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Mexican cartels have set up stash houses across the border in the United States where they are holding migrants hostage, threatening them and shaking them down for money, according to a new video from Project Veritas.
Project Veritas met with 18-year-old Eduin and his aunt Kenya who described in detail their story of survival and escape from one of these "stash houses" in San Antonio, Texas.
"Why don't you tell me your journey here from Honduras?" asked Project Veritas' RC Maxwell.
"I was seventeen when I got here to the US," he began, "so, in the journey it was very difficult."
After paying $1,500 to get across the border, he said he called his aunt who gave him a number of someone who could help him.
Eduin was traveling by train when he was told by his travel companions that there was an immigration checkpoint up ahead and that he must avoid.
After jumping off the train, a WhatsApp message told him to look for some men with a car, who told him they were taking him to a secure location. This secure location ended up being a stash house.
He was locked in a room with other migrants while the men led people out one by one.
They told him that they were part of a cartel dedicated to kidnapping people, insisting that he had to pay them "the amount they asked for and if I or my family didn't pay I would have a bad time."
"They treated us very poorly," he said. They gave us bread and one bottle of water."
Eduin's aunt was contacted by the cartel and asked to pay $4,000, which she didnt have. She was told that "if I didn't pay the money that I should forget about ever seeing my family again."
Eduin eventually managed to escape, asking for his phone back from the kidnappers and then using the first opportunity he had to run.
"I ran so much. They followed me but they couldn't catch me because I was already ahead of them," he said.
Eduin hid in a BBQ pit and contacted his aunt, who immediately called San Antonio police who took him to safety.
Estimates show that as many as 47,000 migrants are due to flood the border on Wednesday.
