A witness at the Texas bus stop where eight people were killed by a speeding Range Rover recalled the moments before the horrific crash – as the driver allegedly shouted profanities before plowing into the crowd.
The witness, identified as Luis, told CBS News through a translator that he was standing with a group of about 17 people outside the Ozanam Center in Brownsville – which houses homeless migrants – when he saw the driver ‘intentionally’ speed up to roughly 60mph on Sunday around 8.30am.
The witness recalled a woman in a white car passing by and telling them to move as the gray Range Rover trailed behind her.
‘Another car behind her came toward us at full speed, yelling profanities at us and ran us over,’ the witness told the news outlet.
The car flipped on its side and the driver tried to flee as brave witnesses rushed to detain him until police arrived. The police of the border-town city haven’t confirmed the reason behind the collision as they claim the driver was ‘uncooperative.’
A witness at the Texas bus stop where eight people died Sunday when a speeding car plowed into them claimed the crash was intentional. Luis (above) recalled standing with a group of 17 people outside the Ozanam Center when the driver shouted profanities and sped toward them
Above is Range Rover that struck a group of people who were at a bus stop outside the homeless center for migrants. Luis recalled a woman in a white car passing by tell them to move as the gray Range Rover trailed behind her
A majority of the victims were identified as Venezuelan men waiting for a bus to return from Downtown. Several of them stayed overnight at the migrant shelter, according to the Associated Press.
Shelter director Victor Maldonado said over the past two weeks he has seen an influx of Venezuelan migrants.
As of Thursday, about 4,000 migrants in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley border control custody were from Venezuela.
Maldonado said the center had not received any threats before the crash, but did afterward.
‘I’ve had a couple of people come by the gate and tell the security guard that the reason this happened was because of us,’ Maldonado said.
Brownsville police investigator Martin Sandoval said the driver was taken to the hospital for injuries sustained when the car rolled over.
There were no passengers in the car, and police didn’t immediately know the driver’s name or age, Sandoval said Sunday afternoon.
Sandoval said there are three possible explanations for the collision: ‘It could be intoxication; it could be an accident; or it could be intentional. In order for us to find out exactly what happened, we have to eliminate the other two.
‘He’s being very uncooperative at the hospital, but he will be transported to our city jail as soon as he gets released,’ Sandoval said. ‘Then we’ll fingerprint him and (take a) mug shot, and then we can find his true identity.’
Police retrieved a blood sample and sent it to a Texas Department of Public Safety lab to test for intoxicants.
Brownsville Police Department weren’t immediately available for a comment.
Police arrested the suspect who was driving the car, but have yet to name him. He has been ‘uncooperative’ with investigators, cops said Sunday as the continue to investigate
The Ozanam center is a homeless shelter that serves individuals and families in the area – and because it sits right on the US-Mexico border, many of its clients are migrants
Police put up evidence markers around the clothes and accessories strewn across the street
The intersection remained closed off in the aftermath as authorities, in partnership with the FBI and Border Patrol, investigated the crash
Brownsville has long been an epicenter for migration across the U.S.-Mexico border, and it has become a key location of interest for this week’s end to pandemic-era border restrictions known as Title 42.
The Ozanam shelter is the only overnight shelter in the city and manages the release of thousands of migrants from federal custody.
The shelter can hold 250 people, but many who arrive leave the same day. In the last several weeks, an uptick in border crossings prompted the city to declare an emergency as local, state and federal resources coordinated enforcement and humanitarian response.
‘In the last two months, we’ve been getting 250 to 380 a day,’ Maldonado said.
About 2,500 migrants have crossed through the river daily into Brownsville in the past few days, Pedro Cardenas, a city commissioner, said.
He said the Border Patrol is aware of the city’s capacity of 1,000 at their processing area near the crossing point and a downtown building where city employees and volunteers guide migrants on how to purchase bus or plane tickets to their final destinations.
The city is considering expanding services to accommodate needs in the coming days, Cardenas said.
While 80 percent of people released from federal custody leave the same day, the city’s emergency management official said, a bottleneck has formed over the past few days.
‘Most of the people coming across don´t want to stay in Brownsville, but we don´t have enough buses for them to buy their ticket to leave,’ Cardenas said. ‘Some are waiting for family members.’
