Thread: Mexico strongly rejects' upcoming execution in Texas of Mexican criminal

Mexico's government 'strongly rejects' upcoming execution in Texas of Mexican citizen

Published January 19, 2014Associated Press

MEXICO CITY – The Mexican government said Sunday it "strongly rejects" the execution scheduled this week in Texas of a Mexican man convicted of killing a police officer.

The Foreign Relations Department said in a statement that executing Edgar Tamayo would be yet another U.S. violation of an international treaty involving such cases.

Tamayo is set for lethal injection Wednesday for the 1994 fatal shooting of a police officer who had arrested him for a robbery.

Mexico has been asking the United Sates to halt Tamayo's execution because the inmate wasn't told he could get legal help from the Mexican government as agreed under the 1963 Vienna Convention on Consular Relations.

Tamayo's lawyers say assistance from the Mexican consulate could have helped him obtain mitigating evidence to persuade jurors to choose a punishment other than death.

Legal challenges regarding the convention and foreign nationals on Texas death row aren't new. At least two other Texas inmates in similar circumstances have been executed in recent years.

In 2004, the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, found Tamayo and more than four dozen Mexican citizens awaiting execution in the United States weren't advised of their consular rights under the Vienna Convention when they were arrested. The court urged new hearings in courts where those people were convicted to determine if consular access would have affected their cases.

A year later, President George W. Bush agreed with the international court and urged that new hearings be held. The U.S. Supreme Court, however, overruled Bush and the impact of the international court decision in an appeal brought by Mexican national and Texas death row inmate Jose Medellin. A Supreme Court majority determined that only Congress could require states to follow the international court's ruling.

Legislation to accomplish that has never been passed.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2014/01...xican-citizen/

Mexico does this at the same time that they are opening consulates and running mobile consulates to help it's citizens break our laws for Mexico's economic gain. Since Mexico wants to give all of it's citizens the same benefits as diplomats, none of the children born here of Mexican parents should be given citizenship. Diplomat's children do not get citizenship because they are under the protection, IE jurisdiction, of their home countries.

When a person goes to foreign country and breaks the law, they are subject to the laws in that country. As far as I am concerned Mexico can blow it's wind in the other direction.

This US citizen was held for RANSOM in a Mexican jail and treated like and animal. Where was the so called International Court of Justice and the Mexican diplomats when this happened? Obama and Hillary were, as usual, absent.

First Photo of Marine Jailed in Mexico




After his parents pleaded with U.S. diplomats, he was removed out of the general cellblocks of the notoriously dangerous prison and placed in solitary confinement. U.S. Senator Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) and Representative Illeana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla) have spoken on the House and Senate floors asking Mexican authorities to releaseHammar.


By Bryan Llenas
Published December 17, 2012
Fox News Latino

BROWNSVILLE, Texas – Held captive in one of Mexico's most infamous prisons, Marine Veteran Jon Hammar is seen chained to a bed in a new photo sent to the family from an anonymous Mexican email account.

"His eyes look a little lost," an emotional Olivia Hammar, his mother, told Fox News Latino. "It doesn't look like him. I feel like my blood pressure is through the roof."

The photo shows Hammar in solitary confinement inside the Matamoros state prison, nicknamed CEDES. A scraggly lookingHammar is seen shirtless and barefoot with a beard, jean shorts and with his feet over what appears to be grey crocs. He is sitting on an old twin-sized mattress in a room with chipped walls. A gallon of water and a refrigerator are seen to his right. Hammar is staring at the person taking the photo and does not appear to have any visible injuries.

It is the first photo released of Hammar since he and a friend were detained by Mexican authorities in August. The pair had crossed the border and handed the paperwork for the weapon to Mexican officials, but police ended up impounding their RV and jailing the men, saying it was illegal to carry that type of gun. Hammar's friend was later released because the gun did not belong to him.

According to Hammar and his family, the gun was an antique shotgun that had belonged to his great grandfather.

The email of the photo was sent anonymously from a Yahoo.mx account.

"I found your email on the Internet and I wanted to send you this photo," the email read in Spanish. "I am not giving you my name because I like my job and I don't want to lose it. Juan is OK but I hope he is let out quickly."

Hammar's parents, Olivia, a magazine publisher, and Jon, a software engineer, have only visited the prison once but unlike past phone calls they've received in the middle of the night from prisoners trying to extort money, Olivia believes this comes from "someone trying to help."

"He doesn't trust anyone," Olivia said of her son.

"Where he is in the prison, he's right next to the administrative offices," she told Fox News Latino. "All of the inmates, staff, all of the visitors walk right by there. So anyone could have taken the photo."

It is difficult to decipher who sent the photo because the prison has a fairly open guest policy. Visitors are allowed to meet with inmates privately and even give them food and gifts. Hammar is said to be chained to a bed for security purposes. After his parents pleaded with U.S. diplomats, he was removed out of the general cellblocks of the notoriously dangerous prison and placed in solitary confinement.

Hammar and his fellow marine friend, Ian Mcdonough, were on their way to Costa Rica to surf and camp in a Winnebago in Costa Rica when they were arrested. Both marine veterans spent several days in custody separated from one another, but McDonough was eventually freed.

Hammar enlisted in the marines at age 18 and was deployed to Afghanistan and Iraq. His unit provided security for Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai, protected election polls and disrupted insurgent cells.

Hammar voluntarily checked himself into treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder in 2011. He graduated from "The Pathway Home" in May.

The charges against Hammar appear to be over a technicality. Mexican prosecutors allege the length ofHammar's shotgun barrel, which according to Mexican law has to be longer than 25 inches, was too short, although a discrepancy has emerged over how the barrel was measured.

Hammar's parents came forward to the media on December 6 hoping the publicity will push Mexican authorities to act.

Since then, U.S. Senator Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) and Representative Illeana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla) have spoken on the House and Senate floors asking Mexican authorities to release Hammar.

The family lawyer, Eddie Varon-Levy, hopes the case can be resolved before Hammar's next court date on Jauary 17.

First Photo of Marine Jailed in Mexico | Fox News Latino

Above article from ALIPAC archives.
http://www.alipac.us/f12/first-photo...mexico-268981/

We should make a deal with Mexico.

We don't execute their citizen who comes to the USA and murders a police officer if they agree to TAKE BACK TWENTY MILLION OF THEIR CITIZENS.

Mexico warns US not to execute Mexican national held in Texas

January 19, 2014 9:30PM ET

Edgar Tamayo was convicted of shooting a Texas cop in 1994; Mexico believes it should have say in his punishment

Edgar Tamayo would be the third Mexican to be executed in the U.S. out of 51 sent to death row without being informed of their consular rights.David McNew/Getty Images

Mexico has strongly objected to the scheduled execution in Texas of a Mexican convicted of killing a U.S. police officer, arguing that by executing him, the United States would be in "clear violation" of international treaties.
Edgar Tamayo, who is scheduled to be executed on Wednesday, was convicted of fatally shooting a Houston police officer in 1994 when he was in the United States illegally. But Tamayo was not informed of his right, enshrined in an international treaty known as the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, to diplomatic assistance.

His lawyers say assistance from the Mexican consulate could have helped him obtain mitigating evidence to persuade jurors to choose a punishment other than death.

In 2004 the United Nations' International Court of Justice ordered the United States to reconsider the convictions of 51 Mexicans, including Tamayo, who had been sent to death row without being informed of their consular rights.

So far, two of that group have been executed; Tamayo would be the third.
In a statement on Sunday objecting to the scheduled execution, Mexico's Foreign Ministry said, "If Edgar Tamayo's execution were to go ahead without his trial being reviewed and his sentence reconsidered ... it would be a clear violation of the United States' international obligations."

Last month, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry wrote a letter to Texas Gov. Rick Perry urging him to reconsider Tamayo's execution because it could make it more difficult for the United States to help Americans in legal trouble abroad.

But so far there has been little sign that Texas is willing to budge, with the Lone Star State arguing that it is not bound by the International Court of Justice ruling.

Mexico's Foreign Ministry said it had taken various measures — legal, diplomatic and political — to try to stay the execution.

That included attempts through Texas courts and petitions from high-ranking Mexicans like Foreign Minister Jose Antonio Meade and Eduardo Medina Mora, Mexico's ambassador to Washington, the statement said.
"The Mexican government opposes the death penalty and is determined to use all available recourses to protect those nationals in danger of receiving such a sentence," it said.

http://america.aljazeera.com/article...nnational.html

I fall Mexicans are here under diplomatic protection, their children should NOT be awarded birth right citizenship.

Court Won't Stop Execution of Mexican National

HUNTSVILLE, Texas January 22, 2014 (AP)
By MICHAEL GRACZYK Associated Press

A Mexican national moved a step closer to lethal injection Wednesday when a federal appeals court rejected a claim that he was mentally impaired and ineligible to be put to death for the fatal shooting of a Houston police officer 20 years ago.
Texas officials have opposed appeals to stop the scheduled lethal injection of Edgar Tamayo, 46, for killing Officer Guy Gaddis, 24, despite pleas and diplomatic pressure from the Mexican government and the U.S. State Department.

Tamayo's lawyers went to the U.S. Supreme Court after the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said an appeal this week renewing an earlier contention that Tamayo was mentally impaired and ineligible for execution was filed too late.

Tamayo's attorneys argued the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, an arm of the Organization of American States, had determined only last week that Tamayo was mentally impaired. Lawyers contended Tamayo should be granted an exception to court rules barring such new last-minute appeals.

His attorneys also appealed a federal judge's refusal to stop the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles from a clemency recommendation in Tamayo's case because of what they argued were unfair procedures by the panel. The board, appointed by Gov. Rick Perry, can recommend he grant clemency. As it has in nearly all previous death penalty cases, the panel rejected Tamayo's request for clemency.
"It doesn't matter where you're from," Perry spokeswoman Lucy Nashed said. "If you commit a despicable crime like this in Texas, you are subject to our state laws, including a fair trial by jury and the ultimate penalty."

Gaddis, who had been on the force for two years, was driving Tamayo and another man from a robbery scene when evidence showed the officer was shot three times in the head and neck with a pistol Tamayo had concealed in his pants. The car crashed, and Tamayo fled on foot but was captured a few blocks away, still in handcuffs, carrying the robbery victim's watch and wearing the victim's necklace.

Tamayo's attorneys and the Mexican government contend Tamayo's case was tainted because he wasn't advised under an international agreement that he could get legal help from his home nation after his arrest. Records show the consulate became involved or aware of the case just as his trial was to begin.

Secretary of State John Kerry previously asked Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott to delay Tamayo's punishment, saying it "could impact the way American citizens are treated in other countries." The State Department repeated that stance Tuesday.

But Abbott's office and the Harris County district attorney opposed postponing what would be the first execution this year in the nation's most active capital punishment state, where 16 people were put to death in 2013.

At least two other inmates in circumstances similar to Tamayo's were executed in Texas in recent years.

The Mexican government said in a statement this week it "strongly opposed" the execution and said failure to review Tamayo's case and reconsider his sentence would be "a clear violation by the United States of its international obligations."
Mexican officials and Tamayo's attorneys contend he was protected under a provision of the 1963 Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. Legal assistance guaranteed under that treaty could have uncovered evidence to contest the capital murder charge or provide evidence to keep Tamayo off death row, they said.

Tamayo was in the U.S. illegally and had a criminal record in California, where he had served time for robbery and was paroled, according to prison records.
"Not one person is claiming the suspect didn't kill Guy Gaddis," Ray Hunt, president of the Houston Police Officers' Union, said. "He had the same rights as you and I would have.

"This has been looked at, heard, examined and it's time for the verdict of the jury to be carried out."

Tamayo was among more than four dozen Mexican nationals awaiting execution in the U.S. when the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, ruled in 2004 they hadn't been advised properly of their consular rights. The Supreme Court subsequently said hearings urged by the international court in those inmates' cases could be mandated only if Congress implemented legislation to do so.

"Unfortunately, this legislation has not been adopted," the Mexican foreign ministry acknowledged.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/m...inglePage=true