Free Republic

A Zetas leader arrested in the streets of Nuevo Laredo is being accused of masterminding the Falcon Lake murder of American tourist David Hartley and the massacres in San Fernando. Mexican marines arrested Salvador Alfonso Martínez-Escobedo in Nuevo Laredo around 7 p.m. Saturday. Martinez-Escobedo, who goes by the nickname "La Ardilla" or "The Squierrel", is reported to be a regional commander for the Zetas drug cartel. Mexican Navy officials report he escaped from gun battle with marines that left one person dead in the San Agustin subdivision early Saturday morning. Marines found Martinez-Escobedo hours later in an SUV in the...

resident Barack Obama seems to have fallen short on economic and immigration promises he made to Latino voters before he was elected. Still, his approval ratings among Latino voters increased to 70 percent after falling as low as 57 percent in June 2010 in a Gallup poll, according to La Opinión. The Spanish-language newspaper cited a poll conducted by its parent company ImpreMedia and Latino Decisions, a research group that focuses on issues facing Latinos. In 2008, Obama garnered 67 percent of the Latino votes, according to La Opinión. The same poll also concluded that Latino voters would not automatically...

PHOENIX (AP) -- The North American Aerospace Defense Command says two F-16 fighter planes intercepted an ultralight aircraft near the U.S.-Mexico border in southwestern Arizona. The plane crossed from Mexico into Arizona just after 6 a.m. Sunday. NORAD dispatched two F-16s from Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson and they shadowed the ultralight for about 30 minutes until it flew back into Mexico.

PHOENIX - Authorities searching for drug smugglers who shot and wounded an Arizona sheriff's deputy in the desert south of Phoenix said they captured 17 suspected illegal immigrants Saturday, including three who may have been involved in the incident.

REYNOSA — Authorities continue to tell the public to avoid a bridge near Reynosa's baseball stadium after at least one unexploded grenade was discovered beneath it Tuesday night. City officials announced about 9 p.m. Tuesday that the explosives were found beneath the Broncos bridge, which runs along the city's baseball stadium. Officials said Wednesday morning the "situation of risk" remains. The bridge remains open and officials say municipal police are monitoring the area, but motorists should avoid the area, officials said. At least one person died late last month after two shootouts near the Broncos bridge. At least seven unexploded...

PHOENIX — On Thursday and Friday, officers with the Arizona Department of Public Safety arrested two suspected human smugglers and turned 48 illegal immigrants over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The busts were made in the Phoenix area. The first incident occurred on Thursday just before 6 a.m. when a motorcycle officer came upon a disabled pickup blocking the westbound off-ramp of 83rd Avenue along Interstate 10. The officer discovered several people under a large piece of plywood in the bed of the truck. A total of 13 suspected illegal immigrants were turned over to ICE. Two men, who were...

LAREDO — On his last night of freedom, Gabriel Cardona laid on his bed in a stash house in north Laredo, chatting on his cell phone about how he’d sliced open twoAmerican teenagers with a broken bottle. “You should have been there,” Cardona, a 22-year-old Laredo high school dropout told a fellow member of the Gulf Cartel’s hitman squad... Jorge “Poncho” Aviles, 19, and Inez Villarreal, 14, were abducted from a Nuevo Laredo nightclub and taken to an abandoned house south of the border, tortured, gutted and then burned in 55-gallon drums. One U.S. law enforcement source, speaking anonymously, said...