Manhunt begins for suspect in border agent's death

he FBI is offering a $100,000 reward for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of a suspect or &  suspects.

      (July 24, 2009)

By GILLIAN FLACCUS, Associated Press Writer

Federal investigators are combing hospitals along the U.S.-Mexico least two suspects who may have been injured in gunfire that killed Border Patrol agent in Southern California

Law enforcement agencies were pursuing "a number of leads" in the United States and in Mexico but no one has been arrested or charged with killing of   Agent Robert the FBI said late Friday.

Investigators said they have notified hospitals on both sides of the border to be alert for patients with suspicious or unexplained injuries.

The Los Angeles Times reported that police in Tecate, Mexico, said Friday they had arrested an injured man walking near the crime scene with a Border Patrol-issued weapon shortly after the shooting. The man, Ernesto Parra Valenzuela, 36, was taken to a hospital, according to a news release.

After-hours messages left for the FBI were not immediately returned.

Rosas, 30, was killed Thursday night while responding alone to a suspected border incursion near Campo, a town in rugged, arid terrain in southeastern San Diego County. He was shot in the head and body and was dead when backup agents arrived, said Keith Slotter, special agent in charge of the FBI's San Diego bureau.

Federal officials have expressed concerns that the drug cartel battles plaguing Mexico could spill into the United States with the targeting of U.S. law enforcement officials. Slotter said investigators aren't ruling out the possibility that Rosas was slain by drug smugglers or even human smugglers.

Investigators said blood evidence at the scene indicated at least one suspect and possibly more had serious injuries, perhaps by gunfire.

Investigators don't yet know how many shots were fired, if Rosas fired any shots himself and how many guns were used.

"It's all possible. I can't definitively say X number of people fired or Agent Rosas got off shots or didn't. I mean, it's too early in the investigation to say that with any certainty," Slotter said.

Authorities said at least one other agent in the field heard gunshots after Rosas left to respond to the call and couldn't reach Rosas on his radio afterward.

Rosas was the first Border Patrol agent to die in a shooting in more than a decade, according to the Officer Down Memorial Page Inc., which tracks fallen officers using information provided by law enforcement agencies. Another agent, Luis Aguilar, was intentionally run over by a fleeing man driving a drug-laden Hummer in January 2008.

Rosas, a three-year Border Patrol veteran, had a 2-year-old son and an 11-month-old daughter, said Richard Barlow, acting chief patrol agent for the Border Patrol's San Diego sector.

"My thoughts and condolences are with Agent Rosas' family and his fellow agents at this difficult time," said Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said in a statement. "His death is a vivid reminder that we are engaged in a serious effort to secure our border and that thousands of Border Patrol agents and other DHS employees risk their lives every single day to protect and defend our nation."

Barlow said he could not confirm reports that Rosas called for backup and then went ahead before anyone arrived. But he said it isn't unusual for agents to work alone along the 60 miles of border in the San Diego sector.

"It is a common occurrence for our agents to start tracking individuals or start pursuing individuals that make an incursion into the United State by himself prior to backup arriving," he said.

The San Diego sector of the Border Patrol has seen a 22 percent decrease in border apprehensions this year after a 7 percent increase in each of the previous two years. Barlow said agents routinely have rocks thrown at them and are physically assaulted.

The president of the union representing 17,000 Border Patrol agents declined to discuss the details of the shooting but said his organization has long been concerned about staffing levels and situations where agents work alone in the field.

T.J. Bonner, president of the National Border Patrol Council, said it was "fairly common for our agents throughout San Diego County and the rest of the country to work without a partner. They each have separate vehicles, and it's a matter of concern with us."

Since 1919, 108 Border Patrol agents have died on duty, according to The Officer Down Memorial Page Inc. Gunfire was the leading cause with 30 deaths, followed by automobile accidents and aircraft accidents.

The FBI is offering a $100,000 reward for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of a suspect or suspects.

Associated Press Writers Christina Hoag in Los Angeles and Amy Taxin in Long Beach contributed to this report.

More Illegal Alien Activity Around Our Country

July 25, 2009

Feds Arrest 3 Connected With Border Patrol Killing

Three people in connection with the Thursday killing of a Border Patrol agent in San Diego County were arrested at O'Connor Hospital in San Jose Friday.

Agents with the Department of Homeland Security surrounded the hospital and arrested two men and one woman.

At least one suspect wanted for the murder of a U.S. Border Patrol agent was reportedly injured during the attack and may seek medical attention on either side of the U.S.-Mexico border, authorities said Friday. Authorities said they traced the cell phone of one of the people arrested.

Investigators checked hospitals and medical facilities in hopes of finding whoever shot and killed Agent Robert Wimer Rosas, 30, late Thursday, said Keith Slotter, special agent in charge with the FBI's San Diego bureau.

Rosas spotted a suspicious group in the remote Campo area near the Mexican border Thursday night and called for backup, according to Border Patrol spokesman Daryl Reed. When the suspicious group split up, Rosas went after some suspects by himself. Other agents lost radio contact with him.

Around 9 p.m., the other agents heard gunshots and found the agent. Rosas was pronounced dead at the scene at about 9:15 p.m. on Shockey Truck Trail in Campo, Battalion Chief Nick Schuler said.

The San Diego County Sheriff's Department said Rosas was shot in the head.

Rosas was 30-years-old and had served with the Border Patrol for the past three years. He is survived by his wife, 2-year-old son and 11-month-old daughter.

Rep. Darrell Issa issued a statement Friday about Rosa's slaying.

"What happened last night was a tragedy and a painful acknowledgment that at any time, our Border Patrol agents may be put into an extraordinary circumstance," Issa said. "The thoughts and prayers of our entire region are with the family and friends of this fallen agent."

A search on both sides of the border after the killing failed to find anyone.

Copyright Associated Press / NBC Bay Area

More Illegal Alien Activity Around Our Country

The Associated Press

Border Patrol agents in the Tucson sector have arrested three illegal immigrants with sex-related charges or convictions for illegally re-entering the United States .

Agents arrested a 47-year-old Salvadoran man Saturday on the Tohono O'odham Indian Reservation who served about six months in prison for conviction of attempted rape and forcible sodomy in New York state before being deported in 2004.

On Sunday, agents arrested a 30-year-old Mexican man near Arivaca who was convicted in 1998 of sexually assaulting a 13-year-old in Illinois . An immigration judge deported the man in 2003.

Also on Sunday, a 23-year-old from Mexico City was arrested south of Ajo who has been charged twice since November with having sex with a minor.

More Illegal Alien Activity Around Our Country

Investigators battle giant coke operation

By TODD RICHMOND

Associated Press Writer

In this Midwestern town 1,500 miles from Mexico , in a place that proudly proclaims itself the birthplace of kindergarten, Coco the cocaine kingpin flourished.

Coco came to the United States illegally, and used layers of family members and henchmen to build an operation that saturated southeastern Wisconsin with cocaine until authorities moved in. Then the players started falling - two dead in Mexico , nearly two dozen locked up in American prisons.

It's a story that echoes elsewhere. The U.S. Justice Department says more than 200 U.S. cities have seen cartel-related drug smuggling. Much has been made of Houston 's gun trafficking, Phoenix 's kidnappings and Atlanta 's status as a drug-distribution hub.

But Coco's tale illustrates just how far from the border Mexican drug dealers set up shop, and how easily they infiltrate a town, hide in plain sight and build a lucrative operation.

"You feel that Watertown is a safe town and that you're isolated from a lot of that," said Karen Timm, 62, who lives two doors down from an apartment one of Coco 's dealers used. "Now you know that you're vulnerable."

In the late 1990s, Jefferson County Sheriff's drug officers started hearing about a Hispanic drug ring moving about a pound of cocaine into the area every month.

But they couldn't get anyone to name names.

In 2005, Detective Sgt. Tim Madson, leader of the Jefferson County Sheriff's drug task force, decided to question dealers and users more sharply about the ring, sometimes offering to reduce charges for information.

The same name kept surfacing: Coco.

In July 2007, an informant introduced Brian Prieve, an undercover Dodge County sheriff's deputy, to two Mexican distributors. Prieve started collecting phone numbers and placing cocaine orders with Coco , a cool, confident Mexican who spoke excellent English.

Coco never showed himself, always sending runners to deliver the drugs.

He was "just a voice," Prieve said.

Two months later, a 46-year-old drifter and suspected cocaine dealer named Arnold Wood called Madson and said he wanted to turn his life around. He talked about Coco .

Wood said he was buying up to 15 ounces of cocaine a day from Coco on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays. On Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, he bought up to 25 ounces a day.

He sold it all over the region. Business was so good he branched out to subcontractors.

Investigators still aren't certain where all the cocaine originated. Mexican cartels bring the drugs across the border and into hub cities such as Houston and Atlanta to be shipped out. From there it filters down through many distributors.

State Justice Department Special Agent Jim Engels, who helped Madson's task force on the case, said investigators could never establish a connection between Coco and the cartels. Their goal was far more immediate: clean up Watertown .

"The ultimate goal was to make a local impact, to get Coco and his group," Engels said. "The bottom line is this is where it (cartel cocaine) ends up."

But investigators struggled to connect the pieces.

Prieve was still buying drugs. Runners would show up, get in his car, give him the cocaine and leave within seconds.

Only 5 percent of the population in this town of 25,000 on the banks of the Rock River is of Hispanic descent, largely migrant workers who earned permanent jobs in nearby dairy farms and a cheese plant. But Coco knew how to blend in.

There were no shootings, no fancy mansions, no flashy cars. His gang drove old Impalas, Jettas and Camrys. Many lived in ramshackle apartments scattered around town, including one just across the street from the Kids Palace day care center.

Deborah Hockman and her three children lived next door to Coco 's brother, Efrain, but had no idea what he did for a living.

"They had little kids who came over and played with our kids," Hockman said. "Nothing ever made us think, 'Oh, they're druggies.'"

Coco himself drove a 1998 Chevy Blazer and lived in a sprawling brick apartment complex off Main Street . The only sign something was afoot? People stopped outside the apartment for a few minutes, sometimes in cars with tinted windows, and then left, said neighbor Pam Hearron.

The ring was building a base of middle-class buyers - men, women, whites, Hispanics.

They did 20 deals a day in broad daylight in parking lots, Madson said. When darkness fell and the stores closed and the lots were empty, they stopped answering their phones for fear their meetings would stand out. They never did business before 2 p.m. on Sundays, Madson said.

"They were just part of the scenery," he said.

The detectives watched, taking photographs and noting runners' cars. Officers waited for a reason to pull them over, then identified them and got addresses. They scoured apartment contracts trying to find out who lived with them.

Slowly, a picture emerged.

Using phone records, license plates and confirmation from Wood, the detectives identified Coco as 24-year-old Maximo Pineda Buenaventura. Pineda was an illegal immigrant from Pandacuareo, a remote mountain region in the Mexican state of Guerrero known as "Tierra Caliente" for its steamy climate. The region, heavily patrolled by the Mexican military, has been plagued by drug-war violence in recent years.

For his ring, Pineda had enlisted the help of his brothers, Efrain and Teodulo, an array of other extended family members and friends from Pandacuareo.

After weeks of undercover drug buys and surveillance, Engels and the team asked federal prosecutors in Madison for permission to tap the phones of drug ring members.

They were getting close. Prieve didn't know it at the time, but Coco had actually appeared at a deal and sat next to him.

But before the wiretaps could begin, everything nearly came apart. Prieve's contacts told him Coco had left for Mexico - gone to build a house.

Maybe, Engels thought, Coco is getting nervous.

Starting in February 2008, investigators spent as much as 12 hours a day, seven days a week, in the wiretap room, listening to five phones they'd identified through Prieve or by cross-referencing incoming calls. They estimate they intercepted 8,000 calls.

The hours took their toll. Madson had committed two members of his four-man drug task force to the Coco case full time for months, putting other cases on the back burner. The team talked at least three times about shutting down and arresting the players still in the area.

Patience, Engels said. Even though Coco was gone, the wiretaps were connecting more people.

And then Coco returned.

Before he'd left for Mexico , Coco had turned the business over to Efrain and his brother-in-law, Servando Herra Vazquez. But Efrain had his own cocaine business in Watertown ; he didn't devote as much attention to Coco 's customers, so Coco 's income dwindled. Then one of their chief runners got arrested on an outstanding warrant.

Soon the detectives were listening in as Efrain made arrangements to get Coco and his family smuggled back across the border. By mid-May, he was back in Watertown .

Coco took his phone back and revved up business, as agents listened in.

"Everything was matter of fact," Madson said. "'What do you want? Here's the price. Ten minutes.' Good coke dealer. Not paranoid. Very comfortable. Very confident."

The exhausted detectives were at a crossroads. They could keep trying to piece together Coco 's web. Or they could make their move.

On June 19, 2008 , more than 120 police officers fanned out across Watertown and Dodge and Rock counties with about a dozen search warrants.

Hearron, who lives across the street from Coco 's apartment complex, remembers police and drug dogs storming inside.

"Oh my God," Hearron remembered thinking. "What did they find over there?"

Back at the command post, Madson was asking himself the same question.

Slowly, the phone calls came in. The tally by the end of the morning: $112,000 seized in cash, including $59,000 hidden in the engine block of Coco's Chevy Blazer; about 2,460 grams of cocaine, hidden in a Special K cereal box and soda cans; a .22-caliber handgun at Efrain's apartment; a .357 handgun at Coco's apartment.

And the big one - Coco in cuffs.

All without a shot fired.

The repercussions were felt 1,500 miles away.

Gerardo Pineda Soria, arrested with about 800 grams of cocaine in his apartment, gave detectives a description of his supplier, according to his attorney, William Jones.

In February, a group of 10 people shot Pineda's brother, Cecilio, to death at a gas station in Zirandaro de los Chavez as Cecilio's 13-year-old daughter looked on, police said.

Several months later, Pineda's cousin, Jose Cruz Garcia Soria, was kidnapped from his truck. He was found dead by a river in Mexico , Jones said. Someone had tied his hands and beat him.

Twenty-one people have been charged in U.S. District Court. Four of those remain fugitives. Those in custody reached plea deals with prosecutors and got sentences ranging from six months to 17 1/2 years.

Coco 's attorney, Jonas Bednarek, argued for leniency. He told U.S. District Judge Barbara Crabb that his client quit school in Mexico when he was 11 or 12. Coco wasn't the ringleader, he claimed. His associates set up their own deals.

"I never thought that the penalties were so harsh for this and I will never ever do it again," Coco told Crabb. The judge didn't buy it and sentenced him to 17 1/2 years.

"You made cocaine available to all kinds of people that had an effect on lives that rippled way beyond yours," the judge told him.

Life goes on in Watertown - Farm Technology Days, swim lessons, T-ball. But Pam Hearron said the city has changed. She's taken to locking her doors and tailing her 3-year-old grandson wherever he goes.

"It makes me angry and sad," she said. "It's almost like you lose a piece of freedom you once had. ... That's kind of scary."

Associated Press writer Natalia Parra contributed to this report from Acapulco , Mexico .