Murder City_ Ciudad Juarez and the Global Economy's New Killing Fields - Charles Bowden [141]
El Diario, Ciudad Juárez, April 19, 2008
Four presumed Federal Police officers were arrested yesterday for public drunkenness, causing a scandal, molesting a woman and assaulting Preventive Police agents.
Frontera Norte Sur, Las Cruces (N.Mex.), April 19, 2008
MEXICAN JOURNALISTS STILL UNDER SIEGE IN 2008
Two young radio announcers from the southern state of Oaxaca are the latest journalists to suffer violent deaths. Felicitas Martínez, 22, and Teresa Bautista, 24, were shot to death in an ambush April 7 while on their way to cover a state meeting of indigenous peoples. Four others were wounded in the attack, including two children aged 2 and 3. As of April 19, no suspects had been arrested for the crimes. Martínez and Bautista allegedly suffered threats before their murders. “Some people think we are very young to know, but they should know we are very young to die,” Martínez and Bautista reportedly said on the air shortly before their deaths.
El Diario, Ciudad Juárez, April 19, 2008
The death of young Alejandro Martínez Cruz, son of the municipal police officer executed Friday night, has caused pain and shock. Neighbors commented that although they barely knew the family, they regretted both deaths, especially that of the 8-year-old boy. “We don’t know if the father was bad or if he deserved to die that way or not, but there was no reason to kill the boy, he was an innocent victim. He hardly ever went out to play but when he did he ran around a lot, like all kids, he was a healthy boy and good at sports.”
El Diario, Ciudad Juárez, April 19, 2008
More than 250 bullets were fired at the municipal police captain and his son who died in the hospital minutes after the attack in the Colonia Margaritas. The victims were identified as Alejandro Martínez Casas, 32, and his son, Alejandro Martínez Cruz, 8. The officer’s wife and mother of the child drove the wounded to the hospital in a private vehicle. State authorities reported that the officer received multiple bullet wounds on his left side, thorax, abdomen and legs. The boy was hit in the head and chest. At least 6 Mexican army tanks and dozens of soldiers disturbed the crime scene, kicking around the spent cartridges in the area.
Rockford (Ill.) Register Star, April 19, 2008
Norma Trosper doesn’t remember growing up with machine guns, burgeoning gangs or drug wars sprawling through the streets of her native town, Ciudad Juárez. That was then, in the late 1970s and early ’80s. Today, it’s a different story in the Mexican border town. “It’s like a war zone,” Trosper said of a recent visit. “I was so scared. I mean, you can feel it. It’s in the air. You just don’t know how many dead there will be for that day. You can almost smell death.”
El Diario, Ciudad Juárez, April 20, 2008
Mexican army personnel yesterday rescued a man who had been held captive. When found, he was gagged and bound with brown-colored adhesive tape and had been tortured. The soldiers also confiscated an unknown quantity of drugs in the rear of a recent model Hummer H2 parked in the garage of the house where the victim was held. After being freed, the unidentified man said that he had been held for 3 days after being abducted by a group of men in green uniforms, similar to those worn by soldiers. After spending several hours at the house, the soldiers left with the rescued man. At press time, no official information had been released. In another incident, a motorcyclist was presumably abducted after being chased and shot by a group of men. Witnesses who asked for anonymity said that the motorcyclist had tried to hide in a nearby Dumpster but he was found and taken away by an unknown group of men.
Washington Post, April 20, 2008
PUERTO PALOMAS, Mexico—Javier Emilio Pérez Ortega, a workaholic Mexican police chief, showed up at the sleepy, two-lane border crossing here last month and asked U.S. authorities for political asylum. In