Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Meanwhile, on the Border,.....

The Washington Times has an article on this. see:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/aug/06/soldiers-cross-into-us-hold-guns-to-agent/

I think we need to use either larger forces of heavily armed Border Patrol officers or a simmilarly armed military force to follow the officers as they patrol. If anyone detains or threatens the officers, they should be permitted to surrender before the security force opens up.

Didn't DoD try military on the border within the last few years? I knew of a couple of NG units that were deployed, and i think some active duty units also. I don't know what happened to them, it either ran out of funding or they were needed in SWA.

Link: http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2008Aug06/0,4670,BorderAgents,00.html

Border agents unevenly spread on boundary
Wednesday, August 06, 2008

By MICHELLE ROBERTS, Associated Press Writer

E-Mail Print Share:

SAN ANTONIO � Despite efforts to add Border Patrol agents to areas where immigrant traffic is high and drug violence is flaring, officers assigned to the 2,000-mile boundary with Mexico are bunched up near the California coast. And some critics see politics at play.

An Associated Press analysis of Border Patrol staffing shows that the San Diego sector, with the shortest section of border and fences covering half the boundary, has four times the number of agents per mile that West Texas does and three times as many as most of Arizona.

That is the case even though the Tucson sector in Arizona has been the busiest spot for illegal crossings for years and El Paso sits next to a Mexican city that has seen a surge in drug-cartel violence so severe that Mexicans are pleading for asylum in the U.S.

"I think it makes us less safe," Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said of the way agents are posted along the border.

Border Patrol officials defend the staffing levels, saying San Diego's transportation routes and year-round balmy weather make it an attractive spot for smugglers.

Others suggest, however, that members of Congress who most embrace the agency's push are rewarded with more agents _ a notion a Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman rejected Wednesday.

Borderwide, staffing has increased dramatically in the past five years as political pressure to prevent illegal immigration has mounted. On the southern border, there are roughly 15,000 agents, up from 9,500 in 2004.

And while the most dramatic growth has occurred near the Arizona-California line and around El Paso, San Diego's short section of border has, by far, the most agents per mile at 37. That compares with 11 for most of Arizona and nine for the Rio Grande Valley and West Texas, based on head counts given to the AP in July.

The 60-mile San Diego sector is at the southern end of a county with roughly 3 million people. It has two major northbound highways and easy access to food, water and communication _ all of which make it inviting to smugglers and illegal immigrants.

But the sector is already heavily reinforced: Two-thirds of the border is blocked by fences or vehicle barriers. The most populous part of the boundary has nearly 10 miles of double-layer fences with stadium lights.

The border in Arizona and Texas is more wide open and more rural in many places, which can make it harder to guard. It also includes major interstates and sizable population centers where recent arrivals can easily blend in. The Rio Grande forms the border in Texas, but in many places it is possible to swim, wade or float across it.

Arizona has long been the busiest and deadliest section of the border, recording hundreds of deaths in recent years among immigrants who fell victim to the rocky terrain and the fierce desert heat and cold.

Nearly half the apprehensions of illegal immigrants along the Mexican border are made in the Tucson sector, but those numbers are a poor indicator of effectiveness because research indicates that people trying to sneak across get caught less than half the time, said Wayne Cornelius, a professor at the University of California at San Diego.

Border communities in Texas have seen a frightening rise in drug violence spilling across the border, with assassinations and kidnappings in the United States.

Laura Keehner, a spokeswoman for Homeland Security, which oversees the Border Patrol, said agents and other assets are allocated based on the needs of the individual sectors.

"The idea that we politicize where we put our Border Patrol and assets is flat wrong," she said. "The Border Patrol tells us what combination works best where. They're in the field every day."

Mark Endicott, a spokesman for Border Patrol in San Diego, said the sprawling city's close proximity to the border, favorable climate and many transportation options make the area unique. He declined to discuss whether San Diego's needs outweigh those of other sectors but said, "As far as the activity going on here in San Diego, the agents are needed."

Observers say, however, politics plays a role in how agents are allocated.

"In many cases, they're very political," said T.J. Bonner, president of the agents union. "Congress giveth and taketh away, so you can't just thumb your nose at Congress and say, `We're going to make these decisions based only on our enforcement needs.'"

San Diego is represented by Rep. Duncan Hunter, a Republican who has been among the most outspoken proponents of increased border security and fences. But a spokesman said the congressman has not pushed for more agents for San Diego.

"It's nothing we've done personally in this office," said Hunter spokesman Joe Kasper.

Texas leaders, under pressure from border communities with close ties to Mexico, have pushed Customs and Border Protection to collaborate more with communities affected by the fence planned along the border and to make sure systems for those entering legally run smoothly _ the kind of cajoling that has sometimes put them at odds with the agency.

Cornyn said he has asked the agency how it assigns agents.

"They say they have a formula, but I'm not convinced or persuaded that this is altogether a rational distribution of resources. There's a certain amount of whoever screams and yells gets taken care of first," the senator said.

Cornelius, the university researcher, said politics probably do play a part in staffing. The entire GOP congressional delegation from San Diego "would have screamed bloody murder if the Border Patrol had reduced San Diego sector staffing levels appreciably," he said.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Looks like you're not to awfully up to speed on the "Medal Of Retreat",......

A Marine Nat. Guard unit overrun by punks with AKS,.....DOPERS,.....

they decorated the whole unit for something or another,......after they RETREATED,......under fire

last year,.....

sad stuff.

NO, repeat no bad call out on the USMC,......this was just some stupid no win political horseshit,.....and it IS verifiable.

GTC

Link: http://www.greeleytribune.com/article/20080806/NEWS/407158336/-1/FEATURES%26parentprofile=-1

Man accused of rape is in country illegally


Email Print Comment Recommend
A man accused of raping a 12-year-old girl in Greeley last month is in the country illegally, according to Weld County sheriff's records, but because he was a juvenile in previous encounters with the law, he wasn't investigated by immigration officials.



Raul Jesus Mendoza is now 19, but he was prosecuted before for sexual assault on a child and designated as a sexual offender as a juvenile.



Mendoza was arrested July 27 after a 12-year-old west Greeley girl told her parents he raped her in an apartment of a mutual friend. The girl didn't report the rape for two days, then told her parents, who called the Greeley police.



Police said Mendoza had been arrested twice before:



� When he was 15, Mendoza was arrested on a charge of improperly touching a young girl, but the charges were dismissed;



� A year later, Mendoza was convicted of sexual assault on another girl, sentenced to two years in juvenile prison and was released after a year.



Immigration officials' policies state that juveniles are not investigated as illegal immigrants unless they're charged as adults. In Mendoza's previous arrests, his background was not checked because he was a juvenile.



But in the present case, Mendoza is an adult, and he has been charged with sexual assault on a child and unlawful sexual contact. His bond has been set at $200,000.



Carl Rusnok, spokesman for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement office, is stationed in Washington, D.C. and said he doesn't know of the Mendoza case. However, he said if Mendoza is convicted of the charges, he will serve his sentence in Colorado, then he would be deported after he's released from prison.



The charges against Mendoza would bring a sentence of two years to life in prison.



Rick Dill, the Offender Supervision Bureau chief for the Weld County Sheriff's Office, said research into Mendoza's background shows he was brought into the United States illegally as a child with his family, and despite living here several years, he never acquired the proper documents to live in the country legally.



Also, with his previous history, he is a registered sex offender, but couldn't be listed on the county's or city's sex offender Web sites because he was a juvenile.



Mendoza's next court date will be his arraignment on Aug. 11.

The border is a war zone thats for sure.
It seems at times like the new fences are working to some degree. It also seems like people still keep dying like its cool to do so. Apprehensions are down, more agents seem to be getting hired. People I talk to are detered to cross due to the increase in agents and funny to hear, even the presence of the military, that in all actuality have no arresting powers.

You want to understand the true US/Mexican Border? Read the book "The Reaper's Line" by Lee Morgan. You want an eye opener, you'll get that and more.

Here is my take on the whole thing.
Put up all the walls, fences, barriers you want, and they will still come.
Put an agent or military personnel on every foot of the border and they will still find a way to come.
Do both and they will still come over and some will still make it.
You can suppress the issue, but not fully eliminate it. Thats just the way it is.
Until both sides of the border work together to better the situation, you will not fix it. Plus we must also remember that not all illegals are from one place, they just cross in the same place.

You think we should ship them all back? That will make things worse. Whether people believe it or not. We need illegals just as much as we don't. Face it, wages won't change. Therefore, you still need someone to do the jobs lazy Americans won't do. Not saying anything derogatory here, but many people would rather go on wellfare than take an outside job or start at the bottom. We need immigrants, preferably legal, but we all no breaking the law is funner, so I guess the illegals will do. It is wrong and unfair, but we need someone to do the jobs.

The border issue will continue and no matter what. Obama or McCain in office, whoever it is, is gonna give the people already here amnesty. It stinks and is very unfair, but watch and see, it will happen. You think we have open borders now, watch what happens if Obama gets in and needs those votes in 4 years. Open borders will get worse.

The desert is littered with trash, rapes take place in the desert, people die, people get mugged, we spend a ton of money each year to prevent this, and yet it continues. There is no accountability, but the small steps taken have produced small results. Its a dent, but we need a hole and we need better.

For my own well-being, I am now wearing my bullet proof vest to work. Better be safe than sorry. But things down south are getting freaky, even if crossings have decreased. But thats the game.

People that have never been down to the border region and base what you write off Lou Dobbs and the news. I hate to dissapoint, but all their facts are not right. Get a first hand look at war zone. You'll think differently.
I see and hear what people go thru on a daily basis. I wonder, how bad must it be where they are from to risk everything for the chance to be poor here, but better off than where they came from?

Kique

Enrique's right about Lee Morgan II 's book "Reaper's Line, Life and death on the Mexican Border".

Here's a brief review from Pub's Weekly :

From Publishers Weekly
The U.S.-Mexican border is one of the most violent places on earth, writes retired drug enforcement agent Morgan. He makes his case over 500 pages of gunplay, fisticuffs and bloodshed interspersed with profanity-laced denunciations of rival agencies and clueless Washington officials who believe they understand illegal immigration and drug smuggling. Having enjoyed serving inVietnam, Morgan sought similar adventure in the Border Patrol and the Custom Service's drug enforcement service. Working mostly in Arizona, he found corrupt officials and Border Patrolmen cooperating with corrupt Mexican officials, police and soldiers to transport drugs and people into the U.S. Still, he and fellow officers intercepted countless shipments, which the author recounts in excessive but lively rounds of shootouts, car chases and murder. Reforms that created the Department of Homeland Security and shifted antidrug enforcement to the Border Patrol are disastrous, he asserts, because the patrol is hopelessly corrupt. Sneering at the current immigration debate, he insists no barrier or law can keep out Mexicans in search of work and that the money would be better spent on making Mexico prosperous enough to provide jobs for its people. Despite the incessant fireworks and macho prose style, the book provides a thoughtful view of these issues. (Sept.)
Copyright � Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Product Description
A true story of violence, drugs, human smuggling and dirty politicians along the Mexican/American border.

When he was 14, Lee Morgan learned to shoot a rifle from a young Marine who later became the "Texas Tower Sniper." Four years later, Lee was conducting CIA assassination missions in Vietnam. Then he spent the next 31 years on the U.S.-Mexico border as a federal agent, where the struggle against smugglers of drugs and starving human beings is as harrowing as anything Lee encountered in Vietnam.

The Reaper's Line is a non-fiction account of unparalleled official corruption, mass murders, gunfights, treason, betrayal, and government wrongdoing.

****************


If you want the straight skinny, and a look at the Border from Seasoned Veteran's perspective,.....READ THIS BOOK.
( I said that)

GTC

older political cartoon still relevant.

Radio show focuses on immigration
By Jonathon Shacat
Herald/Review

Published on Friday, July 25, 2008

HEREFORD � The founder of a new talk radio show recorded in Cochise County that focuses on border and illegal immigration issues says the program is already popular among listeners and he is hopeful it will only get better.

�On the Border with Al Garza,� which first aired July 14, is hosted by Garza, who is perhaps best known for his role as national executive director of the border watch group Minuteman Civil Defense Corps.



Chuck Alton decided to start Cochise Talk due to the lack of local originated radio in Sierra Vista and Cochise County. Garza consented to be the program�s host. The show appeals to conservatives, Christians and patriotic people, Alton said.

Four times per week new programming is produced. It is recorded in segments and then edited. Then a one-hour show is aired continuously in a loop on the Web site www.cochisetalk.com until the next program is produced.

�Our country has been transformed into an oasis for illegal aliens and their uneducated Third World mentality. We have been sold out by the various people we elected to represent our nation�s best interests,� Garza said during Thursday�s episode.



Listeners are encouraged to leave comments by either calling a telephone hotline or sending an e-mail. Garza reads some of the e-mails on the air.

Some of the recorded voicemail messages also are played during the show.

This is just bloody heartwarming,........maybe I should say Blood Boiling......?!

Link: http://www.maconnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3109&Itemid=34

Deputies respond to fight, discover kidnap attempt
Thursday, 07 August 2008
By D. Linsey Wisdom
News Editor


Olivar Angelo RobleroMacon County Sheriff�s deputies arrested a 36-year-old man after he allegedly attempted to kidnap a 9-year-old girl early Monday morning.

Olivar Angelo Roblero of 397 Iotla Valley Park Road was charged with two felonious counts � attempted kidnapping and attempted abduction � and one misdemeanor assault on a child under 12. The arrest came after deputies initially responded to a 9-1-1 call at 2:32 a.m. reporting an altercation between five men involving two-by-fours.

�I need an officer out here ... now, please. I have Mexicans trying to get my nine-year-old little girl in the bed with them and I�ve got my15-year-old brother that is basically going ballistic on them,� said the caller. �I�ve got five of them trying to jump on my brother.�

The caller reported the Hispanic men were using �busted up two-by-fours� to attack her brother.

Deputies Lynn Dulakis and Stephanie Pellicer responded to the call.

�Upon arrival, [the mother] informed deputies that a neighbor of Hispanic heritage had attempted to drag her daughter ... to 397 Iotla Valley Park Road against her will,� wrote Deputy Lynn Dulakis on the arrest report.

Sheriff Robert Holland said the family had come home late that evening after attending a family function. �The girl had a new puppy that needed to go outside and so she took it out inside her fenced-in yard,� he said. While she was alone outside, a man grabbed her from behind and attempted to take her over the fence.

�Her 15-year-old uncle chased the man to his house and the fight broke out,� Holland said.

Officials found Roblero in the bedroom at the Iotla Valley Park Road address with a cut on his left cheek. He offered little information and an interpreter was not present, according to the arrest report.

Two witnesses, the mother and a female roommate, identified Roblero as the man who had attempted to abduct the child. The report indicated that the suspect had consumed drugs and/or alcohol, but Holland said he could not release any further information about that issue.

Roblero was arrested and is being held on a $20,000 secured bond.

�The man is not a U.S. citizen and has admitted he is not a citizen,� Holland said. �ICE (Immigrations and Customs Enforcement) has been already been contacted.�

Holland said it is standard practice that when an illegal citizen is arrested, they are processed through the system and, if found guilty, are required to serve any detention prior to deportment.

The young girl was uninjured in the alleged kidnap attempt, said Holland.

No charges were brought against the uncle and Holland said he did not foresee any additional charges being filed.

Roblero is to appear in court on Wednesday, Aug. 13.

9 killed, 9 injured in SR 79 rollover, highway closed



NEAR FLORENCE -- Nine people were killed and nine more were hurt in a single-vehicle rollover on the highway outside of Florence.

...

According to DPS, a 1998 GMC SUV carrying a total of 18 people rolled over on the right side of the road at about milepost 117, 15 miles south of Florence.

DPS said the SUV was traveling north on SR 79 at a high rate of speed when the driver lost control. The vehicle went off the road and into a wash. The SUV flipped, coming to rest on its roof.

Nine people were confirmed dead on the scene. The medical examiner is en route.

...

It's believed that the occupants of the SUV were undocumented immigrants. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents are on the scene, working with DPS. It's not known at this point if any coyotes were among the dead.

While the SUV was apparently going quite fast, it was not being chased at the time of the wreck.

http://www.azfamily.com/news/homepa...s-080708-fatal-rollover.232cdb2f.html?bn

See? I told you guys in another thread last week that we should invade Mexico. who's with me?

Geez Bristoe, you actually posted something worthwhile.

In other words, I agree with you! ..... About Grahamnesty and Juan McCan't.

Indeed what it should be!

However methinks this is just more of our "conditioning ...... "

IOW, "Welcome to the nanny state and YOU WILL like it!"

Juarez,.....the battleground, ( A mite CLOSER than Bagdad )

Link: http://www.elpasotimes.com/ci_10121004

Police commander slain in Ju�rez
By Daniel Borunda / El Paso Times
Article Launched: 08/07/2008 12:00:00 AM MDT



Related: Past stories on Ju�rez violence
EL PASO -- A Chihuahua state police commander was gunned down at his Ju�rez home late Tuesday night as the body count continued to grow. More than 700 people have been killed in Ju�rez this year.

Vidal Barraza Ortiz, 42, was a commander in the State Investigation Agency of the state attorney general's office, police said. Investigators found 28 bullet casings at the scene.

Barraza Ortiz had worked several assignments, including on the task force on women's murders.

In separate cases, the body of an unidentified man in his 40s was found Tuesday night in a plastic barrel. The man had been shot multiple times, his feet and hands were bound, and he had gray tape and a wire around his neck.

Tuesday afternoon, an unidentified man, age 20 to 25, was fatally stabbed in colonia Francisco I. Madero.

Wednesday morning, another unidentified man was found shot to death in colonia Parajes de Oriente.

Daniel Borunda may be reached at dborundaelpasotimes.com; 546-6102.

Another one bites the dust,.............

The "Tear in the Right Eye" was a nice touch, I thought....

Link: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/5931094.html

Texas executes illegal immigrant from Honduras
By MICHAEL GRACZYK Associated Press
Aug. 7, 2008, 6:52PM


AP
Heliberto Chi was executed for the 2001 murder of his former boss at an Arlington clothing store.

Share
Print Email Del.icio.usDiggTechnoratiYahoo! BuzzHUNTSVILLE � An illegal immigrant from Honduras who claimed his treaty rights were violated when he was arrested for a robbery-murder near Dallas was executed Thursday evening.

"God forgive them, receive my spirit," Heliberto Chi said in English. In Spanish, he told a friend watching through a window that he loved him and appreciated his hard work. He appeared to be whispering a prayer in Spanish with a tear at the corner of his right eye as the lethal drugs began to take effect.

One of Chi's cousins, who was among the witnesses, sobbed uncontrollably. Two sons of his victims watched through another window and Chi glanced at them briefly but didn't appear to acknowledge them.

Chi was pronounced dead nine minutes later at 6:25 p.m. CDT.

Lawyers for Chi had claimed in appeals to the U.S. Supreme Court that he should have been told he could get legal assistance from the Honduran consulate when he was arrested in California and extradited to Texas to face charges for killing his former boss, Armand Paliotta, at a men's clothing store during a robbery 7 1/2 years ago. Chi had once worked for Paliotta as a tailor at the store in Arlington, between Dallas and Fort Worth.

The Supreme Court, ruling about 2 1/2 hours before his scheduled execution time, rejected his appeal without dissent.

The arguments in his case, focusing on rights of foreigners under international treaty, were similar to those used unsuccessfully Tuesday by lawyers for condemned Texas prisoner Jose Medellin. In that case, the Supreme Court, with four of the nine justices dissenting, rejected his appeal and the Mexican-born Medellin was executed for participating in the gruesome gang rape and murders of two teenage Houston girls 15 years ago.

Unlike Medellin, Chi was not among some 50 death row inmates around the country, all Mexican born, who the International Court of Justice said should have new hearings in U.S. courts to determine whether the 1963 Vienna Convention treaty was violated during their arrests. Mexico had sued in the court on behalf of its citizens condemned in the U.S.

President Bush asked states to review those cases and legislation to implement the process was introduced recently in Congress, but the Supreme Court ruled earlier this year neither the president nor the international court could force Texas to wait.

Chi's attorneys argued that unlike the Vienna Convention obligations with Mexico, the 1927 U.S. Bilateral Treaty of Friendship, Commerce and Consular Rights with Honduras was specifically between the U.S. and Honduras and was self-executing, meaning it didn't require legislation to have effect. They said the treaty also conferred individual rights and incorporated international law into enforceable domestic law.

"There can be little doubt that this issue � the proper construction of treaty provisions � is sufficiently meritorious to warrant review," Chi's lawyers said in their Supreme Court request for a reprieve.

The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the state's highest criminal court, late Wednesday rejected a similar appeal.

Chi had visited the suburban Dallas store in 2001, then returned after closing and was let in by Paliotta after saying he'd left his wallet behind. Once inside, he pulled out a gun and demanded a money bag.

Paliotta was shot and killed. Another employee was wounded trying to run away and a third hid among clothing racks and called 911 for help. On a recording of the call played at his trial, Chi can be heard calling the hiding employee, in Spanish, to "Come to the front" of the store.

With police on the way, he fled a few minutes later, jumped into a waiting car and sped off.

He was arrested in Reseda, Calif., northwest of Los Angeles, about six weeks later. His 18-year-old pregnant girlfriend had turned him for assaulting her and told authorities he was wanted for murder in Texas. The couple had been on the run, crisscrossing the country.

Terry O'Rourke, a lawyer on Chi's legal team who teaches international law at Houston's University of St. Thomas, said Chi's guilt wasn't the issue.

"Chi is a murderer, Medellin is a murderer," O'Rourke said. "But we don't kill all murderers. We don't execute all murderers. We do it according to the law.

"When your state violates international law to kill somebody, it has very negative consequences."

Chi was set to die last September, but his execution was stopped because the Supreme Court was looking into whether lethal injection procedures were unconstitutionally cruel. When the justices earlier this year upheld the method as proper, his date was reset for Thursday.

The getaway driver at the murder scene, Hugo Sierra, who is the brother of Chi's girlfriend, is serving a life prison term.

Chi would say little about the crime in an interview with The Associated Press shortly before his then-scheduled execution last year.

"My situation is not about being innocent or guilty," he said. "My rights were violated."

"If it's the Lord's will" and he was executed, Chi said he had "great peace in my mind and soul."

Four other Texas prisoners are set to die this month, including two more next week. They're among at least 15 Texas inmates with execution dates in the coming months.

The total cost of the medical care for the still living people in that SUV could run into the millions.... not likely anyone from Mexico will be paying a dime of those costs either....

agree 100%. As long as we are governed by a punch of pussies it ain't gonna happen though.

There's not one damn job in America that an American won't do. But they won't do it for the low wages an illegal foreign trespasser will work for. All this "doing jobs Americans won't do" talk is pure BULLCHIT. The US needs absolutely no illegals in this country. Get them all the hell out NOW!! Yeah, I know, they're all good people contributing to the economy and trying to make a living. You know what? I'm a pretty decent guy contributing to the economy and trying to make a living too. Which laws do I get to break? Can I choose some? Will I be forgiven? Will the President and Congress try to tell law enforcement to just look the other way when I break them?

Our national sovereignty has been abandoned over this crap. We're willing to shed the blood of American soldiers to protect the borders of Iraq & Afganastan but not the borders of our own country and that's a battle that wouldn't take the better part of one morning.

Just drop the "we need illegals" crap. Move to Mexico and see how illegals are treated there. And stay.

I'm not so sure I can agree with that. I flipped burgers when I was younger, I washed dishes in a seafood restaurant, my wife made beds and cleaned hotel rooms, so why would you think that 25 years later Americans not capable of doing this work?

Back in the early eighties I worked for four years in a meat packing plant, the problem "as I see it" is that today Mexicans are now doing that job for the same wages I was making 20 years ago. You are right, the wages will stay the same so long as the steady supply of those who will accept them is not cut off. We don't need illegals, employers who wish to pay low wages need them.

Now we can argue who prospers from that scenario, low prices for all, or higher profits for buisness, but the fact that these jobs have gravitated from jobs that paid decent wages to jobs"Americans wont do" cannot be written off to American laziness when Americans performed ALL of these jobs in the past.