Pubdate: Mon, 05 Dec 2005
Source: Billings Gazette, The (MT)
Copyright: 2005 The Billings Gazette
Contact:  http://www.billingsgazette.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/515
Author:  Will Weissert, Associated Press

MEXICO SAYS VIDEO WON'T COST FEDERAL INVESTIGATORS THEIR JOBS

MEXICO CITY -- Mexico's top anti-drug prosecutor will not lose his 
job despite doubts about whether federal agents were involved in the 
videotaped beating and torture of four drug hit men, a government 
spokesman said Monday.

Ruben Aguilar, chief spokesman for President Vicente Fox, said that 
no federal investigator was in danger of being fired in the wake of 
the recording, which has sent shock waves through Mexico's 
anti-narcotics efforts.

"It doesn't put anyone at risk" of losing their jobs, Aguilar said 
during his daily briefing with reporters.

But he refused to comment on a contradiction between the statements 
of Deputy Attorney General Jose Luis Santiago Vasconcelos -- Mexico's 
top drug trafficking and organized crime investigator -- and Attorney 
General Daniel Cabeza de Vaca.

Santiago Vasconcelos said last week that investigators were gathering 
evidence to charge 11 federal agents who had been hired by drug 
smugglers to kidnap and torture the people in the video. He said 
eight of those suspects had been arrested, but late Friday a judge 
freed five because of a lack of evidence.

On Sunday, Cabeza de Vaca said that there was no solid evidence yet 
that any federal agents were involved.

Aguilar refused to comment at length on the discrepancy, saying only 
that the president supports the comments made by his attorney general.

The video shows grainy images of four men sitting bruised, bloody and 
bound before a curtain of black garbage bags. Prodded by an unseen 
interrogator, they describe themselves as hit men for the Gulf 
Cartel, detailing how they kidnapped, tortured and killed their enemies.

They also say they worked with Mexican law enforcement agencies.

In one section of the video a hand clutching a gun appears and shoots 
one of the men in the head.

The DVD, time-stamped May 16, was sent anonymously to the Kitsap Sun 
in Bremerton, Washington, last month. The newspaper forwarded the 
recording to the Dallas Morning News, which released it, along last week.
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