Free Republic

A teenage boy pleaded guilty in federal court Friday to fatally shooting Border Patrol Agent Robert Rosas during a robbery attempt at the U.S.-Mexico border. Christian Daniel Castro-Alvarez, 17, admitted to illegally crossing into the United States near Campo with a group of others July 23 and luring Rosas from his patrol vehicle to rob him, according to the plea agreement.

Within minutes, six-year-old Rubjit Thindal went from happily chatting in the back seat of the car to collapsing and dying in her father's arms. "If we had known it was so serious, we would have called 911,'' Kuldip Thindal, Rubjit's distraught mother, said in Punjabi yesterday. "She just had a stomach ache -- she wasn't even crying.'' Rubjit was pronounced dead at hospital barely 24 hours after showing signs of a fever. Later, doctors told her parents she had the H1N1 influenza virus. She is believed to be the youngest person in Canada with the virus to have died.

Five police officers were killed yesterday in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico in a two separate incidents. In the first attack, two officers were killed while on patrol. Witnesses say gunmen killed one officer in his vehicle and the other as he tried to escape. In the second attack, four police officers were shot at while filling up their vehicles at a gas station. Two died on the scene, another died at a local hospital, and the fourth officer is being treated for his injuries. The total number of police officers killed to 47 this year, making it one of the most...

Note: The following text is a quote: Dallas Resident Uriel Palacios Sentenced to 30 Years in Federal Prison for His Role in Cocaine Trafficking and Money Laundering Conspiracy Related to Mexico's Gulf Cartel DALLAS—Uriel Palacios, 23, of Dallas, was sentenced this morning by Chief U.S. District Judge Sidney A. Fitzwater to 360 months (30 years) in federal prison, announced U.S. Attorney James T. Jacks of the Northern District of Texas. Palacios pleaded guilty in June to one count of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute and to distribute more than five kilograms of cocaine and one count of conspiracy...

Few issues have caused as much of a stir this year as the question of whether illegal immigrants will be included in the Democratic healthcare bill. Rep. Joe Wilson's "You lie!" outburst after President Obama stated in September that illegal immigrants wouldn't be covered is one example of the tension. Eighty percent of Americans are loath to subsidize illegal immigrants according to a June 2009 Rasmussen poll. But there's something that might help solve part of the problem, a campaign by Mexican officials to improve the state of healthcare in their own country. Mexico's healthcare system is corrupt, unwieldy, and...

A federal judge in Pittsburgh on Tuesday sentenced an illegal immigrant to time served in jail for his 10th illegal entry into the country. Uziel Jesus Lopez-Jiminez, 28, of Mexico has been deported nine other times between 1998 and 2007, prosecutors said. He was last deported in March, re-entered the country in May or June and was arrested in Beaver County on Aug. 16.

A story was just released by 10News.com that really upset me. It concerns "a desolate corner of San Diego County" that is "so dangerous 10News crews had to put on bulletproof vests before entering the area." "The violence in this area is so bad that a 12-year-old was raped to death." This kind of news make me sick. It makes me angry. And makes me wonder what can we do to stop it. News10 reports "They're ruthless; they'll come over here, they'll pick one out that they want, they drag her off onto the rocks, they'll rape her and they...

From a group calling themselves Electronic Civil Disobedience comes the Transborder Immigrant Tool, a simple mobile application intended to aid and abet border-crossers from Mexico to the United States by mapping the safest routes to take. This GPS app is built to work on the cheapest cell phones available. It brings to mind every petty-but-illegal transgression the casual user could commit and stretches the boundaries of the permissibility of tech's uses for plausibly illegal means. The next time you use P2P or bit torrent clients to download media or use an iPhone app to detect police radars, think about this...

HOUSTON — The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has refused to allow additional DNA testing requested by a Mexican national condemned for the gruesome killing of a 16-year-old girl in San Antonio. Thirty-six-year-old Humberto Leal, from Monterrey, Mexico, wanted more testing to try to clear him of the May 1994 bludgeoning death of Adria Sauceda. Her body was found on a dirt road not far from a party they both attended.

<p>The former head of U.S. Customs and Border Protection called Monday for the U.S. to reinstitute the ban on assault weapons and take other measures to rein in the war between Mexico and its drug cartels, saying the violence has the potential to bring down legitimate rule in that country.</p>

EL PASO, Texas -- The widespread violence in Juarez is affecting a lot of things in El Paso, including the UTEP athletic program. The basis of UTEP's athletic teams are formed by recruiting student-athletes from across the state and country to study and play in El Paso. And now many of them, especially their parents, are now expressing concern about what is going on across the border. UTEP's campus is located just a few football fields away from Juarez, where thousands have been murdered this year, and that is not easy to hide. "I just recruited a girl from Sweden...

MANAGUA – An arsenal of military weaponry seized over the weekend in the province of Matagalpa belonged to a cell of Mexico’s Sinaloa drug cartel, Nicaraguan authorities said Monday. The National Police said Monday in a communique that the arsenal – including 58 assault rifles, two mortars, 10 grenades, 30 sticks of TNT and 19,236 rounds of ammunition – “were being transported by members of the Sinaloa cartel” in a pickup truck with Nicaraguan plates. The shipment of arms, ammo and explosives was confiscated on Sunday in a joint operation involving the police and the army, the statement said. The...

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico, Nov. 17 (UPI) -- A 7-year-old Texas boy and his father were shot to death in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, authorities said Tuesday. A spokesman for the Chihuahua state attorney general's office told CNN Raul Xazziel Ramirez of El Paso was shot in the back after he apparently crawled out their sport utility vehicle's window after shooting erupted Friday evening. His father, Raul Ramirez Alvarado, 35, was found dead behind the wheel, the U.S. news network said. At least 18 9mm shots were fired at the Geo Tracker, spokesman Arturo Sandoval said. No arrests had been made, the...

El Universal (Mexico City) 11/13/09 UN idea rejected A number of business organizations in Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua, have called for a United Nations peace force to come to their city to quell the violence of narco-traffic and other organized crime activities, but President Calderón today rejected that possibility or any other involving foreign intervention. In his statement, Calderón said, “Clearly, it is not a case that requires it. Mexico would not accept the presence or any foreign intervention in the country, for these are matters of internal security.” —- Another tunnel found in Baja California An anonymous tip to Baja...

During the best of the times, Miguel Salcedo’s son, an illegal immigrant in San Diego, would be sending home hundreds of dollars a month to support his struggling family in Mexico. But at times like these, with the American economy out of whack and his son out of work, Mr. Salcedo finds himself doing what he never imagined he would have to do: wiring pesos north. ==snip== Still, poverty is a relative concept. It is easier to get by on little in Mexico, especially in rural areas, allowing the poor to help the even more precarious.

In the battle on the U.S.-Mexico border, the fight against illegal immigration often loses out to environmental laws that have blocked construction of parts of the "virtual fence" and that threaten to create places where agents can't easily track illegal immigrants. Documents obtained by Rep. Rob Bishop and shared with The Washington Times show National Park Service staffers have tried to stop the U.S. Border Patrol from placing some towers associated with the virtual fence, known as the Secure Border Initiative or SBInet, on wilderness lands in parks along the border. In a remarkably candid letter to members of Congress,...

he fence was sabotaged a few days ago with a pole removed near the place of the assassination of Agent Rosas. This is usually an indication of an impending drug smuggling. The fence was repaired, and the Border Patrol remains on heightened alert with increased patrols, scope trucks and a Border Patrol vehicle at Kingfish's high point. Gadget Dan reports we have completed (in November), our 40Th. month for litter removal. Over the past 40 months, we have removed over 42,000 pounds of litter from public lands. Monthly totals for litter removal have ranged from 700 pounds in earlier months,...

A total of 15 people were killed in separate incidents in Juarez Friday. State prosecutor's spokesman Arturo Sandoval said a university professor, three women and a 7-year-old boy were among those who were killed.

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Obama administration has met many of the border security benchmarks Congress set in 2007 as a prerequisite to immigration reform and now it's time to change the law, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said Friday. Napolitano, designated by President Barack Obama to lead the administration's immigration reform efforts, said many members of Congress had said they could support immigration reform, but only after border security improved, Napolitano said. "Fast forward to today, and many of the benchmarks these members of Congress set in 2007 have been met," she said in a speech to the Center for...

Consulting firm AlixPartners has found Mexico to be the cheapest place in the world to manufacture products for the U.S. market. India comes in second, while China and Brazil are the third and fourth cheapest places. This isn't news for some Chinese companies, who have been setting up manufacturing capacity in Mexico for years as a way to reduce their production costs. It's important to remember that costs, even wages, have been rising rapidly in China over the years. Combined with transportation and other factors, it all eventually adds up and apparently has. Moreover, Mexico's competitive position vs. China is...

Group also wants overhaul of Mexican border agencies A binational task force on U.S.-Mexico border issues will call Friday on the Obama administration and Congress to reinstate an expired ban on assault weapons and for Mexico to overhaul its frontier police and customs agencies to mirror the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The recommendations are among a broad set of security, trade, development and environmental proposals that come as President Obama and his Mexicans counterpart, Felipe Calderón, move to deepen engagement on issues including economic recovery, climate change, illegal immigration and narcotics trafficking. Robert C. Bonner, the U.S. co-chairman of...

Perry: Obama 'hell-bent' on socialism By: Andy Barr November 11, 2009 07:08 PM EST Texas GOP Gov. Rick Perry accused President Barack Obama on Wednesday of “punishing” Texas and being “hell-bent” on turning the United States into a socialist country. Speaking at a luncheon for a Midland County Republican Women’s group, Perry said that “this is an administration hell-bent toward taking American towards a socialist country. And we all don’t need to be afraid to say that because that’s what it is.” Perry praised the tea party movement to the Republican activists in attendance, crediting the grassroots groups with discouraging...

MEXICO CITY (November 12, 2009)--Some business groups in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, are calling on the United Nations to send peacekeepers to quell the drug-related violence. Groups representing maquiladora plants, retailers and other businesses said yesterday they'll submit a request to the Mexican government and the Inter American Human Rights Commission. The Mexican government has sent more than 5,000 soldiers to the city across the border from El Paso, but killings, extortions and kidnappings continue. Ciudad Juarez has had 1,986 homicides through mid-October this year - averaging seven a day in the city of 1.5 million people. Soledad Maynez with the...

The Atlantic Foreign Affairs December 2009 In the almost three years since President Felipe Calderón launched a war on drug cartels, border towns in Mexico have turned into halls of mirrors where no one knows who is on which side or what chance remark could get you murdered. Some 14,000 people have been killed in that time, the worst carnage since the Mexican Revolution, and part of the country is effectively under martial law. Is this evidence of a creeping coup by the military? A war between drug cartels? Between the president and his opposition? Or just collateral damage from...

El Financiero (Mexico City) 11/7/09 Mexico and US working together as never before: Napolitano In an interview with the Spanish daily El Pais, US Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano said that the US and Mexico have, at this time, the best cooperation in working jointly against narcotraffic. ”We work very closely with President Calderon and his government and there cannot be more agreement in that there is enormous interest by the US in defeating the cartels,” she said. ”For us, it is a matter of national security in that these organizations should introduce drugs in hundreds of communities,” she...

This presentation presents information obtained from a National Park Study and a Department of Interior Threat Assessment report about the devastating impacts of designated federal Wilderness on our country's southern border: http://www.peopleforwesternheritage.com/PFPOWH_WildernessOnTheBorder/Presentation_Files/index.html According to Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, "Law enforcement work in the National Park Service is the most dangerous in federal service. National Park Service officers are 12 times more likely to be killed or injured as a result of an assault than FBI agents. Overall, NPS law enforcement has a morbidity rate triple that of the next worst federal agency."

MONTERREY, Mexico — When soldiers tried to halt a suspicious-looking SUV that was being escorted through Monterrey by a state policeman, the officer radioed for backup. In minutes, police from 40 patrol cars surrounded the troops, drawing their guns and sending the soldiers diving for cover in an hour-long standoff. Confrontations like that are happening with increasing frequency in Mexico's wealthiest city as soldiers fight corrupt police officers helping drug cartels — in addition to taking on the drug dealers themselves. This year alone, police and soldiers have confronted one another more than 65 times, The Associated Press has learned...

McALLEN(Texas) — Immigration advocates shouted support for health care reform Monday afternoon as Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison was ushered away from the airport during a campaign stop in the Rio Grande Valley. As health care reform takes center stage in the U.S. Senate, the shouting over one divisive and complicated issue won’t stop soon. Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are grappling with how to handle illegal immigrants — an issue, along with abortion, that at times threatened to derail reform efforts in the House — in the health care bill. While both chambers seem to agree that taxpayers shouldn’t subsidize health...

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico - A gang of gunmen killed an off-duty U.S. airman and five other people early today at a bar in the Mexican border city of Ciudad Juarez. Authorities say four other men were killed outside an elementary school in another part of town. That raises to 30 the number of homicides in Ciudad Juarez in just four days. There was no immediate information on a motive for the early morning attack at the Amadeus bar, which also left a seventh person wounded. But Arturo Sandoval, a spokesman for prosecutors in northern Chihuahua state, says the methods bore...

In the story making the rounds here in Mexico's drug capital, the setting is a beauty parlor. A woman with wealth obtained legally openly criticizes a younger patron who is married to a trafficker. The "narco-wife" orders the hairdresser to shave the first woman's head. Terrified, the hairdresser complies. Urban legend or real? It almost doesn't matter; it's the sort of widely repeated account that both intimidates and titillates. And it highlights a disturbing trend: As drug violence seeps deeper into Mexican society, women are taking a more hands-on role. In growing numbers, they are being recruited into the ranks...

CIUDAD JUÁREZ, Mexico – Gunmen killed a police commander Friday here in Mexico's deadliest city, across the border from El Paso. He was the second senior police official gunned down in northern Mexico in recent days. Noel Martínez, a former military officer who was a district supervisor for the police in Ciudad Juárez, was shot inside his car Friday morning, police spokesman Jacinto Segura said. The city is caught in a turf war between rival drug cartels. Drug violence has killed more than 2,000 people in Juárez this year. In the northern town of García, outside Monterrey, five police officers...

Wanna buy a baby for a-thousand bucks? Three doctors and a nurse have been arrested for allegedly selling newborns after telling mothers their babies had died, at a private hospital in Mexico City, authorities said Wednesday. Police uncovered the scheme after one of the women learned her baby was alive and had been sold to another woman for 15,000 pesos, $1,130 in US dollars, said Luis Genaro, the capital's deputy attorney general. The woman gave birth to a girl in a working-class district in October 2008, Genaro said at a news conference. He said she told authorities she heard her...

GARCIA, Mexico - A Mexican police chief has been murdered after being on the job for only five days. Brig. Gen. Juan Arturo Esparza is the latest officer suspected of being killed by a drug cartel. He was the police chief of Garcia, a town outside Monterrey. Esparza was on his way to confront drug cartel members who were threatening the city's mayor. Officials say the suspects opened fire on the police chief's car. The chief, two former soldiers, and two police officers were all killed. Five police officers and five other suspects were arrested and are behind bars at...

In a stunning example of history repeating itself, an invasion of Chinese illegal immigrants is underway in the American Southwest and the authorities are doing everything they can to stop it. In the Nogales Sector of Arizona, 78 Chinese nationals were apprehended while trying to enter the US illegally through Mexico in October of this year alone. Between October 2008 and the end of August 2009, the Tucson Sector arrested 261 Chinese nationals according to Patrol Agent Colleen Agle. In the previous year only 30 had been captured. That is an 1100% increase in one year for Arizona. Texas has...

Amid Rising Violence, Mexicans Fight Back Government Efforts to Control Drug Turf Wars Aren't Enough, Some Say; Mayor Promises to 'Clean Up' Organized Crime By DAVID LUHNOW and JOSÉ DE CÓRDOBA MEXICO CITY -- Mexico's war on drugs took a grim twist this week, as a prominent mayor said he had created an undercover group of operatives to "clean up" criminal elements -- even if it had to act outside the law. Underscoring why the mayor may have felt compelled to take such steps, the new police chief in a neighboring town, a retired brigadier general, was shot and killed...

The bed of artefacts in the state of Sonora in northwest Mexico also includes the bones of an extinct cousin of the mastodon called a gomphothere. The beast was probably hunted and killed by the Clovis people, known for their distinctive spear points, who mysteriously disappeared within about 500 years of leaving their first archeological traces. Intact Clovis camp sites and extensive evidence of hunting has been found across the United States, with the highest concentration of sites just north of the Mexican border, in the San Pedro River basin of southeastern Arizona. But relatively little is known about their...

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico (Reuters) – Gunmen with automatic weapons burst into a Mexican strip club on the U.S. border, opened fire on patrons and killed six people including an American soldier, the army said on Wednesday. The hooded gunmen stormed into the bar in Ciudad Juarez as strippers were dancing for customers, sought out the six men and shot them each several times. A 26-year-old off-duty U.S. soldier who had crossed over from El Paso, Texas, was among the dead, army spokesman Enrique Torres said. "It appears drugs were being sold at the place," Torres said of the strip joint....

MEXICO CITY -- Mauricio Fernandez couldn't have been happier. Here he was, being sworn in again as mayor of one of northern Mexico's most exclusive communities, and he had wonderful news to share: "Black Saldana, who apparently is the one who was asking for my head, was found dead today in Mexico City," he told his cheering supporters Saturday in San Pedro Garza Garcia, near Monterrey. The problem was that the barefoot, blindfolded corpse of "Black Saldana" -- whose real first name is Hector -- wasn't found for another 3½ hours, according to Mexico City prosecutors. And he wouldn't be...

Mauricio Fernandez was being sworn in again as mayor of San Pedro Garza Garcia, one of northern Mexico's most exclusive communities, when he announced to his cheering supporters: "Black Saldana, who apparently is the one who was asking for my head, was found dead today in Mexico City." However, speculation that Mr Fernandez might have had something to do with the death of Hector Saldana arose when it emerged that the barefoot, blindfolded corpse of "Black Saldana" had not been found until three and a half hours after the mayor's speech, according to Mexico City prosecutors. The body - which...

MEXICO CITY — The leader of a Mexican farmworkers' organization and 14 other people were killed in a mass shooting in the northern Mexico state of Sonora... Sonora prosecutors' spokesman Jose Larrinaga said the victims include farm leader Margarito Montes, 10 other men, one woman and three minors. Most were believed to be Montes' relatives or employees. Larrinaga said the victims' bullet-ridden bodies were found on a roadside near a farm Friday. The killers apparently used assault rifles, the sort of weapon favored by Mexico's drug gangs.... Montes was the leader of the General Popular Union of Workers and Farmers,...

A group of illegal immigrants from two East African nations and and two Asian nations are expected to face a federal judge Monday morning. Border Patrol agents caught the eight immigrants near Brownsville over the Halloween weekend. Court records show Border Patrol agents caught three Eritrean immigrants after they allegedly crossed the Rio Grande on Friday. Another group of immigrants from Nepal, China and Ethiopia was caught early Sunday morning after they waded across the Rio Grande late Saturday night. Court records identified the immigrants as: Goitom Messazgi-Araya (Eritrea) Tedros Ghide-Ketema (Eritrea) Merhawi Zemichael-Gebremedhn (Eritrea) Salikram Bishwokarma (Nepal) Yu Gao...

MEXICO CITY – A news reporter who wrote about violent drug crimes has been strangled in the northern Mexican state of Durango, authorities said Tuesday. El Tiempo de Durango journalist Jose Bladimir Antuna was kidnapped Monday morning, said Ruben Lopez, spokesman for the state Attorney General's Office. Authorities found his body that night in a vacant lot in the state capital, about 400 miles southwest of Laredo, Texas. State authorities are investigating the murder. Lopez would not specify whether they suspected connections with organized crime. But Antuna had told his colleagues at the newspaper that he had received multiple telephone...

Note: The following text is a quote: Three Louisiana individuals sentenced for transporting illegal aliens Defendants Part of Large Scale Operation to Transport Illegal Aliens LAKE CHARLES, La. - Members of a large scale illegal alien transportation operation based in Sulphur, La., were sentenced in federal court yesterday following an investigation by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents. U. S. District Judge Patricia Minaldi sentenced Carolyn Joyce Metcalf, 62, to 30 months in prison, followed by three years supervised release; Terri Lynn Fields, 41, to 27 months in prison, followed by three years supervised release; and Jean Morgan Vincent,...

“To explore, enjoy, and protect the planet. To practice and promote the responsible use of the Earth’s ecosystems and resources; to educate and enlist humanity to protect and restore the quality of the natural and human environment; and to use all lawful means to carry out those objectives.” — Sierra Club mission statement. Strategic Ignorance: Why the Bush Administration Is Recklessly Destroying a Century of Environmental Progress — 2004 book by Sierra Club Executive Director Carl Pope. “The raging monster upon the land is population growth. In its presence, sustainability is but a fragile theoretical concept.” – Edward O. Wilson,...

A record 100 alleged murderers and sex and drug offenders have been extradited this year from Mexico to the United States, where they are to stand trial. AFP - Mexico has extradited a record 100 alleged murderers, sex and drug offenders to face trial in the United States this year, the US Department of Justice said Sunday. The arrival of 11 more fugitives north of the US-Mexican border this weekend to face a range of charges in six states brought the overall count to "the highest yearly number of extraditions from Mexico to date," a statement said. "The defendants are...

Are there any freepers currently retired in Mexico who could offer advice on how to retire in Mexico at age 52? excerpt from interesting blog: The Horrible Shortness of Life I'm not going to dwell on this because I prefer positive thoughts, but how much more life have you got? Of course no one knows exactly, but let's say you make it through to your early seventies in good health, how far off is that? How many years? How much retirement is that going to give you? When you are working, the weeks fly past, the months and years vanish....

(See all these news nuggets and more by clicking the excerpt link below): 1. BBC News: “Darwin Teaching ‘Divides Opinion’” Darwinism is a controversial topic, and many believe creation should be taught in the classroom. But why is that news? 2. ScienceDaily: “Junk DNA Mechanism that Prevents Two Species from Reproducing Discovered” Has the U.S. government finally supported creationist research? Alas, no, but the results of a National Institutes of Health study fit squarely within the young-earth creation framework. 3. PhysOrg: “Charles Darwin Really Did Have Advanced Ideas about the Origin of Life” Charles Darwin was convinced that life’s origin...

Por Esto (Merida, Yucatan) 10/28/09 “Mordida”, a favorite extortion and bribe in Mexico In Cancun, Mexico, police stopped a driver, a visiting tourist, for an alleged “administrative violation.” Then they asked the tourist for up to $300 dollars so she could proceed without having a penalty issued to her. It turned out that the victim of this extortion was Michelle Fischbach, a state senator from Minnesota, who later presented a written complaint to the local authorities regarding the episode. Five Cancun “Tourist Police” officers are now under investigation for their personal attempt at extortion. “Mordida” (a “bite”) is a common...

Rights activists in the northern Mexican border city of Tijuana have hung 5,100 small white crosses on the fence straddling the U.S. frontier to commemorate migrants who have died trying to cross. The protest coincides with preparations for Mexico's Nov. 1 Day of the Dead holiday. The crosses represent the number of migrants estimated to have died in the 15 years since the United States toughened border security. The Coalition for the Defense of Migrants also erected a traditional floral offering for the dead. The Mexican government estimates about 350,000 of its citizens migrate to the U.S. annually.

CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas – A Navy T-34 jet trainer with two people aboard has gone missing off the Texas gulf coast. U.S. Coast Guard officials said an air traffic controller at Corpus Christi's naval air station lost contact with the crew about 3:20 p.m. Wednesday. The single-engine T-34 was last reported near Port Lavaca. The Coast Guard has dispatched a helicopter, jet and boats to search for the jet. Port Lavaca is about 75 miles northeast of Corpus Christi.