Posted on 01/13/2008 4:59:33 PM PST by SwinneySwitch
Deadly gunbattles in two Mexican border cities last week left their sister communities in the Rio Grande Valley hoping that the brutal cross-border violence plaguing Nuevo Laredo for years had not spread downstream permanently.
Five people died in fierce firefights between suspected Gulf Cartel gunmen and Mexican troops and federal agents in Rio Bravo and Reynosa.
Those cities sit just across the Rio Grande from lucrative havens for so-called Winter Texans, setting the multi-billion dollar drug trade on a collision course with a growing tourism industry.
"We're very concerned that the Mexican military controls its violence," said Hidalgo County Judge J.D. Salinas. "I stopped going across (the border) to have lunch years back."
Salinas said he now routinely declines invitations from his counterpart in Reynosa to attend events there.
On the other hand, an average of about 18,000 passenger vehicles crossed bridges from Reynosa into Hidalgo and Pharr every day last year, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection. More than 5,500 people walked across those bridges daily.
Miriam Medel Garcia, spokeswoman for the Mexican Consulate in McAllen, said it was too early to tell if the recent violence would affect cross-border traffic in the area.
Mexico did not see a change in southbound border crossings in the days after the shootings, but most of that weekday traffic is business related and less likely to change, Medel said.
"It doesn't matter if it (the violence) is isolated or not, Mexico is going to continue to fight organized crime," Medel said.
Cartel activity has gradually been moving east from Tijuana for nearly two decades, Hidalgo County Sheriff Lupe Trevino said. Nuevo Laredo has been plagued for years with street gunbattles and assassinations, but last week's shootouts in Reynosa and Rio Bravo were unusual.
In recent years, Laredo has begun to feel the pinch from mounting death tolls in Nuevo Laredo, as rival drug cartels battled for valuable smuggling routes. Both cities suffered the losses of retail and hospitality jobs.
Trevino said Nuevo Laredo was an example of what drug violence can do to a tourism economy. People used to make regular trips from San Antonio to Nuevo Laredo for weekend vacations. "You don't see that anymore," he said.
Even if violence becomes more regular across the river from Hidalgo County, Trevino does not expect it to spill across the border. There will always be drug-related violence on both sides of the border, he said, but cartel shootouts are unlikely in the U.S. because they are fighting for smuggling routes on the Mexican side and have more respect for American law enforcement.
But in the past two years, the killings of seven people in Laredo have been linked to rival Mexican drug cartels.
The Gulf Cartel operates violent cells of former Mexican soldiers known as the Zetas, who have been linked to killings of cartel rivals as well as Mexican public officials and are suspected in the Rio Bravo and Reynosa incidents.
"I think it's eventually going to intensify," said Rick Flores, sheriff of Laredo's Webb County. He cited the end of the marijuana harvest season when smuggling picks up and the presence of several thousand Mexican troops and federal agents sent to the border to combat the cartels after former Rio Bravo Mayor Juan Antonio Guajardo Anzaldua and five others with him were gunned down last November.
The U.S. State Department included Tamaulipas state, which stretches along the border from Nuevo Laredo to Matamoros, in a travel advisory issued in October.
Todd Huizinga, spokesman at the U.S. Consulate in Monterrey, said that the advisory remains in effect and U.S. citizens should be cautious.
In the wake of last week's violence, Rio Grande Valley residents held to distinctions in their Mexican destinations.
Sandy Combs, resort manager of Llano Grande Lake Park, an RV resort in Mercedes, said she would not think twice about visiting Nuevo Progreso, a quaint Mexican city popular with Winter Texans. Residents of her 1,134-site resort cross every day and she did not hear any voice concerns.
They go for dentist appointments or just to drink and dance, Combs said. "They love the margaritas."
But "I've lived in the Valley 26 years and you won't catch me in Reynosa or Matamoros," Combs said.
Bill Summers, president and chief executive officer of the Rio Grande Valley Partnership, said he was sitting eight miles from where Mexican agents killed three gunmen in Rio Bravo on Monday and noted he would begin to worry if the violence became regular. But avoiding certain areas, travel at night and any connection with the drug trade leave him fearless on his regular cross-border trips.
Rio Grande Valley residents cross often to Mexico to visit relatives, make doctor's appointments and fill prescriptions, so persistent Nuevo Laredo-style violence would affect this end of the valley, Summers said.
"I just don't like it close to the border," Summers said. "The border is our attraction. It's our Disney World, our theme park."
Ping!
If you want on, or off this S. Texas/Mexico ping list, please FReepMail me.
that would be immoral of us not to spread this to our country.
Innocent Americans need to share the suffering with our friends , the Mexicans!/extreme sarcasm
Where’s the good Teddy when you need him?
Curious name, Matamoros. I just googled it, and I find that it means what I thought it meant: Moor-killer.
Evidently Mariano Matamoros, for whom it was named, must have had ancestors going back to the wars against the Moors during the Reconquista.
“But in the past two years, the killings of seven people in Laredo have been linked to rival Mexican drug cartels.”
Sounds like two weeks worth of killings in some U.S. Citys.
Hey...those Texas land owners on the border are against building a fence. I guess they won’t mind having gun battles with the Mexican Mafia on their property. I have a feeling property values might suffer, however.
More Americans killed by illegal aliens than Iraq war, study says
When you start digging into the numbers the only ones that can be sourced with the feds are the number of American murdered in 2005: 16692
I have seen federal numbers for illegals held in jail ranging from 19.3% to 27% of the federal prison population.
Here's a sampling of USA cities wanted for murder. What you'll see is that in big USA cities like LA or NYC most of the murderers are Hispanic. Unknown are the % of illegals. In smaller cities the FBI will post the nationalities of the murderers. About 25% of the most wanted are illegals wanted for murder. This number agrees with the percentage of illegals incarcerated in federal prisons. +-25%Pictures of top 10 most wanted in LA. Up until recent stories about crime in LA posted by the LA Times--the pictures included the nationality of the murderers. They were all foreign nationals and mostly Mexican.
Wanted for Murder in New York City.
Chicago wanted for Murder
Philadelphia wanted for murder
San Francisco wanted for Murder
New Orleans wanted for Murder
Pictures of suspects wanted for murder in Washington DC
FBI USA 10 most wanted. (two of 10 are Mexican nationals)
There are currently no exact numbers on the number of Americans killed by illegals. Part of the reason is that the government deliberately obscures the number. I talked on the phone with the head of statistics for the US Bureau of Prisons. He said his office wasn't allowed to publish the number of illegal alien murderers. Rather they were forced to put legal and non legal residents in the same category. I talked to ICE. They put out detailed numbers on illegal child molestors. However, they put out nothing on illegal murderers.
Part of the reason for the silence on the matter is that there is evidence to suggest that most Americans being killed by illegals are black--as is the suggestion in this LA Times Article. Also this article from the LA Times.
To look at other USA cities go here http://stlouis.fbi.gov/ and replace stlouis with the city you want.
All that said the true number of criminal aliens is far higher than is revealed by criminal aliens in prisons. Most are simply waived through the courts.DHS Secretary Chertoff, has been quoted as warning that two million people in this country illegally have committed serious crimes. See also here and here
Glenn Beck will be going down there shortly.
Yes. I recommend Warren H. Carroll, “Isabel of Spain: The Catholic Queen,” which has an excellent history of the Reconquista from the earliest days of the Moorish invasion.
Isabel doesn’t usually get a good press from modern liberals and revisionist historians. The book is well worth reading.
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