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Deadly revenge against policemen that help find drug-smuggling tunnels

by patgarcia | September 7, 2008 at 03:44 pm | 171 views | 4 comments | 10 recommendations

From the boulder-strewn heights of Tecate Peak, U.S. Border Patrol officers look into Mexico for signs of smugglers.

Juan Jose Soriano, 35, deputy commander of Tecate, was gunned down after helping U.S. authorities locate a drug-smuggling tunnel

Since Soriano's death relations between the Tecate Police Department and U.S agencies have been harmed .The border lands are more lawless than ever, Mexican sources say.

Soriano's slaying sent a message to cops who would dare cooperate with U.S. authorities.

At Soriano's funeral, many cops seemed to have a celebrating attitude, said a person who attended. Some laughed, chatted loudly in gestures of disrespect.

Mexican authorities suspect police were involved in the slaying. Nobody has been arrested in the case.

Divide and Conquer?Money can do that and more.

The tunnel strategy seems to be getting more sophisticated with air conditioned.Perhaps great architects and interior decorators?

September 7, 2008 Tecate, Mexico

Adrug-sniffing dog pulled the U.S. Border Patrol agent to a rusty cargo container in the storage yard just north of the Mexican border. Peeking inside, he saw stacks of bundled marijuana and a man with a gun tucked in his waistband.

The officer and the man locked eyes for a moment before the smuggler scrambled down a hole and disappeared. By the time backup agents cast their flashlights into the opening, he was long gone, through a winding tunnel to Mexico.

U.S. authorities called a trusted friend on the other side, Juan Jose Soriano.

The deputy commander of the Tecate Police Department gathered the entire shift of 30 officers at the decrepit police headquarters on Avenida Benito Juarez. Soriano knew any of them might leak information to the tunnel's gangster operators. So he took their cellphones and sent them away on a ruse about a car chase near the border.

The veteran officer told only a few trusted aides about the tunnel. Later that day, the officers went into the U.S. and traversed the length of the passageway to an empty building, where they found computers, ledgers and other key evidence.

For U.S. authorities, it was an encouraging example of cross-border cooperation in the drug war. For Mexico's crime bosses, it was a police victory that could not go unpunished.

That night last December, while Soriano slept with his wife and baby daughter, two heavily armed men broke into his house and shot him 45 times. The 35-year-old father of three young daughters died in his bedroom. He had lasted two days as the second-in-command of the department.