THE NEW YORK TIMES

MEMPHIS — Nearly 1,500 miles from his post at the Mexican border, Cyril V. Atherton, a Border Patrol agent, embarked on one of his trickiest missions.

He was here recruiting young blacks to an agency few had ever heard of, trying to entice them to the hot, arid Southwest, where few blacks live, for a job that requires learning Spanish proficient enough to know if their lives are in danger while arresting as many as 100 people at a time.

The team is part of a blitz by the Border Patrol to bring its ranks up to 18,000 agents by the end of the year.

With 16,200 agents, the Border Patrol is the largest federal law enforcement agency. But only about 1 percent of its agents are black, and the agency is moving aggressively to recruit members of a group that officials acknowledge have often been overlooked or been difficult to attract and keep because of the lack of blacks in the agency and in the border towns where they work.

READ MORE: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/23/us/23border.html?_r=1&hp=&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&adxnnlx=1214219674-3meWPjZ6IgxcSnx8rkJKpA

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