Mexico considers trying U.S. border agent for illegal's killing

[Clint]

Mexico considers trying U.S. border agent for illegal's killing


Hector Tobar, Times Staff Writer

MEXICO CITY

Copyright 2006 Los Angeles Times
All Rights Reserved

Mexican President Vicente Fox was under increased criticism here Thursday for his government's response to the shooting last week of a Mexican national during a confrontation with the U.S. Border Patrol just a few yards north of the international frontier near San Ysidro.

Guillermo Martinez Rodriguez, an 18-year-old Mexican identified by U.S. authorities as an immigrant smuggler, was allegedly shot and fatally wounded during the clash Dec. 30 on the U.S. side of the border.

Commentators here have suggested that the agent involved be tried in absentia in a Mexican court, and that the Fox government make it clear to the Bush administration that the human toll of the U.S. crackdown on illegal immigration is unacceptable.

"The defense of the life, the physical integrity and the human rights of our compatriots on U.S. soil cannot be delayed any longer," the influential daily newspaper El Universal said in an editorial Thursday.

El Universal called on the Mexican government to pressure the United States to sign an immigration accord that would allow Mexicans to migrate northward "in an orderly fashion."

Tijuana resident Martinez Rodriguez was part of a group of people throwing rocks at U.S. Border Patrol agents, according to news reports in Mexico. Wounded during the confrontation near a ladder smugglers were using to scale a fence, he fled back across the border. He died of his wounds in Tijuana, his relatives said.

Border Patrol officials acknowledge that one of their agents fired at a suspected illegal immigrant on Dec. 30 who was throwing rocks. But they say they cannot confirm that the bullet struck the suspect, since the man then retreated to Mexico.

Mexican authorities say Martinez Rodriguez was killed by a shot fired from a distance of 7 to 15 feet. The bullet struck him from behind and passed through his neck, they said.

"This is the kind of tragic thing that occurs when people try to illegally cross the border," Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff told reporters Thursday at a San Ysidro news conference. "There is zero tolerance for violence along the border."

Relations between the two countries remained strained Thursday, with new reminders of the increasingly chaotic and dangerous situation along the 2,000-mile border as thousands of Mexicans and other foreign nationals seek to cross illegally every day.

U.S. officials in Texas reported Thursday that Border Patrol agents have come under fire twice recently along the Rio Grande. No agents were injured in the Texas shootings.

On the night of Dec. 30, gunmen on the Mexican side of the frontier opened fire on a Border Patrol boat that was cruising the Rio Grande.

"We don't believe this was a random shooting," Jose Rodriguez, a spokesman for the Border Patrol in McAllen, Texas, said in a telephone interview. The gunmen, he noted, were able to strike the boat five times, even though it was moving quickly in the darkness.

And late Wednesday, unknown gunmen fired on agents on patrol in Brownsville.

No agents were injured in either incident.

In Washington, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the death of Martinez Rodriguez was "tragic for the families and the individuals involved." He said the U.S. government would reply privately to a Mexican "diplomatic note" demanding an investigation of the incident.

On Thursday, Mexican Foreign Minister Luis Ernesto Derbez said he had received a call from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice during which she promised that U.S. officials would investigate the incident.

Derbez was the subject of a scathing cartoon in Thursday's editions of the leftist newspaper La Jornada. He was depicted wearing a sombrero and serape and leaning sleepily against a cactus. The caption said, "Responding to Aggression."

This week, a panel of Mexican lawmakers declared the Martinez Rodriguez shooting "the result of the policies of submission" of the Fox government before the United States.

Several senators called for pressure tactics against the U.S., such as a Mexican boycott of businesses on the American side of the border.

"If they don't want us as workers, then we shouldn't be their consumers either," said Sen. Dulce Maria Sauri Riancho.

For many Mexicans, the shooting was especially galling because it came just weeks after the U.S. House of Representatives voted for the construction of 700 miles of fencing along the border.

Hundreds of people die every year after crossing the border illegally; most succumb to the rigors of crossing the desert with little food or water.

In the last three years, Mexican Sen. Raymundo Cardenas said, "more Mexicans have died [crossing the U.S. border than Germans died during the entire existence of the Berlin Wall."

Times staff writer Richard Marosi in San Ysidro and Cecilia Sanchez in The Times' Mexico City Bureau contributed to this report.

January 6, 2006


If the Mexican Government took a pro-active response to the Illegals crossing the border and there Dope Smugglers, shooting at our people things like this might be avoided.

[TPDHellhound]

Fox needs to understand that he would be better served focussing on internal issues. But since he loves to push his political positions, I say we teach him a lesson and revoke NAFTA, which has been better for Mexico than the US. Maybe then Fox will understand.

[Norm357]

Yeah, good luck with that.

[Ironhead]

Wow. This Mexican politician compares his own country to Communist-dominated East Germany. :rolleyes:

Yeah .... and they seem to forget that both sides of the Berlin wall were in the same country, they were both German and they were, at one time, united.

I dont see comparing the Berlin wall with the US / Mexico border a good match.

[FeudalBaron]

I don't get what there is to gain for the Mexican government here. Maybe you can rally some sort of twisted national support, instill some type of warped nationlism. But when your own citizens are daily (minute-by-minute) performing illegal acts against a bordering sovereign nation, and then get bent when agents of that sovereign nation take action, is just ludicrous.

Common wisdom suggests:

1. That you take control of your lawless population, and bring them to justice.
2. That it might be a good idea to go out of your way to promote good relations with your neighbor. A neighbor with whom you have strong financial ties, and is the world's super-power.
3. That possibly the catalyst of your problems is your own internal policies, and you should quit blaming the US for your fiscal trouble.

Here's a story I stumbled across. Not familiar with the site or author, but it's interesting.
Hillary's Evil Twin

Oh, and as far as trying to put any of our LEOs on trial....

[ChesCopPodz]

That and Berliners KNEW that if they tried to cross they would be shot. Mexicans coming here don't have that fear because the worst that happens to them is they get sent back and are able to try again.

[mxwelch]

Maybe that idiot Fox would realize that people are running north because his leadership hasn't done one good thing for Mexico. I agree with TPD. Revoke NAFTA, build a wall, with signs saying trespassers will be shot.
What would the media and the world say if Bush tried to impose his will on Mexico like Fox does with America?

[cntryboy0531]

Machine gun nests along the border, and since the little punks want to shoot at our boats, arm the boats with several .50 cal automatic rifles. They open up on us, we hose them down with lead.

As for the charges..

KISS MY FAT AMERICAN ***!!! :mad:

[mxwelch]

KISS MY FAT AMERICAN ***!!! :mad:

You shouldn't be fat... you just got out of the academy.:p

[cntryboy0531]

You shouldn't be fat... you just got out of the academy.

Eh, I'm ok. 5'9 and 204lbs. Not bad, but I can sure move if I need to. ;) :D

[NCSO911]

I say shut the border down.
All the companys that ran south across the border will have to suck it up.
I bet the first thing that mexico will do is nationalize all of the international companys.
That will show their true colors. Socialism!

[Deputy757]

I find it surprising that Fox would raise any sort of stink about this at all, other than one purely for show, as their tactics for destroying our nation from within are working just fine. I'm sure I'm not alone on this board being able to remember a day when English was the defacto language of the USA. Then we started needing interpreters to translate for the growing masses of Hispanic migrant workers, then we started putting spanish on product labels, then we got an option to press #1 if we wanted a voice mail system to use spanish instead of english, and now we press #1 if we want the system to use ENGLISH instead of SPANISH! Their migrant workers are wreaking havoc on health care facilities in the southwest who are lawfully bound to provide medical services to same with NO hope of ever being paid for doing so. I'd like to know just how much it cost to send an illegal alien back to his home country so that we could compare it with the cost of incarcerating him/her for 1 year or so of very hard labor, then deporting him/her, and adding the cost to whatever loans are outstanding to that country. Or perhaps the UN could institute a new rule that added those costs to the amount of dues that nation pays to belong to the organization.
Just watch....many of the forces that caused other world superpowers to crumble are at work here. I just hope at some point we wise up enough to put a halt to it and get the US heading back in the right direction.

[Clint]

I don't get what there is to gain for the Mexican government here.

Man, you hit the "NAIL", on the head.... Perhaps our Government should deploy some of Army & Marine Divisions on the the US/Mexican Border before/after deploying to the "BIG-Sandbox", to stop the flow of illegal-aliens entering the US.... Maybe "FOX", would get the message and police his own "CORRUPT BORDER"!!!!!

[hitnrun]

I find the whole idea way too laughable! It amuses me to no end, and I actually enjoy seeing other countries get so worked up over this. Sorry, but that's the way it goes. Mexico can go away now.

[Switchback]

Laughable is right. Mexicao cannot handle their own people and now they want to "handle" ours. All I have to say is, "Come and get our agent!" I would like to see them try that! There is no way that the US gov will acknowledge crap from them. The feds blow off US State Prosecutors when agents are found to be within their scope of duties. Who thinks that the G will listen to a pot full of corrupted politicians south of the border! :rolleyes:

Build the wall, arm agents to the teeth, make it a felony and let Fox take care of his own problems.