taken into US Border Patrol custody after a suspected migrant boat was intercepted south of Newport Beach, California, prompting a city council member to call for surveillance cameras at the harbour entrance.
The vessel was stopped at about 1.30pm on October 3 by a Coastal Interceptor Vessel operated by the Long Beach Marine Unit, according to the US Department of Homeland Security.
Those aboard included 11 adult men, two adult women and an accompanied male juvenile. All told officials they were Mexican nationals.
Air and Marine Operations escorted the boat and its occupants to the US Coast Guard dock in Newport Beach, where one person was assessed for possible dehydration and seasickness. The individual was declared stable and cleared by emergency medical staff.
All 14 people were then handed over to Border Patrol for transport and processing. The boat was seized.
Calls for Newport Harbor cameras
The interception follows a series of suspected migrant boat incidents in and around Newport Beach, including an episode last month in which surveillance footage showed at least a dozen people leaving a boat inside Newport Harbor before disappearing into the surrounding community.
Another 37 migrants were rescued offshore during the same period after reportedly spending two days without food, water or fuel. In a separate incident around two years ago, more than 20 suspected migrants were filmed leaving a panga boat in the harbour and getting into vans.
Erik Weigand, the Newport Beach council member for District 3, is proposing two cameras near the harbour entrance. He said they could be mounted on existing infrastructure around the jetties or seawall and used to monitor boats entering and leaving the harbour around the clock.
The system could alert authorities to suspicious activity and might be developed in co-operation with federal agencies, Mr Weigand said. The type of technology has yet to be decided, with the council member mentioning Flock cameras as one possible comparison.
“If we can have eyes and ears on something that looks suspicious, we could send up a drone,” Mr Weigand said.
He said the vessels’ occupants were not always known to authorities as they approached the Southern California coast, raising concerns about possible drug smuggling or other criminal activity. Those claims have not been linked to the people detained in the latest interception.
“We don’t know, that’s the problem,” Mr Weigand said.
The Department of Homeland Security warned that maritime migration can expose people to deadly conditions and said the United States border would remain closed to unauthorised migration by sea, air and land.
Mr Weigand plans to raise the camera proposal at the Newport Beach City Council meeting on October 13. The likely cost of the surveillance system and whether councillors will approve it remain unclear.
