Report finds pattern of sexual violence among accused Arizona Border Patrol agents

Abduction and sexual assault of a minor, child sex trafficking and fraud, child molestation and sexual exploitation of minors.

These are just some of the crimes U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) agents in Arizona have been convicted of, according to a new report by the Ohio Immigrant Alliance (OIA).

The report found 59 documented criminal cases involving Department of Homeland Security (DHS) employees across the country, with ten cases involving Arizona Border Patrol agents, the second highest following Texas, which involved 20 federal officials. 

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“These are not isolated incidents. Fifty-nine documented cases — 50 of them sex crimes, 35 against children — represent a systemic pattern within the agencies tasked with upholding the law,” the report states. “The data reveals officers who used their badges to prey on the vulnerable; an agency that hired known sex offenders; serial killers and rapists who wore the uniform; family members who lived in terror; and a system that too often looked the other way.”

And the issue is only getting worse. According to the report, cases documented in 2025 and 2026 account for 42% of the entire list, with 13 and 12 cases logged respectively. The analysis reveals a pattern of sexual violence, crimes against children and abuse of authority, the report states. 

As the Trump Administration continues to ramp up immigration enforcement efforts, federal immigration agents are being hired at unprecedented rates with faster hiring processes and fewer background checks. In January, the Trump administration touted a 120% increase in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) personnel, “hiring more than 12,000 officers and agents in less than a year” to support enforcement operations.

At the same time, internal oversight bodies are being dismantled. The result is a system where violence and abuse go unchecked and are perpetuated in one of the country’s largest law enforcement agencies.

According to one woman who previously worked for the department and dealt with sexual abuse within the CBP’s ranks, the report is unsurprising and highlights rampant rape culture and abuse of power that often goes unreported and unchecked.

Eight out of 10 cases in Arizona involve minors

Of the 10 cases involving Arizona agents detailed in the report, eight involved sexual abuse against minors.

These include the case of Ramon Marquez, a CBP agent who led the Border Patrol Law Enforcement Explorer Program — a youth initiative — and is being charged with 15 counts, including sexual intercourse, oral sexual conduct and sexual exploitation of a minor who is 16 years old and Dana Ray Thornhill, who was charged and sentenced to 40 years in prison in 2020 for child molestation and sexual exploitation of minors. During a four-hour standoff where Thornhill barricaded himself in a church, detectives learned of two other sexual abuse allegations that occurred between 1995 and 2007.

You can see the full list of documented cases OIA has collected from across the country here.

The Department of Homeland Security’s culture of sexual violence

Dozens of federal immigration agents have been arrested—and in some cases, convicted—of crim…

CALÓ News reached out to DHS for a statement and to obtain further information regarding recruitment and screening processes.

“The ICE Office of Professional Responsibility diligently applies the proper personnel vetting regulations, including guidelines for national security, and evaluates all available information for every applicant based on these factors,” said a DHS spokesperson in an email. “We take allegations regarding misconduct seriously and cherish the public’s trust. We work tirelessly to uphold the rule of law and hold ourselves accountable.”

The “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” signed in July 2025, allocated $4.1 billion to hire more CBP agents and to add 10,000 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents — a number the agency doubled to 22,000 early this year. 

The CBP hiring process includes medical, fitness, and drug tests, interviews, an entrance exam, a background check and a polygraph exam, according to CBP’s most up-to-date information. 

Currently, the CBP offers a $20,000 recruitment incentive — $10,000 paid upon successful completion of the academy and the other $10,000 awarded for accepting a prioritized location. Newly appointed agents can then apply for $40,000 in retention incentives for the next four years, the recruiting website states. 

To meet the administration’s ICE quota, the agency removed all age requirements, cut its training program length in half and offered student loan forgiveness. 

At the same time, the administration downsized three internal oversight bodies within DHS that deal with civil rights and liberties and serve as independent watchdogs for concerns about misconduct in immigration detention facilities. Last March, DHS delivered Reduction in Force notices to the three agencies — something which organizations like the Kino Border Initiative in Nogales have stated has had detrimental impacts on their reporting of abuse cases.

More than just sexual harassment, other non-partisan organizations like the American Civil Liberties Union have released a report reviewing over 1,200 incidents of immigration enforcement where they found patterns of misconduct including physical force, threatened force, deployment of chemical irritants and forceful arrests.

Their report also points to a culture of “abuse and broken accountability," and states that these abuses are a blueprint for expanding authoritarian rule in the U.S.

A 2017 report from the non-profit American Immigration Council also documents the lack of disciplinary actions taken against Border Patrol agents’ misconduct, which ranged from beatings, sexual assaults, denial of medical care and theft.

A woman’s experience as a Border Patrol agent 

Jenn Budd worked in Border Patrol for nearly six years and is the author of “Against the Wall: My Journey From Border Patrol Agent to Immigrant Rights Activist,” a book that details her experience in the agency as a lesbian woman. The book tells the story of her own rape and how it exists within a broader, unchecked rape culture within the agency — not just against female Border Patrol agents, but migrants and within agents’ own families as well. 

“You cannot exist in that agency and not know this is going on, that's how robust it is,” Budd said in an interview with CALÓ News. “It's not to say that there maybe aren't people with good intentions, but you know, when you get in there, you got to cover that shit up if you want to stay there because if you don't, then they start targeting you.”

She remembers being in training at the academy and being told by another woman who was graduating, “‘You're either going to be asked in this academy to voluntarily give it up or it's going to be taken from you. That's your choice. That's your only choice.’”

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She added that while not every single woman encounters “full-on rape,” they definitely encounter some form of sexual harassment. 

“The agency encourages and condones sexual violence against their own female agents, and the union does not protect us when our abuser is a male agent who's also a member of the union,” she said. “They encourage it, they condone it, they look the other way. And the sexual abuse and assault, if they're doing that to their own, what the f**k do you think they're doing to the migrants? What the f**k do you think they're doing to their own children?” 

She resigned in 2001 in protest of the “rampant corruption and brutality” she witnessed and has gone on to help uncover Border Patrol’s rape culture and abuse of power. She has a Substack where she writes specifically about Border Patrol Rape Culture. 

Already, the number of rape allegations that get reported and convicted are low, but those numbers are even lower within these agencies that are tasked with upholding the law with integrity, one of the agency’s core values. 

“Honor first in the Border Patrol means honor to the green uniform,” Budd said. “It means shut your mouth. It means you don't ever frickin’ talk about it.” 

The OIA report did not surprise Budd and, according to her, is just one of dozens of reports that all say the same thing about the federal immigration agencies: that they abuse their power and are protected by a culture that fails to reprimand immoral behavior and illegal actions.

Susan Barnett is an independent journalist in southern Arizona covering the immigrant and Latine community. She is a recent graduate from the University of Arizona, where she received her Master of Arts in Bilingual Journalism. She previously worked at La Estrella de Tucson and co-founded Tucson Spotlight.