San Mateo, Ecuador – Oswaldo Angulo is a natural hunter, like the generations before him. The eldest of his brothers, he dropped out of high school in Ecuador To learn trade with his father. When he’s not at sea for weeks at a time, Oswaldo, 36, lives with his parents. He can’t imagine it any other way.
Marlon, the younger brother, also lived at sea – he is a natural mariner. But he fell in Drug traffickingAs did many Ecuadorian fishermen before him. Marlon’s speedboat, which was carrying one ton of cocaine, was stopped by the US Coast Guard in 2018. He is now 30 and serving an 11-year prison sentence.
Anthony, 32, the middle son, was not drawn to the sea as his brothers were. Instead, he earned a degree in communications. But like many in… This is peaceful once A country in South America, Cannes It shook beforeViolence That hit like a hurricane over the past five years. On December 27, 2023, he fled his hometown of San Mateo to the United States
In this fishing village on the coast of Ecuador, the Angulo family embodies some of the driving forces behind migration to the United States unleashed by gangs. wave of Violence and extortion are in every corner of this nation of 18 million, turning lives upside down and spurring an unprecedented exodus. Entire communities and industries have been consumed, and families have been torn apart. Many say they were forced to flee to escape the chaos.
The threat of organized crime generally disqualifies people For asylum In the United States, but that did not stop Ecuadorians from leaving, making them the fourth largest nationality arrested in the United States. United States border with Mexico During the past year.
Those who flee often spend thousands of dollars and risk being killed or kidnapped. If they manage to reach the United States, the world’s top destination for asylum seekers since 2017, they enter a system of punishment. Overcrowded immigration courts Where cases can take years. Most people can stay and get work permits until the problem is resolved.
It’s chaos in Ecuador Of violenceThere was decreasing investment, lower wages, and fewer jobs. Residents feel hopeless – some believe governments are ineffective or complicit, and are giving up hope that this will happen Secure financial future A safe environment to raise children.
The feeling of despair is not limited to Ecuador. It drives migration in many other countries, including Mexico, Colombia, Honduras and Haiti.
At first, Anthony Angulo’s mother did not take his plans to leave for the United States seriously. But he saw a lot of change in Ecuador, for the worse.
“Blackmail, kidnapping, death threats. He said many things. “Years ago, everything was good there.”
He was particularly shaken when six fishermen disappeared from San Mateo, weeks before he left. He told his mother that he had been receiving threatening text messages demanding money.
“Now is my chance,” he told her.
She did not try to dissuade him.
In San Mateo, everyone seems to know each other – the population is just 5,000, and many families have lived here for generations. On the hillsides, colorful homes command ocean views, and parked fishing boats outnumber cars on some winding streets.
The men catch dozens of species, including tuna, marlin, shark, lobster, wahoo and dorado. They alternate between days or weeks at sea and preparations for the next voyage. For some, like Oswaldo Angulo, this is still a viable way to make a living. For others, opportunities dried up alongside the violence.
Ecuador’s long Pacific coastline boasts whale watching, diving, a national park and signature seafood dishes, but upscale hotels, luxury homes and fine dining are few and far between. Just 8 miles (13 kilometers) from San Mateo lies Manta, Ecuador’s main seafood port town. But the main coastal road to San Mateo is riddled with potholes, prompting residents to take out associations of motorists to fill them with dirt. Houses are lit with candles when drought occurs Nationwide power outages They come at night, a result of Ecuador’s heavy reliance on hydroelectric power.
Other signs of unfinished economic promise dot the landscape of San Mateo and surrounding areas. The remains of the government’s oil refinery project appear to be little more than a pile of scrap, since construction was halted after spending $1.5 billion. There remains a deforested skyline of never-used water channels, with newly paved but rarely traveled roads.
Ecuador in general has long been a safe place for the region, a world away from the wars of some other countries. But drug trafficking Gang fights To gain control, waves of violence shook the country, starting around 2018.
President Daniel Noboa (36 years old), the heir to the banana fortune who is preparing for re-election next year, has deployed the army to fight the gangs, but he faces a formidable opponent in the Ecuadorian gangs supported by powerful Mexican and Albanian gangs.
The most affected area was Guayaquil, the largest city in Ecuador and home to a busy port. No part of the country has been spared – Ecuador is home to five of the ten cities affected by the disease highest murder rates in the world, With Manta in third place. Last year, the mayor of Manta, a candidate for mayor of the nearby fishing village of Puerto Lopez, and one The most prominent presidential candidates They were assassinated.
Gang members and associates go from house to house, demanding “blanks” – monthly payments for protection. Sometimes these blackmail requests come from neighbors and acquaintances. The demands appear in the form of text messages on mobile phones, or threats of violence over refusal to pay.
This gap – literally vaccine in English – affects Ecuadorians of all classes and income levels, stifles the economy, and sows fear.
In Guayaquil, stores may pay about $2,000 a month to keep operating, while street food costs $50 or $100, residents say. Taxi drivers pay to drive in certain neighborhoods. Those who refuse may be killed, kidnapped or robbed.
In San Mateo and other fishing villages, the cost of clearing for boat owners is $140 a month per engine, or $280 for twin-engined vessels needed for longer trips. The fishermen say they were given plastic cards that looked like debit cards and said “Choneros 100%” – named after the gang that controls the area.
The vakouna is supposed to prevent theft at sea, but some who pay get robbed anyway.
For some hunters, the costs of vacuum are too much. For others, extortion payments reduce a business’s profits, translating into lower wages and fewer job opportunities.
By December 2023, violence and extortion have become part of daily life for the Angulos and the rest of San Mateo’s residents. But the disappearance of six local fishermen that month, including two teenagers, shocked them.
The alarm spread as the days passed without any word from the crew. The army found nothing, so the townspeople banded together to conduct a comprehensive search. The city of Manta supplied them with fuel.
This search eventually led to the discovery of three bullet-riddled bodies. The others have never been found and are presumed dead.
Valentina Lucas, who lives two blocks from the Angulo family, lost her husband of 36 years and her 16-year-old nephew. The couple had two sons, one 12 and 3, whose only words were “mama” and “dada.”
Lucas (28 years old) said about her husband: “He always left in the middle of the night, and before he went, he would hug me and kiss me, and say, ‘Take care of the kids.’”
No one has been arrested, and the motives are unclear. Witnesses say the radios were stolen, but the boat’s older engine remained.
It was the last straw for Anthony Angulo. The gangs were pursuing him in order to extort money. He’s had enough.
The family sold a boat engine that the patriarch and patriarch Alfonso, now 62 and blind due to diabetes, had stayed on after retiring after 45 years with the company. Anthony paid $1,300 to travel to El Salvador and sent smugglers $2,000 to take him to the US border.
Even local authorities say they understand why Anthony and others left.
Police find themselves simply confronting gangs and criminals, said Javier Briones, who oversees public safety for the government of the Manta region, including San Mateo. He said the police lacked money even to buy batteries for their radios.
“The police are trying to drive at 100 kilometers per hour, and the tires and doors are barely holding on,” he said. “Organized crime groups drive 150 cars and fly.”
Briones said that when the San Mateo fishermen went missing, he boarded a military ship to search for them. Residents gave gas for their searches.
When the bodies were found, hundreds crowded the small beach.
Given these deaths, other crimes and economic hardship, Briones said he understands the exodus — especially of fishermen and their families.
A stolen engine costs $12,000 to $20,000 to replace. Officials say about 200 items have been stolen at sea from town residents since 2018, a sharp increase from previous years.
Briones noted that fishermen earn less and pay their crews less when extorted.
“People are bankrupt and don’t know how to recover from losing the engines that were their source of livelihood,” he said. “People have lost their boats, people have lost it all and are badly damaged, suffering psychologically and being treated very badly.
“We do what we can with what we have.”
Oswaldo Angulo noticed that many fishermen were leaving for the United States. He works on large industrial ships – unlike the smaller ships used by many of his relatives and neighbors, and pays for their vacations to operate them themselves – and is relatively untroubled by violence. But his crews have limited their month-long trips to the early evening hours, the best time to avoid the increasing presence of bandits searching for victims near shore.
Anthony Angulo is part of Ecuador’s largest migration wave in modern history, surpassing two major waves in the early 2000s to the United States and Europe due to the economic crisis. At the time, the area around San Mateo was the epicenter, with fishermen packing migrants onto boats for Guatemala and Mexico.
Since January 2021, the U.S. Border Patrol has arrested Ecuadorians about 350,000 times. During that period, Panama recorded more than 100,000 Ecuadorians passing through Darren gapa bumpy road 60 miles (96 kilometers) long. Expansion of the forestLoaded with snakes, scorpions and Other risks.
Migrants who pass through the Darien River are often among the poorest, and it can cost them a few hundred dollars to cover transportation and other expenses.
Others buy a round-trip plane ticket to El Salvador and pay $90 for a passport to skip the jungle. Smugglers charge several thousand dollars to reach the United States from El Salvador.
Anthony Angulo was among the latter group.
He came to the United States after that Crossing the Rio Grande (Brownsville, Texas). He surrendered to border agents and spent three months in prisons in Georgia and Mississippi. He was released with a court date set to pursue asylum – in December 2027.
Anthony lives with a friend in Bayonne, New Jersey, while working at a factory that makes snack products. Sends money from paychecks home.
His mother, Maribel Montenegro, 54, sends him food from San Mateo so he can get a taste of home.
She is relieved to have Anthony near his younger brother. Marlon is imprisoned in neighboring Pennsylvania, is scheduled for early release in December 2026, and will likely be deported. Anthony hadn’t seen him in years and said he was looking forward to visiting him there for the first time.
For Anthony, prison was a time of reflection. Perhaps he realized that he did not fully appreciate his life in Ecuador. He said he would like to return when it is safer.
But when will that be? No one in his family or San Mateo could tell.
“I can’t go back to Ecuador until things get better,” he said.
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This story was supported by funding from the Walton Family Foundation. AP is solely responsible for all content.
