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Juarez Schools Under Violence Threat

Saturday, December 13th, 2008

The pressures exerted by the Government of Mexico take their toll on schoolchildren in Juarez.

Not much reporting on this, but it seems to have been going on for a few months.

It was the case in TJ that, when the Tijuana Cartel was being dismantled by government pressure and rival drug trafficking operations, that cartel members took to kidnappings-for-ransom and other “petty” crimes, in order to raise cash.

The Juarez school threats would seem to be a corollary. Perhaps the Juarez Cartel is under threat in the same way: by government pressure and rival drug trafficking organizations.

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Nothing Like Self-Promotion as the Best Promotion

Monday, December 1st, 2008

Diana Washington Valdez blogs about some writer named Diana Washington Valdez’ new book. The topic is intriguing, at least until the next book on Mexican drug traffickers is written and self log-rolled.

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BBC on Border Violence: Killings Up In Spite of Mexican Army

Sunday, August 17th, 2008

The BBC tried to weigh in on the increased violence in Mexico. They incorrectly implied one thing. In actuality, the surge in army deployments didn’t cause the upswing in killings; their deployment was a result of the upswing in killings.

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Drug Smuggler Aldrete-Davila Takes it in the Hiney Again

Friday, November 23rd, 2007

Remember Osvaldo Aldrete-Davila, the drug smuggler who was paid by the U.S. to help convict USBP agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean for shooting him in the ass when he was smuggling marijuana into the US in 2005?

He’s about as dumb as we thought he was back then.

El Paso Times notes his tearful family letting that Aldrete crossed into the US because he thought he was getting more money from the feds — for Christmas gifts.

You can’t make this stuff up. One hundred and twenty-nine other dummies just got rounded up in El Paso in the same way. High IQ is not highly-regarded among the criminal set along the border.

Aldrete, who lives in Juarez, from where he gazed lovingly at the William Beaumont Army Hospital in El Paso where he received ace medical attention, had said he’d never cross back into the US — with or without a load of dope, presumably.

I expect Aldrete will have a lot more worries about his backside in prison than the bullet lodged there a couple of years ago. While Ramos and Compean have suffered from inmates’ abuse, this celebrity trafficker will be (in)famous enough to learn about new ways to make his butt-ocks hurt. They really ought to get TVs out of prisons.

Patterico links to the news, and Johnny Sutton’s name turns up in the comments, like a chow chip under your boot.

Diggers Realm has more.

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Congressman Reyes: Stupid Is as Stupid Does

Thursday, July 19th, 2007

What? Silvestre Reyes takes a stand? Well, the year is over half over. Reyes, a consummate slimy politician well-practiced in the art of graft and handouts, wants President Bush to commute the sentences of former Border Patrol agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean. They were convicted of unlawfully chasing a Mary Jane smuggler and shooting his punk-ass in the ass and then hiding evidence. The U.S. got 750 pounds of dope out of the deal and they got the shaft.

Sounds good, eh? A former Border Patrol agent and sympatico to the genuine hardships they endure — rockings, gunfire, assaults — standing up for one of his own.

Not so fast, amigo.

First of all, it’s a far cry from his August 22, 2006 position, saying, “A jury found them guilty. I will refer to (U.S. Attorney) Johnny Sutton.”

Reyes must have been dismayed when Senators Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and John Cornyn, R-Texas asked President Bush to commute the agents’ sentences. Nothing sucks like being late out of the starting gate, especially when you get owned in a bilateral way by outsiders mucking up your home turf.

Or perhaps Reyes was motivated by Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison’s lame attempt to play both sides of the aisle, that of USBP friend and US Attorney “escort.”

Or perhaps Reyes has had an attack of conscience since his daughter got implicated in that scandal back in 2005.

Some politicians will chew up anything and everything to rise as high as they can. You can’t blame anyone for trying to rise above their humble roots along the Rio Grande, but you can blame them for trying to forget them.

In between his pining over/forgetting his past and his longing for his so-called future, Reyes was junketing his way through the Western Hemisphere like a conquistador high on wine. Humorously, his web site notes how quickly he departed spaces, as if to reassure the public that its money was well-spent.

Too little, too late, for this small-time hood to resurrect anything resembling a reputation that bodes well for his political future. He’s become as stupid as his Democratic peers.

UPDATE: Nervous US Attorney Johnny Sutton sucks spit and defends himself.

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Aldrete Davila Case — Three Other USBP Agents Taking One in the Buttocks, Too

Monday, February 19th, 2007

The El Paso Times reports that two Border Patrol agents in the 2005 shooting incident of suspected drug smuggler Aldrete Davila have been given notification of termination. A third resigned before being fired.

4 Borders Pundit will have more to say about this case later. We’re in a “discovery phase” of reviewing case transcripts, DHS positions, and possible political positioning by bureaucrat “playas.”

For now, it appears that the sentences of agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean were quite harsh, although some punishment was due for procedural violations and evidence tampering.

It’s the kind of case that will inspire the Government of Mexico to continue (through its US consulates) ridiculous, overblown assertions of legal and human rights for the dregs of Mexican society — drug and alien smugglers, in the main — who commit crimes on US soil. Everyone knows what GOM’s aim is — it needs to deflect attention from its failed-state potential in some parts of Mexico.

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G Men on the Case: Don’t Shoot Them Thar’ Fightin’ Illegals

Thursday, January 18th, 2007

On 12 January, a US Border Patrol agent shot and killed an illegal immigrant west of Douglas, AZ. The agent was apprehending seven undocumented immigrants (UDA) when one started a fight. Naturally, the FBI is investigating.

This is for two reasons:
1) High publicity cases always attract FBI attention, G-Men being the attention whores that they are.
2) High publicity cases always attract FBI attention, G-Men being the publicity whores that they are.

I’m surprised USBP agents haven’t walked off the line after this turn of events, the upheld convictions of two agents, and the more than 746 acts of violence against agents in FY2006.

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