On June 27, 2022, a tractor-trailer pulled up to the Border Patrol checkpoint on Interstate 35. It looked like most any other 18-wheeler, and Border Patrol agents waved it through without looking inside.
Had they inspected the rig, they would have found 66 migrants who were in the country without authorization. And the Border Patrol would have saved the lives of 53 people.
Later that very hot day, when the tailer reached San Antonio, the passengers from Mexico, Guatemala and Honduras were succumbing to the extreme heat and lack of ventilation.
The driver didn't try to save his human cargo. He parked the trailer near Lackland Air Force Base and ran.
This event is considered the deadliest human smuggling attempt in U.S. history.
Journalist Elliott Woods investigated the victims' stories and traveled to Mexico and Central America to speak with their families.
Elliott Woods is an Iraq veteran and an award-winning journalist. This article was produced in collaboration with the Food & Environment Reporting Network, an independent, nonprofit news organization. Work on this story was also supported by the journalism nonprofit the Economic Hardship Reporting Project.
His story “A Deadly Passage” is in the March 2025 issue of Texas Monthly.
'Desert Killer'
David Leonard Wood is due to be executed by the state of Texas on March 13.
Wood is also known as the "Desert Killer." He was convicted of being a serial killer and rapist who killed at least six girls and women in El Paso in 1987.
Wood has insisted on his innocence. And there is a lack of physical evidence that ties him to the deaths.
Wood’s defenders say the prosecution was able to convict Wood and sentence him to death using only questionable “jail house snitches.”
Maurice Chammah has written about the case for The Marshall Project. His article is “He Refused to Become a Jailhouse Snitch. Can He Stop David Wood’s Execution?”
