Thread: 5 killed in 2 violent days in Nuevo Laredo

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/world/4033450.html

July 8, 2006, 8:37PM


5 killed in 2 violent days in Nuevo Laredo
Associated Press

NUEVO LAREDO, Mexico — Three men were killed in a prison, one in a hospital and one on the street in two days of violence in this unwieldy Mexican border city, police said today.

With the latest deaths, there have been 144 slayings so far this year in Nuevo Laredo, a city of 300,000 across the river from Laredo, Texas that has been plagued by fighting between rival drug gangs.

Oscar Perez, 29, Juan Guerrero, 42 y Luis Deras, 21, were stabbed to death in Nuevo Laredo's state prison during visiting hours this morning, said Victor Almanza a detective for the Tamaulipas state police. All three men were in prison on drug trafficking charges.

On Friday, former city police commander Rogelio de la Cruz Alvarez, 42, was shot and wounded outside his house on the westside of the city, police said. Four masked men later forced their way in to the hospital where De la Cruz was being treated and shot him dead.

Also on Friday, police found the blindfolded and bullet-ridden corpse of a man in a working class neighborhood on the eastside of the city. The man was not identified, but police said he had a tattoo across his chest with the word "Sinaloa," the name of a Mexican state on the Pacific.

Investigators say gangsters from Sinaloa are fighting a bloody turf war with rivals from Tamaulipas over the billion-dollar drug smuggling routes through Nuevo Laredo into Texas and the rest of the United States.

If for anything else, this should go to a very good reason as to why the wall should be built. They come over and kill our police officers, it doesn't matter that he was a former city police commander. This should NOT be allowed or tolerated at all. Somebody needs to take Bush down there and drop him off. See how long he will last....or how fast that wall will be built. I mean drop him off no Secrete Service guys nobody to protect his butt since this is how he is treating these poor border towns.

On Friday, former city police commander Rogelio de la Cruz Alvarez, 42, was shot and wounded outside his house on the westside of the city, police said. Four masked men later forced their way in to the hospital where De la Cruz was being treated and shot him dead.

They really wanted this man DEAD didn't they?