Juarez Top Cop Faces Allegations of Kidnapping
2011-04-05
Posted by: badanov
By Chris Covert
On the first day, March 11th, newly appointed Juarez police chief Julian Leyzaola Perez had impressed Juarez street police officers with his action oriented approach to management. Two issues were addressed the very first day, including assurances to female officers that middle managers would no longer cover for officers who sexually harassed their female counterparts
The other was his willingness to be on the ground and not in his office, according to news articles an issue with municipal police officers with the last police chief.
Leyzaola Perez has garnered an impressive record in his previous job as police chief in Tijuana, Baja California, a record so impressive, he had been commonly credited with reducing massive drug and gang crime violence.
His record had gained him an appointment as deputy director of Baja California's Secretaria de Seguridad Publica, appointed by Governor José Guadalupe Osuna Millan in December 2010, the last post he held before taking the Juarez job.
Leyzaola Perez's record also included accusations by Human Rights Watch of favoring one drug gang over another as a strategy to reduce drug crime violence, a strategy supported by a local Tijuana business organization. His methods has also gained some positive mention in US Wikileaks cables.
But on March 26th an arrest by several Juarez municipal police officers of four suspects involving two of the four assistants Leyzaola Perez brought with him to Juarez may prove to be his undoing.
Juan Carlos Chavira, 28, Dante Castillo de la O, 25, Raul Navarro, 29, all Nextel employees, and Felix Vizcarra, 22, a car salesman were arrested by Juarez police officers manning five police units in Juarez Saturday night near a busy market near the corner of calles De la Paz and Oasis Revolucion in the Oasis Revolucion colony, according to local Mexican press. The Ford pickup truck they were in was found abandoned in a tunnel a kilometer away the next day with the registration gone and the keys in the floorboards.
Two of the police units, specifically 509 and 504, were identified by witnesses who observed the arrest, which are units assigned to be part of Leyzaola Perez's security detail.
On March 27th, Rosa Maria and Armida Vazquez, the mother and sister of two of the missing went to several Juarez municipal and Chihuahua state police substations, and apparently the local Policia Federal headquarters to find where they were, but to no avail. The following day, a case was filed with the Chihuahua state prosecutor numbered 8/77/11.
Neither state police nor Juarez municipal police have stated they have the four in custody.
Extrajudicial abductions are rare in Mexico, but they have taken place on occasion. The last known sanctioned kidnapping was last summer when two undercover Policia Federal agents were detained by Tijuana, Baja California municipal police agents acting on an anonymous tip, taken to a military base, beaten then later released. A subsequent confrontation between the local Policia Federal detachment and Tijuana municipal police came very close to ending in gunfire.
To read the Rantburg report on last summer's near shootout between Mexican Federal agents and Tijuana poice click here.
Two other cases of putative Juarez police involvement took place last year as well, one apparently turning out to be in fact organized crime.
In early May, 2010, four men, all US citizens, were kidnapped from a Catholic wedding ceremony in Juarez. Originally, local Mexican press reported the victims had been abducted by police agents, at least that was the accusation by relatives at the wedding. Three of the victims were found dead two days later in two separate locations.
To read Rantburg report on the recovery of the three dead in May, click here.
To read the Rantburg report on the original crime, erroneously reported at the time as a triple murder, click here ( last item ).
The fourth victim was released in a rescue in a Policia Federal operation nine days later.
To read the Rantburg report on the rescue operation click here.
The other case involved two missing 13 year old girls whose mothers accused Policia Federal and local police of kidnapping. It turned out the two teens ditched school after attending a late night party the day they came up missing .
To read the Rantburg report on the missing teen girls, click here (the Wait-Until-Your-Father-Gets-Home Department item)