Police pursuits of drivers fleeing from traffic stops or U.S. Border Patrol checkpoints while engaged in human smuggling have become a common occurrence along Arizona’s southern border, leading to thousands of reported motor vehicle accidents and property damage incidents since January 2021.
The federal immigration crisis has created well-documented staffing and financial burdens on municipal, county, and state law enforcement agencies, as well as fire departments, ambulance providers, and hospitals.
But discussions about the border situation frequently overlook the real life impacts being suffered every day by law abiding Arizonans due to injuries, vehicle repairs, missed work, property damage, and higher homeowner or automobile premiums which result from unfortunate encounters with drivers involved in human smuggling.
The problem is especially bad in Cochise County, where there is an unending stream of drivers from other counties eager to make a quick buck by smuggling migrants who attempt to get into the U.S. without surrendering themselves to immigration officials.
Many of those drivers engage in what officials call failure to yield, which is another way of saying a driver refuses to pull over when signaled to do so by a law enforcement officer. Some of the drivers try to evade or even outrun the police, leading to accidents that forever alter the lives of Arizonans who were simply minding their own business.
One such victim was Wanda Sitokski. She was driving to a Sierra Vista restaurant on Oct. 31, 2021, to celebrate her birthday by having dinner with her son, who was receiving treatment for stage 4 colon cancer.
But Sitokski never made it.
Instead, she died instantly when a vehicle driven by 16-year-old Felix Mendez Jr., of Mesa ran a red light and crashed into Sitoski’s Ford Focus vehicle at high speed. The Ford was sheared in half. Two undocumented migrants in Mendez’s vehicle suffered serious but non-life-threatening injuries.
Sitokski’s son, Edward Fritsch, died just days before the one-year anniversary of is mother’s death.
“The turmoil, grief and stress of losing his mother in such a tragedy took a profound toll on his health,” Fritsch’s obituary noted.
Mendez recently turned 18 in jail, where he has remained since the October 2021 incident. He formally rejected a plea deal last month which would have given him a chance to get out of custody in about 19 years.
“We are here to ensure you understand the plea offer that was extended by the State,” Judge Jason Lindstrom told Mendez during a June 26 hearing. The judge also advised the teen that “there is no constitutional right to a plea offer.”
Mendez is being prosecuted by Chief Deputy County Attorney Lori Zucco. She explained during the hearing that the plea offer offered with the input of Sitokski’s surviving family called for Mendez to plead guilty to manslaughter.
He would also plead guilty to two counts of aggravated assault for the two migrants injured in the crash and two counts of felony endangerment for placing other motorists at risk of injury.
In return, Mendez would spend no more than 24.5 years in prison, with credit for the time spent in jail awaiting resolution of the case. The sentence came with a possibility of early release after Mendez serves 85 percent of the prison time.
But if Mendez goes to trial, he is looking at the prospect of spending the rest of his life in prison, Zucco noted.
That is because a conviction at trial on the most serious charge of first degree murder during the commission of a felony (fleeing from law enforcement) would require Mendez to serve at least 25 years before release. And release is not guaranteed, meaning Mendez could spend his natural life in prison, Zucco pointed out.
Lindstrom questioned Mendez’s understanding of what would happen if the teen accepted the plea deal and what could happen at trial if Mendez did not.
“I find he understands the terms,” Lindstrom said after Mendez and his defense attorney rejected the plea offer. The judge then set a four-week jury trial to start in May 2024.
In the meantime, federal immigration officials have taken steps to ensure the two migrants in the car with Mendez at the time of the crash are not deported so that they will be available to testify.
Another victim of border smuggling activities is Dana Law, longtime owner of Benson-based Sundance Fire & Rescue.
In January 2021, Law suffered severe back injuries and his wife suffered a head injury when an unlicensed 16-year-old crashed into their Ford F350 truck at about 80 mph while fleeing from USBP agents.
That driver, Alexander Uriel Barron of Somerton, was transporting six migrants in a borrowed Pontiac sedan around 7:30 p.m. without the car’s headlights on along Interstate 10. The force of the impact with Law’s truck caused the sedan to roll several times, injuring Barron and all six passengers.
The night of the accident, Law and his wife were headed home after going out for dinner following their recovery from COVID-19. Instead, they were airlifted to a trauma hospital in Tucson, leaving them with medical costs, loss of income, and serious damage to their vehicle.
Law told Arizona Daily Independent he continues to have health issues as a result of the accident. He also had to retain an attorney to help with the insurance claims and related issues.
Barron was initially charged with 15 felonies but received a 150-day jail sentence and three years of probation as part of a quick plea deal after pleading guilty to one count of attempted unlawful flight from pursuing law enforcement vehicles and six counts of endangerment.
Those seven convictions are undesignated Class 6 felonies, meaning Barron can petition the court to downgrade each to a misdemeanor if he successfully completes probation.