Pubdate: Mon, 24 Dec 2001
Source: Dallas Morning News (TX)
Copyright: 2001 The Dallas Morning News
Contact:  http://www.dallasnews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/117
Author: David McLemore, The Dallas Morning News

CALL FOR MILITARY HAS BORDER UNEASY

Town Hasn't Forgotten How Marine On Drug Patrol Killed Teen In '97

REDFORD, Texas - The white cross, fashioned by hand, rises behind an old 
well on a stony hill near the Rio Grande. In the fading light of a winter 
sky, the cross shines like a beacon.

It marks the spot where Esequiel Hernandez Jr., 18, died May 20, 1997, the 
first American citizen in 30 years to be killed by the military on U.S. 
soil. A young Marine corporal on clandestine anti-drug patrol shot him. 
Just why remains a controversy.

The killing of Mr. Hernandez, a lanky, clean-cut kid known as "Zeke" in 
this West Texas border town, brought an end to the use of armed military 
patrols along the Southwestern border as part of the war on drugs.

That may change as a result of the Sept. 11 attacks. Congress and the White 
House want to place military troops along all borders to guard against 
terrorism. In Redford four years ago, it was a recipe for disaster.

"These hills along the river are our back yard. For the government, it was 
a battleground," said Diana Valenzuela, who lives a few hundred yards from 
the shooting site. "Now, they want to send troops again? That just means 
somebody else's kid will die."

The breakdown between federal law enforcement agencies and the military 
that resulted in Mr. Hernandez's death was an aberration, not the norm, 
said U.S. Rep. Lamar Smith, R-San Antonio. In 1998, Mr. Smith's 
investigation of the incident demonstrated numerous failures in mission 
training and information-sharing.

"There have been improvements within the agencies that create more 
sensitivity to the people who live on the border," Mr. Smith said. "We want 
to ensure that we don't mistake the good guys for the bad guys."

Redford, a small farming community 16 miles downriver from Presidio, exists 
in isolation on the Rio Grande amid the harsh beauty of the Big Bend 
country. Chartered in the 1870s, the village was once known as "El Polvo" - 
Spanish for "dust."

Today, about 100 people live in the scattering of faded adobe and 
cinderblock homes of Redford. At the elementary school sitting alongside 
the highway, "God Bless America" has been spelled out in sun-bleached, 
red-white-and-blue Styrofoam cups.

"This is a tiny community. And everyone is a part of the circle," said 
Enrique Madrid, whose great-grandfather helped Redford become a town. 
"Everywhere we walk, Zeke walked. Of course, his death is still felt here. 
They killed 1 percent of our town."

The shooting occurred in the dry ridges and arroyos near the river, amid 
the ruins of an abandoned Army post dating from the 1916 hunt for Pancho 
Villa, the last military incursion in Redford.

Controversy clouded the incident from the start. On that day, Marine Cpl. 
Clemente Banuelos, then 22, led one of the four-member surveillance patrols 
conducted along the border in support of Border Patrol anti-drug initiatives.

The Marines operated in secret, keeping watch over what the Border Patrol 
said were dangerous drug-crossing points. Residents point out there had 
been no drug arrests around Redford for years.

The Marines weren't told that residents used the crossing point regularly 
to visit Mexico. They weren't aware homes were set in the scrubland near 
their surveillance area.

And no one living in Redford knew that combat-equipped Marines were hiding 
in the brush.

The Marines' Account

According to Marine accounts and investigation reports, Cpl. Banuelos fired 
one shot after Mr. Hernandez fired twice at the Marines with his antique 
.22-caliber rifle and threatened to shoot again.

People in Redford don't believe it. They recall Zeke Hernandez as a good 
high school student who didn't smoke, drink, or have trouble with the law. 
The young man they knew rode in the annual Onion Day parade and hoped one 
day to be a park ranger. He carried the rifle only to protect his family's 
goats.

Time hasn't muted the sorrow of the shooting. Or the anger.

"We still have nightmares about it. Anytime a helicopter flies by, we run 
out to check on our children. It's not something we're ever going to 
forget," Mrs. Valenzuela said. "That day, we learned we couldn't trust our 
government."

The shooting spawned a series of state, federal, and military 
investigations. For Redford residents, the inquiries generated reams of 
paper but no justice.

Series of reviews

The April 1998 Marine investigation by retired Maj. Gen. John Coyne came 
closest. Though no charges were filed, Maj. Gen. Coyne determined that the 
Marine command, as well as other federal agencies involved, created an 
environment for tragedy through inadequate training and poor coordination.

After conducting its own inquiry, the Border Patrol acknowledged inadequate 
intelligence-sharing and poor coordination with the military, as well, but 
it did not accept any guilt.

In November 1998, Mr. Smith's subcommittee report issued a scathing 
criticism of the Border Patrol for its failure to advise Marines about 
local conditions and residents in the patrol area and for seriously 
impairing the criminal investigations that followed the shooting.

"Hernandez's death was attributable to a series of failures on the part of 
the Justice Department and Defense Department personnel who were negligent 
in their training and preparation for the border," according to the report.

While the congressional panel expressed doubts about how the shooting 
occurred, Mr. Smith said the course of events leading up to the shooting 
remained uncertain.

In settlement of a civil suit, the Hernandez family received a $1.9 million 
annuity from the government for its loss but no apology.

"The family is crushed, and they're trying to deal with it," said Mel La 
Follette, 71, a retired Episcopal priest who has lived in Redford since 
1984. "Zeke was a great kid. His death is something they'll never get over. 
And neither will the community. This is a community with an open wound. 
What will it take to heal? A few indictments would help."

Mr. Hernandez's death resulted in changes. In October 1998, the Pentagon 
ended armed military patrols in support of civil law enforcement anti-drug 
operations along the border.

Military units still carry out other anti-narcotics duties, including air 
reconnaissance, intelligence gathering, and road building along the border 
as part of the joint task force with federal authorities.

The House recently approved an amendment by Rep. James Traficant, D-Ohio, 
to return troops to the U.S.-Mexico border. Similar efforts died in the 
Senate. Next time around, considering the continuing wave of concern over 
homeland security, failure may not be an option.

In early December, U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft announced that 400 
National Guard troops would help police the Canadian border and that 
military helicopters would patrol rural areas.

"There is a great national concern about the need to do a better job of 
securing our borders. But any use of the military at the border will be for 
backup only," Mr. Smith said. "We don't want soldiers out there with the 
rifles pointing at everyone crossing the river."

A new presence

Last month, the long arm of homeland defense came to Redford. Federal 
authorities blockaded the shallow El Polvo crossing point with a load of 
boulders and a barricade as a security precaution. The people in Redford 
say that the only people affected by the closing are local residents. They 
have used the crossing for generations to see relatives in Mexico.

"They say truth is the first victim of war. That's certainly true in 
Redford," said Mr. La Follette, the retired Episcopal priest.

"The Border Patrol told the Marines we were all a bunch of desperados and 
narco-trafficantes. They misled everyone then. Are we now going to all 
become terrorists?"

Investigation reports show the Marines depended on Border Patrol 
intelligence that indicated that drug smugglers made up 70 to 75 percent of 
Redford's population.

"Since there's only 100 people here and 24 of them are in elementary 
school, that means the Marines were expecting every adult they saw to be a 
drug dealer," said Mr. Madrid. He documents that in 1997, there were only 
44 drug arrests in Presidio County. None of them occurred in Redford.

The town's anger isn't focused on the Marine who killed the teen. In 
conversations with Redford residents, no one speaks badly of Cpl. Banuelos.

"There were two lives destroyed that day - Zeke and the Marine who killed 
him," Ms. Valenzuela said. "That's a lesson I hope the government learns."

The hill where Mr. Hernandez died triangulates his short life and death 
with stunning economy. From the white cross, a visitor can down on the home 
where he spent his childhood, the greasewood-choked arroyo from where he 
was shot and the cemetery that holds his grave.

"We hope that this place creates an event so powerful, it changes the 
course of the nation," Mr. Madrid said. "We hope the terrible lessons 
learned from this hill will mean no other American will be killed by their 
own soldiers."
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MAP posted-by: Terry Liittschwager