By HENRY ROMERO
Reuters
ENSENADA, B.C. -- Federal police on Monday evicted some 200 U.S. retirees from a multimillion- dollar beachfront resort in northwestern Mexico following a Supreme Court ruling that changes the ownership of the land.
Some 250 armed officers took part in the raid on the Baja Beach & Tennis Club in Ensenada, Baja California.
"They are going from house to house," Baja California Homeowners Association vice president Leigh Zaremba told Reuters. "We've been given five hours to get out of our houses before they are sealed."
U.S. retirees own about 90 percent of the homes at the Baja Beach and Tennis Club. They paid local farmers and a private developer, Koster S.A., between 500,000 dollars and 1 million dollars for each of the villas.
The resort property comprises a hotel, 18 cabins and 23 houses and is valued at about 48 million dollars.
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That's where My brother got screwed. The Ijido (sp?) tribe received title to the land on the Punta Banda sandspit in the late 60s from Mexico, in honor of some old treaty.
They leased parcels to Americans in good faith, but a few changes of government and greased palms later, Punta Banda was turned over to a couple of families who claimed the land prior to the grant to the Ijido.
The American leases were simply nullified.
As my brother says... "That's why they call it Mexico."
I'm familiar with the BBaTC south of Ensenada and have visited it back in 85 or 86. I met a lady who was building a home on the beach there and went out to see the construction. The homes were incredible for what the were paying for them. Marble floors, countertops, and baths. And you could step right out onto the beach. Too bad, looks like another Mexican swindle of the gringos. As a neighbor in Mulege Baja Sur once said to me, "Mexico would be a beautiful country if it weren't for the Mexicans."