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By Karen Branch-Brioso
The Tampa Tribune

Video: Cubans Found On Longboat Key | Video: Witness Interview

TAMPA - The group of 26 Cuban refugees who landed on Longboat Key set a new record for the northern-most “dry-foot” landing of sea-faring refugees who made it to U.S. soil on Florida’s West Coast, according to police and federal officials.

“The Coast Guard had said first thing this morning, that we had the record now of being about 70 miles north of the northernmost dry-foot landing,” said Deputy Chief Martin Sharkey of the Longboat Key Police Department, which responded just after 5 a.m. Monday when a passerby reported seeing the group ashore in Manatee County.

Steve McDonald, agent in charge of the U.S. Border Patrol station in Tampa – where the refugees were taken for processing – confirmed that it was “the furthest north landing that I’m aware of.”

Prior to that, McDonald said, the northernmost landing was at Venice on Florida’s West coast in the mid-1990s.

McDonald said this group left Cuba around midnight Friday in a 30-foot boat with in-board motors and a center console. The smuggler dropped them off in the surf near Longboat Key about 4:30 a.m. Monday, according to interviews with the refugees who told federal officials they were “paying for a trip to Florida.”

The Cubans told officials that the smuggler dropped them off in the water so the boat “didn’t have to come too close to shore, which can be dangerous,” McDonald said. “We had several people die on the East Coast because of that issue.”

Around 5 a.m., a passerby spotted the group of 19 men and seven women – ranging in age from 19 to 59. The Longboat police arrived and contacted federal officials. The Coast Guard is searching for the smuggler’s boat.

The refugees, who said they hadn’t been offered food or water during the trip, were sunburned and showed signs of dehydration.

Reporters were able to briefly interview one of the refugees this morning.

Emilia Zenaida Vazquez Sevilla, who said she goes by the name Susana, said the group left Cuba on Friday. They last ate on Wednesday.

Vazquez Sevilla, 53, said she is from Havana.

She said the journey was arduous. “The ocean was very rough.”

She said she felt “physically destroyed when she arrived.” But it didn’t take long for the group to get the first taste of U.S. hospitality.

Officials rushed to give the group medical attention, blankets, water, clothing and “very good snacks,” Vazquez Sevilla said.

“We’re very grateful for the way we’ve been treated,” she said.

Under the Cuban Adjustment Act, the refugees would qualify to apply for permanent residency here – unless they have a criminal history. The Tampa office of the Border Patrol was running the background checks and interviewing the refugees. If they clear the background checks, they’ll be taken to Miami for health screening and released.

Had the group been interdicted at sea, they would have been returned to Cuba under the “wet-foot, dry-foot” policy adopted 11 years ago as a revision to the Cuban Adjustment Act. Refugees who make it to land get to apply for legal permanent residency.

Reporter Karen Branch-Brioso can be reached at (813) 259-7815 or at kbranch-brioso@tampatrib.com.

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