U.S., Mexican legislators discuss border vigilantes
Posted on 11/24/2002 2:06:29 AM PST by MeekOneGOP
U.S., Mexican legislators discuss border vigilantes
States may take action against groups that target migrants
11/24/2002
NUEVO LAREDO, Mexico - U.S. and Mexican lawmakers expressed concern Saturday about a growing number of American vigilante groups that capture and sometimes hurt or kill Mexican migrants who cross into the United States illegally.
The fringe groups have sprung up in several border towns in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, where residents frustrated by U.S. border agents' inability to stop illegal migration have taken matters into their own hands, said Arizona state Rep. Robert Cannell.
Mr. Cannell said Arizona legislators will likely take up the issue of vigilante groups during the state's next legislative session. The Democrat said he was "strongly opposed" to the groups.
Mr. Cannell was one of eight U.S. state legislators - three from New Mexico, two from California, two from Arizona, and one from Texas - who joined 38 lawmakers from the six Mexican border states at the third annual legislative border forum in Nuevo Laredo.
In separate Binational Commission meetings on Monday and Tuesday in Mexico City, high-ranking U.S. officials, including Secretary of State Colin Powell, will hold talks with their Mexican counterparts on what to do about the estimated 3 million Mexicans working illegally in the United States.
New Mexico state Sen. Mary Jane Garcia said vigilante groups appeal to undereducated young men who feel that state and federal governments haven't done enough to protect towns along the border. The Democrat said the issue also needed urgent attention in the New Mexico legislature.
Also on Saturday, Chihuahua state lawmaker Cesar Castro Lopez called on investigators from the FBI and Britain's Scotland Yard to help solve the brutal slayings of women in Ciudad Juarez.
More than 75 women have been raped and killed since 1993 in Ciudad Juarez, the border's largest city. Dozens of suspects have been arrested, but bodies have continued to turn up in the desert.
Mr. Castro Lopez said that Mexican state and federal commissions assigned to investigate the crimes have failed to produce any concrete leads.
"It has become a financial issue of vital importance for those who do business on the border," he said, adding that violence in Juarez has begun to affect U.S. commercial interests, thus ensuring that the killings fall under U.S. jurisdiction.
The killings have "ruined the reputation of Ciudad Juarez in the eyes of the world," Mr. Castro Lopez said.
LAcking a police state here, others want to import it, full with jurisdictional and sovereign conflicts of interests. And we let them do it.
November 12, 2002
Squatters' Homes Torn Down in Cd. Juárez's Lote Bravo
On November 11, 2002, in the Ciudad Juárez neighborhood of Lote Bravo, more than 50 houses made of wooden pallets and cardboard were torn down by city employees using pipes and crowbars. The city workers engaged in razing the homes were from the Departamento de Regulación de Asentamientos Humanos (Department for the Regulation of Human Settlements) and were backed up by local police agents.
Reactions varied as the destruction of the homes took place. At least one man was arrested by police and other people complained about the loss of their investments.
Edel Alberto Arroyo, one of the Lote Bravo squatters, told the Cd. Juárez newspaper El Diario that residents should have been given the opportunity to save their pallets. El Diario estimated that each dwelling was worth approximately 1,000 pesos (nearly US$100) because wooden pallets sell for 15 pesos (US$1.50) each.
Vigilantism is an obvious and regrettable consequence of government malfeasance. Now, predictably, some in government focus on vigilantes as the problem; not themselves and not the Illegals.
Should the government turn on the people in favor of Illegals, what do you suppose is the next logical outcome?
Funny, I heard many are retired police officers and others who are educated. That means, they're also not "young men." And, if they're property owners protecting their properties and families, they are obviously working and paying taxes....productive US Citizens protecting themselves and their rights under the Consitution.....since our government has seen fit not to follow its prime directive: secure the borders.
You're thinking like an American, not a politician.
Needs to be repeated.
Mr. Cannell said Arizona legislators will likely take up the issue of vigilante groups during the state's next legislative session.
OK, Legislators, what outcome are you looking to promote?
New Mexico state Sen. Mary Jane Garcia said vigilante groups appeal to undereducated young men who feel that state and federal governments haven't done enough to protect towns along the border.
These legislators are either grossly ignorant of the Reconquista movement, or are guilty of supporting it.
Mr. Cannell is my representative, in his case he is not worried about votes, he doesn't have to be, he is well known in the area, and very popular, he will be re-elected until he is term limited. In some areas he is very uninformed, many times his opinions are emotion based, this seems to be one of those times. He is educatable in some areas, but I don't think this is one of them.
I wonder if they will actually decide Americans have no private property rights anymore, that if someone's on your property, you must allow them be stay on it?
As in Kosovo and "palestine."
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