20-year-old Mexican police chief quits after receiving death threats, flees to US

By CHUCK BENNETT
Last Updated: 7:45 AM, March 4, 2011

The brave 20-year-old police chief of a drug-ravaged Mexican border town has quit after receiving death threats and fled to the United States, where she is seeking asylum, a relative said yesterday.

Marisol Valles, a college student majoring in criminal justice, made international headlines when she accepted the job last October in Paxedis Guerro, a small town near Ciudad Juarez, on the Rio Grande.

But she "received death threats from criminal groups that wanted to force her to work for them," her relative said.

Valles, who fled with her baby son, became the top cop after a drug gang murdered the town's mayor and his son, scaring off all other applicants.

Erika Gandara, the 28-year-old police chief of nearby Guadalupe, was kidnapped last December, and her fate remains unknown.

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