Thread: Federal, state police take control of Tijuana

Federal, state police take control of several TJ neighborhoods

Local police called into stations, disarmed

UNION-TRIBUNE

11:37 a.m. November 18, 2008

TIJUANA – About 500 federal police, state police and marines took over patrol of several city neighborhoods Tuesday from the municipal police officers who normally perform those duties.

The action occurred in central and eastern Tijuana, where high crime rates related to drug violence have been recorded in the last two months.



Municipal police are expected to undergo extensive background checks and training, Mayor Jorge Ramos said. The military and state and federal police are scheduled to be in place for a month.

The municipal officers were called in from patrol Tuesday morning. When they arrived at their stations, they were disarmed. Federal and state agents got into the municipal patrol pickups and headed out for the city streets.

About 9:30 a.m., municipal officers who had been disarmed stood around outside the La Mesa station waiting for instructions on what to do next.

Last week, federal officials detained high-ranking municipal police officers suspected of links to organized crime. More than 600 people have been killed in Tijuana this year, and many of the victims have had ties to drug cartels. Drug gangs are fighting one another for control of smuggling routes along the border, police and crime experts say.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/mexi ... jcops.html

These people have TOO MUCH in COMMON with IRAQIS. They are just about as trust worthy, i.e. corrupt police, corrupt government, beheadings.....Build the damn fence!

Mexico investigates Interpol liaison

By MARK STEVENSON, The Associated Press 6:09 p.m. November 18, 2008

MEXICO CITY — A top police official who worked as Mexico's main liaison with Interpol was placed under house arrest as part of an investigation into leaks of information to drug cartels, prosecutors said Tuesday.

The arrest of Ricardo Gutierrez Vargas – who served as director for International Police Affairs and Interpol at the Federal Investigative Agency – was the latest blow to Mexico's police forces, which have seen a number of top officials linked to the nation's powerful and violent drug gangs.

The investigation that netted Gutierrez Vargas also resulted in the detention of several other federal police officials in recent weeks on suspicion of leaking information to traffickers.

An Interpol Web site identified Gutierrez Vargas as head of Interpol's Mexico National Central Bureau, or NCB.

The site said NCB officers are employed by their local countries' police forces rather than the Lyon, France-based Interpol General Secretariat. Officials at Interpol's offices in Lyon were not available Tuesday.

Interpol said "each NCB is connected to INTERPOL's secure police communications network I-24/7, which enables them to share crucial information on criminals and criminal activities 24 hours a day, seven days a week."

Officials in those offices have direct access to databases of information on suspected terrorists, wanted persons, fingerprints and DNA profiles, among others things, the agency said.

Earlier this month, Mexican prosecutors announced that Rodolfo de la Guardia Garcia, the No. 2 official at the Federal Investigative Agency from 2003-2005, was placed under house arrest for 40 days as investigators look into the possibility he leaked information to the Sinaloa cartel in return for monthly payments.

De la Guardia was elected to Interpol's executive committee in 2002 but was removed from that post by the Mexican government in 2004, the Interpol General Secretariat said in a statement at the time.

The detentions of both Gutierrez Vargas and De la Guardia are part of the Mexican government's "Operation Clean House," which is aimed at weeding out corruption that came to light after the January arrest of Alfredo Beltran Leyva, a reputed Sinaloa cartel lieutenant.

Former federal police commissioner Gerardo Garay and three other officials of the Public Safety Department were placed under house arrest earlier, though officials have not revealed the allegations against them.

In recent weeks, the Sinaloa cartel also has been linked to four Mexican military officers and one soldier, as well as five officials in the organized-crime unit of the attorney general's office, which oversees the agency that employed de la Guardia.

On Tuesday, prosecutors also announced the detention of a crusading former federal police official for questioning on possible links to organized crime.

The Attorney General's Office said former regional police coordinator Javier Herrera has been detained for 48 hours. No formal charges have been filed, and it was unclear if Herrera had a lawyer.
Herrera had openly accused top federal police officials of incompetence and mismanagement and has since been dismissed from his post.

http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/ ... ndex=13996