Thread: How boy from San Diego became cartel hitman PART 1,2,3,4

The Cartels' Grip (Part 1 of 4)

How boy from San Diego became accused cartel hitman

By Morgan Lee and Janine Zúñiga
9:08 p.m., July 13, 2011

Mexican soldiers showing San Diego-born Edgar Jimenez Lugo, 14, to news crews after his arrest in December. Marco Antionio Diaz Sierra

The top of the boy’s head barely reaches the shoulders of the men at his side as they exit a military pickup shortly before dawn.

He is 14 and small for his age — a thin figure draped in a sweatshirt with a concert tour logo. He has a fat lip, a swollen eye and abrasions on his neck.

Mexican soldiers in bulletproof vests and black masks stand the youth against a brick wall on a dark side street outside the federal prosecutor’s office in central Mexico. Cameras flash as someone holds a cellphone to the teen’s face.

His chest heaves and for a moment he looks as if he will cry.

"What is your name?" . . .

http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2011/...edgar-jimenez/

Am I supposed to feel sorry for him? Uh no, I don't. His father left a good home and life in Mexico, guess a home that was given to him good enough for, no? I feel sorry for the grandparents who gave their kids everything and for what? What a waste!

Part 2 of 4

The Cartels' Grip

Cartels' Grip Part 2: Rescue, then irreplaceable loss

Matriarch protects Edgar, other children; her death results in family’s disintegration

By Morgan Lee and Janine Zúñiga
8:49 p.m., July 14, 2011
Part two in a four-part series

The 71-year-old widow was nearing the end of a 1,500-mile journey from central Mexico to restore order to the lives of her grandchildren.

A social worker held up a handmade sign to greet Carmen Solis Gil at the Tijuana airport and take her to adoption court in San Diego.

Carmen was preparing to be a mother all over again, this time to six grandchildren who were placed in foster care after the youngest, Edgar Jimenez Lugo, was born with cocaine in his bloodstream. She was filling in for a son and his common-law wife who had entered the United States illegally and fallen into a life of squalor and drug addiction.

In her home village of Tejalpa, Carmen had raised six children and had even taken in the destitute children of other families. Now, she and these grandchildren were going to live under one roof.

At a San Diego court hearing in August 1997, two Polaroid photographs were snapped. The faded images show a judge in a black robe towering over kids dressed in a clashing assemblage of overalls, skirts and sundresses. Edgar, a curly-haired toddler, balanced in the arms of a visiting aunt.

All trained their eyes on the camera, except for Carmen. She was smiling at the children.

The judge’s approval of the adoptions opened the way for U.S. aid to help support Edgar and his siblings once social workers in Mexico evaluated their care.

Few people understood at the time that drug lords had taken root in Cuernavaca, a vacation getaway a few miles from the children’s new home in Tejalpa.

For Teresa Jimenez Solis, one of Edgar’s aunts, memories of the adoption day are now colored with regret. She had traveled with Carmen to bring back the children.

“The judge gave my mother the adoption papers, congratulated her on her success, told her to take care of the kids,â€

THE CARTEL'S GRIP / A BOY, HIS FAMILY, TWO NATIONS

Cartel's Grip Part 3: When cartels overrun a town

Drug gangs unleash wave of violence after chief slain by special forces; Edgar gets mixed up with a group of killers

By Morgan Lee and Janine Zúñiga
6 a.m., July 16, 2011

About this series

This four-part series, focused on a boy born in San Diego accused at age 14 of heinous crimes for a drug cartel, illustrates the expanse of a drug trade that ensnares adults and children on both sides of the border.

Union-Tribune reporters Morgan Lee and Janine Zúñiga have written the stories based on public records and interviews in Mexico and the United States.

Series

A thriving family, upheaval and Edgar’s birth

Part One
Edgar’s rescue, early travails in Mexico

Part Two
When cartels overrun a town

Part Three

Sunday: Four community voices — two from the U.S. and two from Mexico — discuss the lessons from Edgar’s story

Spanish: Lea la serie en español

Part three

Mexican marines had cornered the “Boss of Bossesâ€

THE CARTEL'S GRIP / A BOY, HIS FAMILY, TWO NATIONS

Cartels' Grip Part 4: What are lessons of Edgar’s story?
Four community voices - two from the U.S., two from Mexico - share their insights

By Morgan Lee and Janine Zúñiga
6:05 p.m., July 16, 2011

Police and soldiers fighting drug cartels in Mexico often need to mask their identities for their safety. — Associated Press

About this series

This four-part series, focused on a boy born in San Diego accused at age 14 of heinous crimes for a drug cartel, illustrates the expanse of a drug trade that ensnares adults and children on both sides of the border.

Union-Tribune reporters Morgan Lee and Janine Zúñiga have written the stories based on public records and interviews in Mexico and the United States.

Series

A thriving family, upheaval and Edgar’s birth
Part One
Edgar’s rescue, early travails in Mexico
Part Two
When cartels overrun a town
Part Three

Sunday: Four community voices — two from the U.S. and two from Mexico — discuss the lessons from Edgar’s story

Spanish: Lea la serie en español

When President Felipe Calderón took office in December 2006, he went after drug cartels in an effort to end their lawless grip on much of Mexico.

“I had to act because I knew that people were being kidnapped, being extorted, being killed,â€

Other Jimenez family members arrrested
By Morgan Lee and Janine Zúñiga
9:32 p.m., July 16, 2011

Edgar Jimenez Lugo’s involvement with a drug gang has led to others in his family being incarcerated.

Elizabeth Jimenez Lugo: Edgar’s sister Elizabeth, 19, is awaiting trial in Mexico on charges of kidnapping in association with organized crime members.

She shares a prison cell with older sister Lina Ericka. The two are held in seclusion from other inmates at a high-security lockup outside Cuernavaca.

Lina Ericka Jimenez Lugo: A married mother of a 5-year-old boy, Lina Ericka, 24, was arrested after dropping off Edgar and Elizabeth at Cuernavaca’s airport.

Relatives say that for years Lina Ericka regularly distributed money from her mother in San Diego to her siblings to help pay for such things as food and clothing. The Mexican army contends that she knew of her siblings’ gang involvement and helped finance their illegal activities.

David Jose Mario Jimenez Solis: Edgar’s cousin David Jose Mario, 20, was arrested by soldiers who barged into his family home in Tejalpa on the night of Oct. 29, looking for Edgar and Elizabeth.

David, who maintains his innocence, was driven across town to a gang safe house stocked with drugs and guns. He was beaten, interrogated and presented to the news media along with five suspected gang members. Denied bail, David awaits trial on organized crime charges at a prison near Cuernavaca.

Yolanda Lugo Jimenez: Four days after Edgar’s arrest on Dec. 2, his mother, Yolanda, 43, was detained outside her apartment in San Diego’s Logan Heights neighborhood by Border Patrol agents concerned about her son’s possible criminal activities in Mexico.

Yolanda Lugo JimenezShe has pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to illegally re-entering the country and will likely serve time in prison before being deported to Mexico. Her sentencing is pending.

Her husband, an undocumented immigrant with no criminal record, was arrested at the same time and returned to Mexico. The couple’s two, elementary school-aged daughters, who were born and raised in the United States, are living with relatives in San Diego.

www.signonsandiego.com

Since Mexican law only permits minors to be held until their 18th birthday
and because he is an American citizen he will be deported to the U.S., where he faces no criminal charges.

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