Crusading Mexican editor slain

cnn.com ^ | Tuesday, June 22, 2004 | cnn.com

[marron]

TIJUANA, Mexico (AP) -- Gunmen ambushed and killed an editor of the crusading weekly newspaper Zeta on Tuesday, the latest in a series of attacks against the newspaper's leadership.

Masked gunmen in a pickup truck opened fire on Francisco Ortiz Franco as he left a clinic with his children, said Raul Gutierrez, spokesman for the state attorney general's office.

Ortiz was struck by three bullets, Gutierrez said. The children, aged 8 and 10, were unharmed.

In Mexico City, federal Attorney General Ramon Macedo de la Concha said he had no firm details yet about the incident, but he told reporters at a news conference, "If we have evidence that it deals with organized crime, we will take over the case."

[snip]

Ortiz, who trained as an attorney, was one of three editors at the newspaper and specialized in legal affairs in his column, "To Start With," though drug trafficking was not his main focus. Zeta has been famed for its reporting on the influence of drug traffickers in Tijuana, home to several notorious narcotics operations.

[snip]

The newspaper's co-founder Hector Felix Miranda was ambushed and killed on April 20, 1988. Two men were convicted in the shooting. One of them worked as a bodyguard at a local race track owned by Jorge Hank Rhon, a businessman from one of Mexico's most powerful political families who is now running for mayor of Tijuana in elections that will be held Aug. 1.

[snip]

In 1997, the newspaper's publisher, Jesus Blancornelas, was badly wounded in a gangland-style attack that killed his bodyguard and driver, Luis Lauro Valero. Shortly before he was shot, Blancornelas had written a column blaming David Barron Corona, a reputed lieutenant in the Arellano Felix drug gang, for a machine-gun slaying of two federal agents outside a Tijuana courthouse. Barron was among the men who attacked Blancornelas, dying in the crossfire. Following the attack on Blancornelas, Ortiz vowed that threats would not deter the staff.

[marron]

ping

[BlackVeil]

A brave editor, a martyr to the values of his profession.

[marron]

Two of the three founders are dead, and they tried to kill the other one.

At one time they had to publish on the San Diego side of the border because no one on the Mexican side would do their printing. I don't know if thats still true...

I used to pick up a copy whenever I could; some of the stories would make the hair stand up on your head, I'm not surprised they were targets of death threats. And murder.

Honest men in office and in the press there run very real risks.

[janetgreen]

Masked gunmen in a pickup truck

Coming to America soon over the virtually open Mexican border, thanks to the U.S. government.

[Rebelbase]

Peaceful Mexico ping.

[DumpsterDiver]

Bananna Republic bump.

And from Babelfish:

República del Plátano bump.

[janetgreen]

Sorry, President Bush/Fox, your arguments don't fly here in invaded Mexifornia where illegal immigration is not appreciated, no matter what country they come from. 90% of them happen to be from Mexico.

[Delbert]

gunned down in front of his kids, man that is terrible.

[janetgreen]

There are definitely two sides to this argument. I am on the side of LEGAL immigration and the personal responsibility of those who come to our country. For American citizens to be forced to support millions of illegal aliens is abhorrent to the American way of life for more reasons than I care to go into because you already know why, you just don't agree. We agree to disagree.

[dennisw]

Como en Iraq ping!

[janetgreen]

The two factors which most entice legal and illegal immigrants are jobs and free government services. The cost to American taxpayers is rising astronomically. In 1985 in the city of Los Angeles it cost over $10 million a month just for AFDC payments for children born to illegal alien mothers and that did not include housing, medical care and education. And where did these illegals come from? Sixty to 70 percent are from Mexico and Central America, the remainder mostly from the third world.

I got this paragraph from the article by George Putnam posted this evening. Your arguments are not valid in border states like California.

[janetgreen]

without considering what we gain from them.

Anyone living in the middle of the illegal alien mess will argue this point with you. Big companies who demand slave labor gain, politicians who big business support gain, but taxpayers lose in many ways. If you haven't been to California in the last ten years, come here and take a look. Countless towns now look like Mexican colonias because the "immigrants" are creating Mexico in our midst. All the arguments in the world doesn't change the fact that Americans are having illegal aliens shoved down our throats and are being forced to pay the bills.

Come here and look at the schools, come here and look at our medical facilities that have closed under the burden, come here and look at our towns and our freeways. Ask construction workers and many other American workers who have taken their jobs taken by illegal aliens who work for cash, ask them who is getting free medical care and education.

If all this is OK with you, fine, but it's NOT OK with those of us living daily in the mess. Until you've walked in the shoes of a border state native, don't tell us that illegal aliens are good for our country.

[janetgreen]

in order to be fair and balanced

Simply stated, I am fair and balanced when it comes to LEGAL IMMIGRATION only. Sorry, but I believe in strong enforcement of the existing immigration laws, with no entitlements or perks of citizenship to border hoppers. If they want to live in our country, they should apply legally and wait their turn like legal immigrants do.