By Ignacio Ibarra
Arizona Daily Star
A National Park Service ranger at Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument was killed in a shootout with suspected smugglers this afternoon, said deputy Nicole Feldt of the Pima County Sheriff's Department.
The shooting took place near Puerto Blanco Loop Drive, a dirt road that runs through the national monument west of Arizona 85, Feldt said.
The ranger was responding with U.S. Border Patrol to a call for assistance from Mexican authorities about 3 miles east of Lukeville, according to Dale Thompson, chief park ranger at the Organ Pipe National Monument.
The ranger's identity was being withheld Friday pending notification of his next of kin. Thompson said the man died of a gunshot wound in the incident, which is under investigation by the Pima County Sheriff's Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
The incident took place about 100 yards north of the border in a rugged stretch of desert that is known for both drug and people smuggling. Details were sketchy Friday night.
But an employee at Gringo Pass, a store near the Lukeville Port of Entry, said the shooting took place about a half mile east of the port of entry while the park service agents confronted people crossing the border with guns.
U.S. authorities said the incident began in the early afternoon, when Mexican authorities notified the U.S. Border Patrol that two men in a vehicle fleeing Mexican police had crossed onto the the park.
U.S. Border Patrol spokesman Ryan Scudder in Tucson confirmed that U.S. Border Patrol agents were on the ground, and in a helicopter overhead when the shooting incident occurred, but he referred all other questions to the Sheriff1s Department and FBI.
Thompson said the helicopter pilot spotted the vehicle about a half-mile from the border, and at least one of the suspects hiding in a wash not far away.
The park ranger, a commissioned law enforcement officer who was armed, and wearing body armor at the time, "was shot, but I don't know the details as to what took place. The shooter was fatally shot, but I'm not sure by who at this time," said Thompson.
He said the weapon that killed the ranger was a rifle of some type, but he could not confirm reports that the weapon used was an AK-47.
The ranger was one of four Park Service Rangers assigned to the Organ Pipe Cactus National monument Mexican authorities could not be reached for comment Friday evening.
Gringo Pass? Is that near Wetback Ridge?