DOUBLE CROSSED
THE AIR IS HOT AND STICKY behind the metal gates of Senda de Vida, a migrant shelter on the bank of the Rio Grande in Reynosa, Mexico. Hector Orvis-Enrique, wearing sunglasses and a ball cap, fidgets with his hands as he sits on a cinder block wall and describes his kidnapping.
Like many migrants, the 25-year-old had come to this border town after running from death threats in Central America. He’d slogged his way north from Honduras with his sights set on the United States. Members of a local drug cartel spotted him as soon as he arrived at the Reynosa bus station. They asked if he had a clave—a code confirming he’d already paid the cartel to be let into town. When he said no, they forced him into a car and sped away to a house where he was held for ransom with other abducted migrants. One of his captors put a gun to his head and told him, “If you don’t pay, you’re going to get killed.” By the time Mexican federal police rescued him, he’d been in captivity for almost
