Top Mexico cops charged with favoring drug cartel
By MARK STEVENSON
MEXICO CITY – President Felipe Calderon's war on drug trafficking has led to his own doorstep, with the arrest of a dozen high-ranking officials with alleged ties to Mexico's most powerful drug gang, the Sinaloa Cartel. The U.S. praises Calderon for rooting out corruption at the top. But critics say the arrests reveal nothing more than a timeworn government tactic of protecting one cartel and cracking down on others. Operation Clean House comes just as the U.S. is giving Mexico its first installment of $400 million in equipment and technology to fight drugs. Most will go to a beefed-up federal police agency run by the same people whose top aides have been arrested as alleged Sinaloa spies. "If there is anything worse than a corrupt and ill-equipped cop, it is a corrupt and well-equipped cop," said criminal justice expert Jorge Chabat, who studies the drug trade. U.S. drug enforcement agents say they have no qualms about sending support to Mexico. "We've been working with the Mexican government for decades at the DEA," said Garrison Courtney, spokesman for the Drug Enforcement Administration. "Obviously, we ensure that the individuals we work with are vetted." Agents who conduct raids have long suspected Mexican government ties to Sinaloa, and rival drug gangs have advertised the alleged connection in banners hung from freeways. While raids against the rival Gulf cartel have netted suspects, those against Sinaloa almost always came up empty — or worse, said Agent Oscar Granados Salero of the Federal Investigative Agency, Mexico's equivalent of the FBI. more here....
http://news.yahoo.com mexico_cartel_in_control
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Man guilty of ID fraud to get work
http://www.nwanews.com/adg/News/250295/
A formal naval attache for the Peruvian Embassy in Washington pleaded guilty Thursday to fraudulent use of identification documents that he used to try to get a job in Rogers. Nestor Eduardo Perales-Paredes was one of two people who admitted Thursday to U.S. District Judge Jimm L. Hendren to using illegal documents to gain employment at the Embassy Suites. Perales-Paredes overstayed his visa by four years, according to court documents. He was one of four hotel employees arrested Sept. 28 by Northwest Arkansas' Immigration Criminal Apprehension Task Force. Local police, working with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, make up the task force. The task force also inspects work-identification records at businesses in Washington and Benton counties to make sure they aren't hiring illegal aliens. Evangelina Catalan-Flores, of Springdale, another of the Embassy Hotel workers, pleaded guilty to the same charge. They each face up to five years in prison and a maximum fine of $250,000, or both. One of the remaining two arrested in September pleaded guilty to misdemeanor illegal entry. Nora Pineda-Rodriguez of Rogers has already served a sentence of 21 days and faces deportation. The fourth worker, Maria Karina Salazar-Ortega of Lowell has a trial set for Feb. 11.
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