United States law enforcement authorities, seeking to avert a spillover of drug violence from Mexican border cities, are cautiously trying out new cross-border cooperation with the Mexican federal police, according to senior Homeland Security officials. The efforts will include coordinated operations and expanded intelligence sharing. American border and customs agents are working more directly with the Mexican police, the officials said, despite a history of collaboration efforts that were compromised by leaks through Mexican authorities to traffickers and smugglers south of the border. [continues 955 words]
Crime: He Was Also A Customer And Business Partner Of One Of That Nation'S Most Notorious Drug Traffickers. Mexico City - His fans thought of him as the Sunday afternoon television comic whose vulgar but ruthlessly funny jokes about their lives helped them while away tedium and laugh away woes. But according to murder indictments handed down in Mexico City late Friday, the much-watched comedian, Francisco Stanley Albaitero, was also a customer and business partner of one of Mexico's most notorious drug traffickers. And his satire was so demeaning to those close to him, the police said, that his sidekick conspired in his murder. [continues 719 words]
Two Books Revisit Charges That The C.I.A. Condoned The Sale Of Crack. For Gary Webb, this should have been ''the Big One,'' the story that leads to the Pulitzer, fame and glory. In August 1996 he wrote a three-part series in The San Jose Mercury News, entitled ''Dark Alliance,'' on the origins of the crack cocaine epidemic in Los Angeles. The series implied that the Central Intelligence Agency encouraged the drug trafficking and knew that some of the profits were being funneled to the contra rebels in Nicaragua. [continues 986 words]
MEXICO CITY -- A flap over an undercover money-laundering operation by American customs agents has escalated into a full-scale diplomatic altercation that has strained the close ties between the United States and Mexico. The feud took a new turn Friday with the publication here of a letter from Sen. Trent Lott, the Senate majority leader, to President Ernesto Zedillo. In the May 26 letter the senator expressed his "deep disappointment" over recent comments by Zedillo that the operation violated Mexican law and sovereignty as well as several bilateral cooperation agreements. [continues 514 words]
MEXICO CITY When U.S. agents in San Diego arrested two men suspected in the brazen murder of an Mexican antidrug prosecutor, officials in both countries praised the operation as a stellar instance of crossborder cooperation. The arrests came after Mexican authorities gave their U.S. counterparts evidence gleaned from a fastmoving inquiry that pinpointed the suspects' whereabouts to a stylish beach community on the California coast. It was, seemingly, a triumph for Mexican law enforcement officials, who have frequently been criticized for both ineptitude and corrupt ties to drug lords said to spend billions of dollars on payoffs. [continues 1725 words]
