but whatever you do, dont profile them, cause that is against their civil rights....
Oh, how true...Rush was all over that this afternoon.
Posted on 03/08/2005 8:59:09 AM PST by SwinneySwitch
Feared gang using area only as conduit, officers say
MATAMOROS, March 8, 2005 — Despite several recent arrests, officials from both sides of the border insist that members of the feared Central American gang Mara Salvatruchas are using the Rio Grande Valley as a conduit for other destinations in the United States and not setting up operations here.
The violent street gang is allegedly involved with drug smuggling, human trafficking and murder for hire. Its members also have been accused by American federal officials of meeting with al-Qaida operatives to smuggle terrorists into the United States.
But based on arrests and interviews with prisoners, both Mexican and American authorities said they do not believe the gang has created permanent cells in the Valley or the Mexican side of the border.
“They are here in transit and nothing more,” said Tamaulipas State Police Cmdr. Omar Alanís Vasquez. “The people we’ve arrested come from other places and don’t live here.”
Nonetheless, officials from both sides of the border are expected to meet at a binational conference in McAllen on Thursday to discuss the twin threat to regional security posed by the Maras and members of the elite Gulf Cartel gang of assassins known as the Zetas.
Last week, state police arrested a gang member from El Salvador who had kidnapped his 22-month-old son from Houston and then planned to smuggle three Central Americans into the United States.
“These are dangerous people that belong to a large organization,” Alanís said.
Two weeks ago, Mara Salvatruchas leader Ebner Anibal Rivera Paz was caught hiding in the trunk of a car in Falfurrias. Rivera is accused of masterminding a bus attack that killed 28 people last December in San Pedro Sula, Honduras.
In December, Francky Sanchez Solorzano was arrested trying to cross the Rio Grande with a Bangladeshi man and a group of 12 other undocumented immigrants.
Sanchez remains in federal custody at the Bayview Immigration Detention Center. At least one other Mara Salvatruchas gang member is incarcerated in a Cameron County jail for stealing a car in San Benito.
U.S. Border Patrol McAllen Sector spokesman Roy Cervantes said agents have been trained on how to identify members of the Central American gang through their distinctive MS-13 or MS-18 tattoos.
“When they encounter an individual that is heavily tattooed, they start looking at that person closer,” said Cervantes. “They catalog the tattoos and interview them.”
Both American and Mexican authorities said they must work together to prevent the gang from becoming a greater threat.
“We are in coordination with federal immigration authorities,” Alanís said. “We received an alert about the situation about the characteristics of these people.
“If we see a person with these characteristics, we detain them immediately and bring them in for questioning,” he said.
schapa@brownsvilleherald.com
That's comforting.
Other places? You mean like Saudi Arabia, Syria, Jordan...?
Southern Sieve Ping!
Please let me know if you want on or off this South Texas/Mexico ping list.
They have already spread out around the US.
They have already spread out around the US.
but whatever you do, dont profile them, cause that is against their civil rights....
Oh, how true...Rush was all over that this afternoon.
Besides, the ones who have settled here pay the Mordida, so we leave them alone.
Probably the ubiquitous facial and neck tattoos? One "good" thing about this is these people should be pretty easy for we "civilians" to identify when the shiite hits the fan. And it will.
See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil.
Don't forget the tattoo between thumb and index finger, also the one just above the navel and the one over the kidneys...
How did you get to listen to Rush in Cube ville? I can't even have a ra-did-e-o in the bat cave in building 1.
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