John Doe
Aug 17
Join us for a special screening of Missing in Brook County, a documentary which offers an in-depth narrative on the nation's silent mass disaster in South Texas and the work of humanitarians and scientists to reunite the missing individuals with their families.
Saturday, April 1, 2023
Missing in Brooks County closely follows the physical and emotional journeys of two families searching for loved ones who have gone missing in Brooks County, Texas, roughly 80 miles north of the US/Mexico border and home to one of the busiest checkpoints in the US. Since the adoption of Prevention Through Deterrence in 1994, there has been a surge in undocumented migrants deaths often attributed to dehydration and heat exhaustion - a result of having to travel greater distances through hazardous terrain to circumvent checkpoints and detection. The film also weaves together the perspective of humanitarian workers, border patrol agents, ranchers, and pioneering anthropologists who are helping to identify remains and provide information for families.
The event will begin with a brief introduction from the museum and the filmmakers, followed by an English language screening of the film with Spanish subtitles. Afterwards, there will be a discussion with those involved in the film: Eddie Canales of the South Texas Human Rights Center, Texas State University anthropologist Kate Spradley, Michelle Chinos, and Omar Roman who will reflect on their experiences around migration and the southern border since the making of the film. Information will also be made available on local organizations that provide immigration services and how climate change is being recognized as a leading cause of displacement and migration.
Admission is free and event registration is encouraged for our planning purposes.
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About the Participants:
Eddie Canales is a retired union organizer who came out of retirement to open the modest South Texas Human Rights Center to deal with the missing migrant crisis. Canales is the only humanitarian help available in Brooks County, and his phone never stops ringing with families desperate to find their missing loved ones.
Michelle Chinos and Omar Roman have returned to Brooks County to find out what happened to Omar's brother, who went missing after fleeing from Border Patrol.
Dr. Kate Spradley is a biological anthropologist at Texas State University. With her team of graduate students and colleague Krista Latham, Kate is trying to process the scores of bodies which were recently found buried in mass graves in Brooks County.
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About the Filmmakers:
Jeff Bemiss (Co-Director, Producer) is an award-winning, Oscar-shortlisted writer/director who has worked in shorts, features and documentaries. His work has aired on network television and PBS. He is a graduate of the University of Southern California film school and the L.A. Sanford Meisner Academy. Jeff is a Connecticut Artist Fellow and a Film Independent Fast Track Fellow. He freelances for disability and social activist clients and has taught film at Trinity College in Hartford, CT.
Lisa Molomot (Co-Director, Producer) has directed and edited documentaries about the American Southwest in recent years including Precious Knowledge, The Cleaners, and Soledad. She has also focused on stories about education. Her hugely popular film School's Out has been an integral part of the movement for providing outdoor education for young children, and her recent short film Teaching in Arizona is an inside look at the teaching crisis in that state.
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Climate Change and Migration
As the climate crisis worsens and accelerates, researchers expect unprecedented migration of humans and non-humans from de-stabilized environments to more resilient places. Increasingly, climate change - in the form of powerful storms and record droughts - is being recognized as a leading cause of displacement and migration, especially for those who rely on the land to survive. In Honduras, for example, repeated hurricanes are forcing families with nothing left to flee. But industrial flows also interact with local ecologies to create unliveable situations, as the red tides which impact fishing communities in the Gulf of Mexico demonstrate.
Registration is encouraged.
Missing in Brooks County
Film Screening and Conversation
Saturday, April 1, 2023, 4:30 - 7:30 PM
Houston Climate Justice Museum
3308 Garrow St.
Houston, TX 77003
To attend the event in-person, register for tickets here.
