Pubdate: Fri, 21 Jan 2000 Source: The El Paso Times (TX) Copyright: 2000 The El Paso Times Contact: P.O.Box 20, El Paso, Texas 79999 Fax: (915) 546-6415 Website: http://www.borderlandnews.com/ Author: Diana Washington Valdez, El Paso Times MEXICAN AND FBI INVESTIGATORS CALL OFF SEARCH FOR BODIES IN JUAREZ REGION Mexican and FBI investigators have called off the search that turned up nine bodies at four sites in the Juarez region, Mexico’s top law enforcement official announced Thursday. During a press conference in Mexico City, Attorney General Jorge Madrazo said investigators were interviewing witnesses to the suspected drug slayings. Jose Larrieta, chief of the Mexican attorney general’s organized crime unit, said seven of the bodies were tentatively identified. He would not release their names or indicate if any of them were U.S. citizens. “What we have developed in this investigation will lead to very interesting things,” Larrieta said. “We will find the people responsible.” Madrazo said five people have been detained in the case, but he would not provide details. Mexican officials said the dead men were killed by the drug-trafficking organization associated with the late drug kingpin Amado Carrillo Fuentes. The binational investigation into the deaths and disappearances of people in Juarez began Nov. 29, with reports that as many as 100 bodies may be buried in mass graves around the city. The initial investigation involved 65 FBI agents, 400 Mexican army soldiers and 200 Mexican federal officials. Heavily armed soldiers wearing face masks guarded the FBI agents and Mexican forensics experts during the excavations. “There is testimony (from informants and other witnesses) that there were these graves, and we were investigating more than 100 disappearances,” Larrieta said in response to questions about initial reports that investigators were looking for 100 or more bodies at the four ranches. The FBI specialists finished their work in Juarez in mid-December, officials said. El Paso FBI Special Agent Andrea Simmons said, “The FBI is still involved with the general investigation, and there are still FBI agents actively investigating the disappearance of U.S. citizens.” Simmons said the FBI returned the bodies Wednesday to Mexico, “because it’s their evidence, after FBI experts finished collecting samples for DNA analysis.” U.S. and Mexican officials had agreed that “the Mexican attorney general will notify the victims’s relatives and then release their identities,” Simmons said. Forensics experts spent two weeks digging with backhoes and shovels at four ranch sites: Rancho de la Campana, 18 miles south of El Paso off the Casas Grandes Highway; a ranchette in the Granjas Santa Elena subdivision 20 miles south of El Paso; a ranchette on Luna Street about two miles from the Zaragoza Bridge; and Rancho Santa Rosalia, about 40 miles southwest of Juarez near Asencion. Officials said all the victims were men, four in their late 30s and five more than 50 years old. Six had been bound with duct tape, and the others appeared to have been blindfolded. Four were shot to death. The cause of death of the other five is still being investigated. Madrazo appointed Special Prosecutor Enrique Cocina to investigate the disappearances. In recent years, Amnesty International and other international non-governmental groups also have investigated. In a report, Amnesty International suggested that some of the missing people could be held clandestinely in one of several military camps in Mexico. Such camps were used in the past to house political dissidents, often without notifying relatives or local authorities. Mexican officials said the people who disappeared from Juarez were involved in drug-trafficking, were kidnapped by rivals or were targeted because they investigated drug dealers. - --- MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart