Pubdate: Sat, 22 Apr 2000
Source: San Diego Union Tribune (CA)
Copyright: 2000 Union-Tribune Publishing Co.
Contact:  PO Box 120191, San Diego, CA, 92112-0191
Fax: (619) 293-1440
Website: http://www.uniontrib.com/
Forum: http://www.uniontrib.com/cgi-bin/WebX
Author: Gregory Alan Gross, Staff Writer

HIGH-RANKING MEXICAN DRUG AGENT REPORTED MISSING

A high-ranking Mexican narcotics agent in Tijuana has been missing since 
April 10, the same day three other anti-drug agents disappeared in Baja 
California, a U.S. government official said yesterday. The other agents 
were later found dead.

The U.S. official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, identified the 
agent as Felipe Perez Cruz, a Mexican army major who at one time headed the 
Federal Judicial Police office in Tijuana.

"He is missing. We have been notified (by the Mexican government) that he 
has been missing since then," the official said.

The United States has no independent evidence that Perez has disappeared, 
the official said. "We're not confirming anything."

Word of Perez's disappearance comes on the heels of persistent reports in 
the Mexican press - and firm denials by Mexican officials - that he is missing.

On Tuesday, Mariano Herran Salvatti, director of the elite Mexican 
anti-narcotics arm known by the acronym FEADS, told Mexico City reporters 
that Perez is back at work.

"We have directly confirmed and verified through the Secretary of National 
Defense that Maj. Perez Cruz has resumed his (military) activities after 
terminating his commission in Tijuana," Herran said. So far, however, Perez 
has not appeared publicly since Mexican journalists first reported him 
missing almost two weeks ago.

Attempts yesterday to contact Mexican justice officials by telephone in 
Mexico City were unsuccessful.

Perez reportedly disappeared on the same day three members of FEADS, who 
had been working closely with U.S. law enforcement agencies, vanished while 
driving from San Diego into Tijuana.

The battered bodies of Jose Patino Moreno, Oscar Pompa Plaza and Rafael 
Torres Bernal were found in a crashed sedan that had gone over a cliff near 
the mountain town of La Rumorosa.

The Mexican federal Attorney General's Office later confirmed that the 
three men had been slain and the crash of their Chevrolet Lumina had been 
staged.

Patino, 48, and Pompa, 41, both were special prosectors for FEADS, while 
Torres, 29, was a Mexican Army captain on loan to the agency.

They reportedly had been involved in the investigation that led to the 
arrest in Tijuana last month of JesFAs Labra Aviles, who Mexican 
authorities say is the "financial brain" behind Tijuana's notorious 
Arellano Felix drug cartel.

They also were investigating the subsequent killing of Labra's Tijuana 
attorney, Gustavo Galvez Reyes, whose tortured, smothered body was found in 
Mexico City, a week after Labra's arrest.

The disappearance of Perez on the same day the trio vanished adds to 
questions surrounding the deaths of the three FEADS officers.

Those questions deepened last week when the Mexican government revealed the 
existence of a videotape shot by remote cameras at the Otay Mesa border 
crossing April 10. It showed the FEADS agents crossing the border about 
10:40 a.m., followed closely by a dark-colored Chevrolet Suburban.

Suburbans are the vehicle of choice for Mexican government officials and 
high-ranking law enforcement officers.

Perez arrived in Tijuana in January 1997 to lead the Federal Judicial 
Police under the regional command of Gen. Jose Luis Chavez Garcia, who had 
been brought in to head operations in Baja California for the PGR, the 
federal Attorney General's Office.

They arrived at a time when the Mexican government was giving its military 
a much larger role in anti-drug efforts, and Perez - nicknamed "El Puma" 
and "Yanqui" - was in the thick of it. They were reassigned to Mexico City 
in December 1998.

Perez became a familiar figure around Tijuana in his green Chevrolet 
Suburban, leading several high-profile arrests himself.

He personally collared Arturo "Quite" Paez, an alleged Tijuana 
"narco-junior" who quickly rose to become one of the cartel's most trusted 
figures. Paez is being held in Almoloya, a maximum-security prison near 
Mexico City, and the U.S. Attorney's Office in San Diego is seeking his 
extradition to the United States.

Perez also personally seized Amado Cruz, allegedly one of the cartel's 
principal money launderers. Cruz is serving a four-year sentence in Almoloya.
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jo-D