 |
 |
|
... More articles on page 3, Back to page 1... Chiapas: US Army Frets over New Forms of Social Struggle, (posted 2/22/99)
The Zapatista rebels inaugurated a new form of social struggle that shook the foundations of the Mexican political system and has implications in the future for the strategists of National Security from the United States at the international level. This is maintained in a study preared by the army of this country published this week. According to the investigation, Mexico is the laboratory of a new type of conflict that is managed through the articulation of local and transnational networks, and which uses the technology of the age of computers to promote its objectives. Its authors define this as a new dimension of strategic studies: the "War of Networks" or NetWar. That model was introduced by the EZLN and it represents a new challenge for those in charge of the policies regarding national security, both in Mexico, the United States and the rest of the world. "According to conventional mediators, the EZLN has never had much in the order of battle equipment, only a mixture of weird weapons and a few formations combat size", argued David Ronfeldt and his coauthors in their book published by Rand Corporation. However, in the Zapatista 'Social Netwar' in Mexico, they claim that the EZLN "has shaken the foundations of the Mexican political system, by creating extraordinary pressures in favor of democratic reforms and raising the spectrum of instability of the neighbor on the side of America". Links with the NGOs In the 168-page study they begin by describing the uprising in Chiapas, focusing on the EZLN's links with the media and the local and trans-national NGOs. "The NGOs were able to form trans-border coalitions that were highly interconnected and coordinated to create a social netwar in the age of computers that would limit the Mexican government and would support the EZLN's cause." The "netwar" concept which Ronfeldt concedes is part of the EZLN's strategy is defined as the development of the social struggle through a scheme of networks, or "network war". That, according to the expert on strategic and military matters regarding Mexico, is what gives a particular definition to the EZLN's struggle and what distinguishes it from a classic guerrilla insurgency. That new type of conflict depends, to a great extent, on the technological changes in communication, and in particular on the information exchange through the Internet network. "While the 'information operations' were put in foreground, the insurgents decentralized their organization even more and deemphasized combat operations in order to obtain firmer links with the NGOs", the authors point out. They maintain that the Zapatistas dominated the political debate in Mexico for two years using that type of strategy, and they offer a detailed analysis of the links between th EZLN and local and international NGOs, as well as of the use of the new technology to spread out the information about the conflict. The Mexican government's response was to try to change the focus: from a fight against the guerrilla movement to how to face a social network war. The Center of National Security Investigations (CISEN) of the Department of the Interior established a group of interagencies to coordinate the efforts of various government offices, but it only had limited success. "There has been a constant tension and an interplay, on the one hand, in dealing with the Zapatista movement as a social networks' war in the computer age, and on the other, wishing to treat it as insurgency", the researchers argue. "Mexican military personnel and the NGOs are the powers that frame that conflict", they say. But according to those Rand experts, in their investigation which was ordered by the U.S. Army, those actors also present a problem for the U.S.'s wider political objectives. "Neither the State, nor the NGOs, who include many leftists and center-leftists, seem to favor Mexico's transition to an open market economy", they claim. The authors argue that the Zapatista network "seems to be beyond its highest point", although they advise that the conflict has not ended and it could reactivate. The study suggests that Mexico is now at "the stage of more network wars" than any other society in a similar stage of development. "The potential risk in a more serious future for Mexico is not a civil war of antiquity, or another social revolution-that type of situation is not very probable. The greatest risk is a plethora of social network, guerilla and criminal wars. Mexico's security (or insecurity) in the computer age could be, increasingly, a function of network wars of all types." However, the authors consider that it is very unlikely that those factors can provoke a greater instability in Mexico in the short run. Nevertheless, they propose that the military men of the U.S. ought to adopt a policy of "cautious opening" towards their Mexican counterparts, and they warn that a very close relationship with military personnel in Mexico could implicate them in strong-arm policies and strategies in Mexico. Military and Strategic Worry An important point in all that, for Ronfeldt and his colleagues, is that the Chiapas conflict has implications for the military strategy of the U.S. in general. "Why does that matter to the U.S. Army?", they ask. "To a great extent, it matters because the world is changing in ways that could have more of a probability of showing more network wars than traditionl insurgency wars in many Nation States that are allied, or are of interest, to the United States. The authors maintain that the U.S. military must center its attention in the activities of the NGOs and Internet communication. "The NGOs of global civil society, whose focus is more informative than economic, political or military, could end up being more powerful as political and strategic instruments in the computer age", they conclude. The text of the study is available in the Internet: http://www.rand.org/publications/MR/MR994/MR994.pdf/ NUEVO AMANECER PRESS - N.A.P. To know about us visit: http://www.nap.cuhm.mx/nap0.htm
(spanish) Urban Patrols Push U.S.-Bound Migrants Into Remote Areas, (posted 2/22/99)
ON THE RIO GRANDEAs the Border Patrol boat rounded the river bend, a group of Mexicans on the high southern bank waved their arms and pointed to the murky water below. One youth clutched his neck with both hands to indicate someone had drowned. About 20 feet beneath them, floating face down, the body of a woman was tethered to an overhanging tree to keep it from drifting away before rescue workers could bring it up the steep embankment. The word on the Mexican side was that a man had also drowned during a crossing to the United States the night before, and the group on the riverbank wanted the Border Patrol to join the search for his body. The unidentified woman was one of the latest victims of an illegal migration that has claimed the lives of untold thousands of people over the decades. By most accounts, the trek has grown more treacherous in recent years, with rising death tolls along certain stretches of border. The danger attracted national attention last summer. Scores of undocumented immigrants died of heat stroke in deserts on the U.S. side as temperatures soared above 100 degrees day after day. But an equal number of people drowned in the waterways that separate the United States from Mexico, the Immigration and Naturalization Service says. The deaths stem in part from a U.S. border strategy aimed at pushing illegal crossers away from urban centers, where they can blend in with the local populace, and toward more remote areas where they risk prolonged exposure to the elements in much rougher terrain. However, U.S. officials and illegal immigrants also blame many deaths on professional alien smugglers, who have assumed a growing role in the cross-border traffic because of the increased difficulty of evading the Border Patrol's beefed-up forces and high-tech detection equipment. Smugglers have been accused of guiding people into hazardous areas and abandoning them, or overloading makeshift rafts for the short but often risky trip across the Rio Grande. According to the INS, 254 people died trying to cross the 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexican border in fiscal 1998, the first year in which the agency systematically compiled such statistics. Of the total, a third drowned, while another third died from heat exposure. The highest number of fatalities was recorded in California's El Centro Border Patrol sector, where 83 illegal immigrants perished in the desert or drowned in the deceptively swift-flowing All American Canal, which runs along 82 miles of border in Imperial Valley. The five sectors that span the Texas border along the Rio Grande from El Paso to McAllen accounted for 109 deaths, 43 percent of the total. More than 40 percent of the victims were never identified, U.S. officials said. While deaths have risen in remote areas of the border, they have dropped in more populated sections, where hundreds of illegal crossers formerly were hit by cars while trying to cross busy highways, said Renee Harris, the Border Patrol's Washington-based border safety coordinator. The Mexican Embassy in Washington says 368 migrants died trying to cross the border last year, 78 of them on the Mexican side. In a recent study, "Death at the Border," the University of Houston's Center for Immigration Research documented more than 1,600 "possible migrant fatalities" along the southwestern border from 1993 to 1997. Nearly 600 of them were "Rio Grande drowning deaths" that were reported by Mexican sources but not tallied in the United States, the report said. The Border Patrol acknowledges that its count is not comprehensive. It includes illegal immigrants whose deaths have been confirmed on U.S. territory, but not those whose remains were never found or whose bodies were recovered in Mexico. Among those not counted is the unidentified woman found floating in the Rio Grande late last month a few miles west of McAllen, Tex. According to the Border Patrol, she was in a group that tried to cross illegally after midnight on a small, rickety raft. Agents caught nine members of the group on the U.S. side and were told that two others had been lost when gusts of wind kicked up foot-high swells, capsizing the raft. The Border Patrol sent a dozen agents and a helicopter equipped with an infrared scope to search for the two, but nothing was found that night. The next morning, agents Mark Jones and Richard Johnston came upon the woman's floating body while patrolling the Rio Grande in the McAllen sector. "This happens probably more often than we know," said Jones, 38, as he piloted the 16-foot, flat-bottomed boat, one of 10 new craft that make up the only riverboat fleet in the Border Patrol. At the request of the Mexicans, the agents ventured up the river to look for the other reported victim. Carrizo cane growing on the banks rustled in the breeze as blue herons, ducks and kingfishers flew overhead or paddled in the greenish waters. A long-necked white egret stood on one leg, seemingly oblivious to the boat's passage. A turtle splashed into the water from a fallen tree limb at the river's edge. But while this river of contradictions harbors abundant wildlife and showcases spots of pristine beauty, its polluted waters also flow past man-made eyesores and detritus. Black inner tubes and plastic garbage bags dot the banks where alien-smugglers and drug-traffickers have brought their loads across. Among the junk left on the U.S. side are plastic bottles that have been tied together to make crude flotation devices, pieces of abandoned clothing, and rags tied to tree limbs to mark crossing points. And despite its often placid appearance, the river can be treacherous. Shallow enough to walk across in some places, it is more than 20 feet deep in others. To Mexicans, it is known as the Rio Bravo, an adjective that can mean valiant, but also savage or fierce. "Many times the water looks very still, but there are some undercurrents that are very strong," said Armando Mercado Jr., assistant Border Patrol agent-in-charge in McAllen. "It may be that it's named the Rio Bravo because it's very vicious and can easily end your life." Wearing bulletproof vests as protection against potshots by drug traffickers, Jones, who formerly served in the Coast Guard, and Johnston, a recent recruit who emigrated from Canada 10 years ago, peered into the vegetation on both banks of the river but could not find a second body. The Border Patrol later heard that the purported male victim, apparently the husband of the drowned woman, had turned up alive on the Mexican side after trying to rescue her. "Since she wound up on the Mexican side . . . [the woman] is not part of our statistics," Mercado said. As often happens, the smuggler hired to bring the group across was "irresponsible," he said. "It wouldn't take but an extra three minutes to make two trips, but that increases the chance of being caught. So they'll load these rafts beyond their capacity, and that's where they wind up having accidents." Smuggling guides known as "coyotes" have caused many deaths by abandoning their fee-paying charges in dangerous areas or turning them over to border bandits, illegal immigrants say. Other migrants have simply disappeared, their fates unknown. Fidencio Delgado Cardona, a 23-year-old Honduran interviewed at a Brownsville homeless shelter, said he was robbed before crossing the river last month with other young men from Central America, where Hurricane Mitch caused extensive damage last year. A coyote on the Mexican side "led us to bandits," who pulled guns on the group and demanded money, he said. "The coyote was in league with the robbers." Delgado, who said his father and two brothers were killed in the hurricane, knew that his trip to "El Norte" could be dangerous, but felt he had no choice. "I have an uncle who left for the United States 19 years ago," he said. "We never heard from him again. He left behind children who grew up never knowing their father. Is he dead? We don't know." Border Deaths Drowning and heat exposure cause most of the deaths of illegal immigrants trying to cross the U.S.-Mexico border. The Border Patrol says many deaths go uncounted because the bodies aren't found. Migrant deaths along border by Border Patrol sector
Cause of migrant border deaths
SOURCE: Immigration and Naturalization Service Two Steps Forward, Two Steps Back, (posted 2/22/99) Minorities make infinitesimal gains among large-firm partnership ranks
Alfred Moore laughs as he recounts the time opposing counsel, stalled in settlement talks, brought in a black lawyer to deal with him. "What is he going to do?" Moore mused to himself. "Talk jive to me?" The only African-American partner at San Francisco's Heller Ehrman White & McAuliffe, Moore, 42, would like to see more black faces in the office and he believes most large firms-including his own-are slowly moving in that direction. The numbers don't appear to support that perception. A recently released study by Washington, D.C.'s National Association of Law Placement shows that the ratio of minority partners at large law firms is up just one-one-thousandth over 1997, to 3.07 percent. Moore, a towering 6-foot-4-inch graduate of Duke University School of Law, says he doesn't believe minority lawyers face a greater challenge than their white counterparts when it comes to making partner at a large firm. Instead, he says a smaller pool of minority talent at top-tier law schools and increased opportunity outside traditional law firm work leave the partner ranks at most big firms devoid of much color. "The fact that there aren't more people like me doesn't mean I have to feel uncomfortable," he says. "Do [clients] send me work because I happen to be a black lawyer? They send me work because I am, I believe, an excellent lawyer." Still, Moore says he sometimes gets puzzled when he looks around a conference room and sees he is the only person of color. If the NALP study is any guide, he shouldn't expect much company anytime soon. Even in cities like San Francisco, Palo Alto and Menlo Park, which continue to place better than most areas in the country when it comes to making minority partners, the overall numbers remain very low. The NALP study found that partnership ranks at firms surveyed in San Francisco had 4.6 percent minority representation. In Palo Alto, the average was 5.6 percent. In Los Angeles, the average is 5.85 percent. Offices in Menlo Park, Palo Alto and San Francisco rated highest in the survey in diversity among associates, with minority representation of 20 percent or more. Large Bay Area firms differed most from their peers around the nation in the relatively high percentage of Asian-American partners, according to NALP's 1997 survey. This year the organization did not break the survey down into separate minority groups, but Judith Collins, NALP's director of research and information, says little has changed since 1997. That year, African-Americans made up the largest group of minority partners, at 36.5 percent; Asian and Pacific Islanders accounted for 32 percent; and Hispanics 21 percent. Hispanic representation was highest in Los Angeles, while African-American partners are more common in cities such as Atlanta and Washington, D.C., according to last year's study. The 1998 study also looked at the numbers of women in law practices, finding that just 14.5 percent of all 43,249 partners included in the survey were women. Female lawyers appeared to be making inroads at the associate level, however, accounting for 40.9 percent of associates and 44 percent of summer associates. 'SUBTLE STEREOTYPES' The survey shows that bigger firms with more than 250 lawyers tended to have a higher number of minority partners. Mid-sized firms with between 100 and 250 lawyers, on the other hand, had the lowest percentage of minority partners. "It's not overt racism," says Drucilla Ramey, executive director of the Bar Association of San Francisco, who called the survey depressing. "It is subtle stereotypes that hold minorities back." Ramey, who tries to get firms to set goals for minority hiring, says firms need to look at where they are in minority hiring and think about how they got there. Then there is the Proposition 209 problem, as Ramey calls it. With more than 20 percent of the country's lawyers coming from University of California law schools, a decrease in minority admissions as a result of the 1996 anti-affirmative action initiative means there will be fewer minority lawyers to pick from, she says. Ramey says firms with affirmative approaches are better at raising minorities to partner than firms with a sink-or-swim attitude-no matter how color-blind the firm purports to be. Firms which have established a high number of minority partners already are also more likely to attract new minority candidates. "Success breeds success," says McCutchen, Doyle, Brown & Enersen of counsel Robert Sims. "A larger [minority] presence helps recruit and retain [minority lawyers]." Sims, who is black, says he chose McCutchen after leaving the U.S. State Department because of black partners David Andrews, who is now legal counsel for the State Department, and Raymond Marshall, president of the State Bar of California and today the only African-American partner at the firm. While Sims says there is a concerted effort by firms to recruit minority lawyers, retention has always been a challenge. He says the industry trend toward lateral movement among big-firm lawyers has an even more exaggerated effect on minorities. While most new associates do not expect to make partner at the first firm they join, Sims says the feeling is even more pronounced for minorities, who often lack the mentoring relationship needed to succeed on the partnership track. "Whites may think they won't make partner," BASF's Ramey says. "But they see a lot of partners that look like them." LACK OF ROLE MODELS In the Bay Area, which had the highest representation of minority associates, attorneys of color made up almost 35 percent of San Francisco summer associates. That number dropped to 20 percent by the time associates were polled and less than 5 percent in the partner ranks. Morrison & Foerster partner Arturo Gonzalez says it is extremely difficult for minorities to make partner, and those who do often leave the firm within five years. He says a lack of role models and the pressure of being the only minority makes partnership very difficult. Gonzalez says law firms that retain minorities successfully often have a strong pro bono practice. "Lawyers of color often feel an obligation to return something to their communities," he says. Adding that if MoFo didn't have a strong commitment to pro bono work, he would have walked a long time ago. The bottom line, says Gonzalez, is that law firms will be quicker to diversify if clients put pressure on the partners to do so. Gonzalez says firms must adapt to a more diverse landscape. In 10 years, he says, the firms that diversify will be more successful than the firms that don't. "Both clients and law firms have been slow to appreciate the importance of putting a trial team in front of a jury that looks like [the jury]," Gonzalez says. Heller's Moore says the challenge for law firms is to recruit talented minorities from law school and give those lawyers the opportunity to prove their merit. Not one to condone special treatment for minorities, Moore advocates that firms just give all associates the same opportunity to prove themselves through good work. "It has nothing to do with how much melanin I have in my skin," Moore says about his skills as a bankruptcy lawyer. But sometimes he thinks, "wouldn't it be nice not to be referred to as an excellent black lawyer." He is not there yet. Copyright © 1999 ALM IP, LLC-American Lawyer Media. All rights reserved. The Canaries of Southeast LA, (posted 2/22/99) By David Bacon LOS ANGELES (2/14/99) -- In the days before sophisticated monitoring equipment, coal miners discovered that canaries were sensitive to the odorless methane gas which often built up inside the mines. When the tiny yellow birds began to droop, miners knew their lives depended on quickly leaving the shafts before an accidental spark detonated an explosion. In southeast Los Angeles, children are like the canaries carried into the coal pits of Pennsylvania and West Virginia. Like canaries, children are more sensitive to toxic chemicals than adults. An examination of the location of schools in southeast Los Angeles reveals that they play and study in a chemical soup blanketing whole communities. And the disastrous health effects of that pollution often show up first in the schoolyard. In 1989, southeast LA's industrial past resurfaced in one of the three poorest cities in the US - Cudahy. At Park Avenue Elementary School, parents and teachers noticed a black tar-like substance bubbling up through cracks in the asphalt covering the school playground. It had an acrid, pungent smell. The 1989 incident was not the first. A Cudahy policeman, Jose Mireles, told the LA Times that "it was coming up when I attended school there from 1971 to 1975. There was also a rotten egg smell in the summer. You couldn't breathe. We thought it was normal." By 1989, people didn't think it was normal anymore. Children complained of getting bad headaches, or that they felt weak when they got home from school. Parents and teachers demanded answers about the possible consequences to children playing in the yard. The school district and the Environmental Protection Agency discovered the black sludge contained methylene chloride, methylnapthalene, phenanthrene, pyrene, benzo pyrine and hydrogen sulfide. These chemicals can cause cancer, eye and skin irritation, and kidney and respiratory illness. The school had been built in 1968 on top of an old landfill, into which industrial wastes had been dumped in the 1930s, 40s and 50s. The district finally evacuated the school for a year. An asphalt cap with an undlying liner was put over the schoolyard, and the school reopened once more. Continuous monitoring afterwards found no detectable traces of toxic chemicals. Past industrial contamination isn't the only source of toxic pollution, however. Many southeast schools are located next to existing sources of toxic emissions. In 1986, a ruptured pipeline at a Purex plant released a cloud of chlorine gas which drifted over Tweedy Elementary School in Southgate. Seventy-one people were sent to the hospital, including 27 children. The spill galvanized Tweedy's parents, who demanded health testing for the school's children and teachers. County Health Department officials denied that children would suffer longterm health effects from exposure to chlorine gas. But "if you have an asthmatic child sensitive to this environment, your child should not be here," said the department's Dr. Paul Papanek. Parents discovered that the school was surrounded by at least 16 different industrial facilities. Some had been cited by the Air Quality Management District for a variety of violations, including open spray-painting, emitting dust and odors, and illegal emissions of industrial solvents. But the most dangerous facility was located just on the other side of a chain link fence from the schoolyard. Cooper Drum Co., which cleans and stores industrial drums, for years had been emitting significant amounts of hexavalent chromium, a chemical identified as a carcinogen in the mid-1980s, and ammonium hydroxide. Ten months after the spill, principal David Sanchez requested and received a transfer, since he continued to suffer respiratory problems, nausea and headaches. Parents protested that the district was transferring the principal, while leaving the children exposed to the same conditions. Finally, Tweedy was closed, and moved a few blocks away. Today, the original Tweedy schoolyard is still vacant. Weeds grow up through the schoolyard, and abandoned buildings fall into disrepair. The drum facility is still in operation. In 1988, concerns over the effects of hexavalent chromium led to protests at another southeast LA school - Suva Elementary and Intermediate School in Bell Gardens. That year two teachers miscarried deformed fetuses, while third teacher had to abort one. Research by Suva employee Roberta Swanson revealed that four out of five pregnant school employees had miscarried. The Suva school sits right next to two chrome plating plants, Chrome Crankshaft Co. and J&S Chrome Plating Co. Both have been discharging hexavalent chromium for 30 years. The Health Department's Dr. Paul Papanek spoke to Suva teachers and parents, assuring them that the chemical's level at the school was similar to that in the Los Angeles Basin as a whole - five to ten nanograms per cubic meter of air. He admitted, however, that a longterm exposure of one nanogram can result in 150 additional cancer cases per million people. Ultimately, despite studies, no direct cause was found for the high incidence of miscarraiges among Suva teachers. The school remains open, and the plating plants continue to operate. "In my opinion, the Board of Education has done everything it can," said Montebello Unified School District President John Cook. "There is really not a lot more we can do." That lack of answers doesn't satisfy many teachers and parents, but it does highlight the problem of schools in southeast LA. They can't simply relocate children and teachers out of a community overburdened with toxic pollution. The communities of southeast Los Angeles suffer from toxic contamination at a rate significantly higher than the LA basin overall. Pollution is concentrated in eight cities where the percentage of Latino residents ranges from 75% in Vernon to 93% in Maywood. It is an overwhelmingly immigrant population-as high as 52% in Huntington Park, and 58% in Cudahy. And it is a poor population. Cudahy and Bell Gardens are two of the three poorest suburban communities in the country, and unemployment is double the national average-over 10% in every city. A study by researchers at Occidental College found that about 493,000 blacks, Latinos, Asians and Native Americans in LA County live within half a mile of a hazardous waste treatment or storage facility, compared to 107,000 white residents. It's no surprise, therefore, that Park Avenue Elementary School is located in Cudahy, rather than, for instance, the upper middle-class communities of Sierra Madre, San Marino, Palos Verdes or Bel Air. The children exposed to high levels of hexavalent chromium and other toxic air emissions from surrounding factories are the predominantly poor and minority children of southeast Los Angeles. They are the canaries, involuntary participants in a huge environmental experiment. Damage to their health has become an early-warning sign of danger to the health of the entire population of the Los Angeles basin. INS Raid Is Called Retaliatory By Tenants, (posted 2/22/99) Landlord hit by complaints over bad living conditions Julie N. Lynem, Chronicle Staff Writer Tears roll down Olga Fierros' cheeks when she talks about the raid by the Immigration and Naturalization Service at her Redwood City apartment building last fall. She and other tenants say their landlord, Giuseppe Ruggiero, called the INS in retaliation for complaints about deplorable living conditions at the 16-unit complex on Chestnut Street. On the morning of October 18, INS agents assisted by the Redwood City Police Department stormed in and ordered residents-many partially clad and in stocking feet-into the hallway, Fierros recalled yesterday. The authorities addressed some of the tenants with racial slurs and ordered at least two women to lift up their blouses, she said. By the time it was over, about 18 people had been taken into custody. That day, they voluntarily returned to Mexico under INS safeguard. Fierros plans to file suit Tuesday on the tenants' behalf. Her complaint, which could not be filed yesterday due to a court holiday, alleges that Ruggiero broke his promise to provide habitable housing and set in motion unlawful evictions that resulted in the displacement of Latino families. About a dozen tenants and community activists picketed in front of the apartment complex early yesterday and then visited Ruggiero at his San Bruno office, where he rejected the allegation that he ordered the INS raid. Ruggiero stared straight ahead at the crowd confronting him before giving his side of the story. He declined a copy of the lawsuit. "They can say whatever they like,´´ Ruggiero said. "I did not under any circumstances call the INS. My business is not calling the INS. It´s taking care of tenants.´´ Ruggiero, who has owned the building since 1997, also refuted claims that his complex is in poor shape. "I´ve done everything possible to help the tenants,´´ he said. "I put on a new roof. I´ve done my best to keep up the property. What else can I do?´´ Sharon Rummery, INS San Francisco district director of public affairs, said the operation stemmed from an anonymous tip that individuals in the building were making counterfeit documents and that some residents were using them. Two INS agents, Rummery said, went to the apartment complex that morning and started knocking on doors. When the agents found the men they were searching for, they spoke only to them. They accompanied a few of the men, who were partially clothed, to their apartments so they could find a shirt. Between 16 and 20 people were returned to Mexico that day, Rummery said. The allegations that agents used racist language and asked women to show them their breasts are false, she said. "We would never do that,´´ Rummery said. Because agents received an anonymous tip, the INS would not know if it had come from the landlord, Rummery said. "We do not ordinarily work that way,´´ she said. "We received an anonymous tip, and we followed up on that tip." Renee Saucedo, staff attorney with La Raza Centro Legal in San Francisco, said she is standing behind the tenants, who have lived day to day with moldy bathrooms, broken windows, cockroaches and inadequate plumbing. La Raza Centro Legal responded after tenants called to complain about the shoddy conditions. A series of meetings was held with residents, and it was determined that Ruggiero had broken the law, Saucedo said. "It was important for us to handle this case, not only because he broke the law, but because we wanted to send a message out that it was unacceptable for him to use the INS in order to intimidate these families,´´ she said. Paul Cohen, another attorney on the case, said Ruggiero is "notorious´´ for evicting people who complain about his property. He said he is presently working on other cases in which Ruggiero is either named as the owner or manager of the property. Cohen said La Raza Centro Legal hopes to meet with INS officials soon to discuss the matter. They already have been in contact with the Redwood City police to talk about establishing a "no collaboration´´ policy between law enforcement and INS enforcement agencies. Fierros said the damage has been done. "It was a traumatic experience for us,´´ she said. "We all feel terrorized whenever someone knocks on our doors." ©1999 San Francisco Chronicle Page A17 Channel 10 Hires News Chief From Florida, (posted 2/22/99)
A seasoned TV executive from Florida has been hired by KGTV/Channel 10 to lead the station out of its ratings doldrums and calm what has been a tumultuous year for the newsroom. Seeking to maintain the delivery of "significant, relevant newscasts" to local viewers, Channel 10 has hired Mike Stutz, news director of WJXT/Channel 4 in Jacksonville, Fla., to take over the San Diego station's news department. Stutz will assume his duties here March 1. He replaces Don Wells, who is returning to his previous Channel 10 job as creative services director after a tenure in which he came under fire for not retaining a respected Latina reporter and for the station's inability to rise from also-ran status in the ratings. "I know San Diego is a very competitive market," Stutz said yesterday. "I've seen the numbers . . . there's some good-looking competitive newscasts. I'm impressed with the job they do at (Channel) 10 and am looking forward to the chance of helping the station stay in the news game." Stutz, 46, is arriving as Channel 10 (an ABC affiliate owned by McGraw-Hill Companies) is in a fierce ratings battle with its two principal competitors: KFMB/Channel 8 and KNSD/Channel 39. Channel 10 lately has been airing promotions for its news operation by attacking Channel 8, considered the best local station for breaking news. Last fall, during a noontime newscast, Channel 8 aired a high-speed police chase in Los Angeles. Using that event in its recent on-air promotions, Channel 10 criticizes Channel 8's news decisions. It also calls the station's news helicopter "a toy." Despite the swipes at Channel 8 (a CBS affiliate), San Diegans have preferred its 4, 5 and 6:30 p.m. newscasts, according to the Nielsen ratings. Channel 39's 11 p.m. news report continues to win that time slot. In a separate division from Channels 8, 10 and 39 is KUSI/Channel 51, which has a newsroom operation of fewer than 70 employees and only a 10 p.m. news program. Later this year, XETV/Channel 6 and KSWB/Channel 69 will enter the news reporting business, each with a 10 p.m. newscast going directly against Channel 51. Stutz regards himself as "a meat and potatoes" newsman interested in reporting the issues that concern a community. Under his direction the past four years, WJXT has won (in 1997 and last year) the Radio and Television News Directors Association National Edward R. Murrow Award for Overall Excellence. The honors were bestowed primarily for the quality of WJXT's spot news reporting and community involvement. Jacksonville is the 52nd-largest media market in the United States. San Diego is 26th. Stutz is a native of Minnesota and a graduate of the University of Missouri. Besides Jacksonville, he has worked in Milwaukee, Denver and St. Louis. "Mike has the experience to take us further down the road toward consistently delivering significant, relevant newscasts to our audience," said Wells, who was Channel 10 news director for slightly more than two years. Wells' return to creative services has been in the works for some time. Although he aggressively competed as news director with his counterparts, Wells and Channel 10 management recently came under fire from a number of Latino organizations in the wake of the ouster of Latino affairs reporter Laura Castaneda. In November, Wells notified Castaneda that her contract (after three years of service) was not being renewed because he was concerned about the consistency of her reporting, level of productivity and involvement in the Channel 10 newsroom environment. Castaneda suspected a more troubling reason for her departure. She contended that Wells told her that it was a conflict of interest for her to be president of the California Chicano News Media Association, which last summer criticized KFMB/AM 760 sports talk show host Hank Bauer for saying a Channel 10 "Hispanic reporter" he had seen on TV one night was "really awful." A year ago, Wells took heat from the gay community after Channel 10 took a hidden camera into a men's room at San Diego State University to expose what he said was "illegal" sexual activity. National English-Only Group Sets its Sights on Utah, (posted 2/15/99) SALT LAKE CITY, February 13 -- The Washington, D.C., group U.S.English will not take no for an answer. With or without Rep. Tammy Rowan's endorsement, the group dedicated to making English the official language of every state said Friday that it will give money and support to put the issue on the Utah ballot in 2000. And that's not all. U.S.English Chairman and CEO Mauro Mujica also said his group will actively campaign against Utah lawmakers who voted down versions of Rowan's English-only bills. "Our members in Utah are determined to pass this initiative," Mujica said in a prepared statement. "We will work with our members to expose the politicians who oppose our common language." The statement came the day after Rowan, R-Orem, surprised her colleagues in the House by trying to revive a modified English As Official Language bill. The attempt failed by a 38-36 vote. (Desert News) Suits Challenge English-Only Law, (posted 2/15/99) ANCHORAGE , February 13 -- A Yup'ik-speaking village on the edge of Bristol Bay filed suit in state court Friday to stop the English-only law scheduled to go into effect next month throughout Alaska. The suit was filed in Dillingham Superior Court on behalf of officials and residents of Togiak, a fishing community of about 750 people. A separate lawsuit, challenging the new law on behalf of 27 plaintiffs from other Alaska communities, was filed late Friday in Anchorage, said Jennifer Rudinger, executive director of the Alaska Civil Liberties Union. The law, approved in November by 69 percent of Alaska voters, requires that government business, with some exceptions, be conducted only in English. Togiak conducts most of its business, including City Council meetings, in Yup'ik. (Anchorage Daily News) The Nation's Business, (posted 2/15/99) FROM UNIVERSAL PRESS SYNDICATE For more than a year, we've heard people from all across the political spectrum speak of the need for politicians to get back to minding the nation's business. Everyone, including politicians, has repeated the mantra of saving Social Security, rebuilding our national defense and cutting taxes as examples of what the business of lawmakers ought to be. Yet nowhere to be found is a greater vision, such as the goal of eliminating poverty. We might also ask, Where is our nation's heart? It's little wonder that members of Congress have had so much time on their hands recently. The issues they raise are the same ones they ineffectively deal with year in and year out. Incompetency aside, the time is now at hand to determine what this country's business should really be. Eliminating domestic poverty, say within 25 years, requires something more than trite minds. It requires creating a new vision for the United States. Doing this is the social equivalent of Kennedy's vision in the early 1960s of putting a man on the moon. Instead, Congress has been sending the message that the lives of 14 million children living in poverty are not national priorities. The new way of dealing with poverty in this country is to shift responsibility for the poor to the states. This has little to do with ending poverty and is particularly harsh in communities of color. The National Latino Children's Institute estimates that 40 percent of black and Latino children live in poverty. In a broader sense, what we actually need is a national dialogue regarding our societal priorities. We are confident that in such a dialogue, the military-industrial complex would lose out in favor of resolving our complex human relations. Under fire from his impeachment trial, President Clinton's recent kowtowing to the military-industrial complex has resulted in him proposing to revive former President Reagan's Cold War relic, the Star Wars defense program. When that war was in full swing, Reagan's idea was deemed as unworkable and extremely costly. Now, without real enemies, throwing $112 billion dollars at this program requires no vision and will simply amount to a huge governmental jobs program. More than anything, it will take away money that could instead be "thrown" at schools, where the true antidote to poverty exists-better education. (A case for eliminating poverty does not need to be made; what's lacking is the leadership and the commitment to eliminate it.) In speaking recently at a media conference at San Francisco State University, professor and African-American intellectual Manning Marable spoke of the need to redefine the meaning of what it means to be an American within the context of the nation's changing demographics. What also needs to be redefined, we would add, is what it means to be a human being. In our vision, being human means creating a society without legal and illegal populations. And just as important, that vision includes creating a society that Pope John Paul II speaks of: one without moral, spiritual or material poverty. While some politicians combat spiritual poverty, many fall short when comes to ending material poverty. For some, the simpleminded solution to having illegal aliens or poor people in our midst is to get rid of them or segregate them from public view. Of course, it's easier to deport people or lock them up-to shift the problem elsewhere-than to work toward the elimination of the root causes of poverty and migration. If we as a society were to embark on the task of eliminating poverty, we would invariably realize that our world is completely interconnected, which would also inspire efforts to eliminate world hunger. Perhaps the reason politicians don't rise up beyond partisan politics and declare that we as a society will eliminate poverty is that it would require too much work, cooperation and imagination. And too costly? Not quite. The Children's Defense Fund concludes that poverty costs the U.S. economy $130 billion a year because of the millions of impoverished youth who are less educated, will earn less and will be less productive. Most people already know that it's less expensive to educate than to imprison large sectors of uneducated and untrained populations. It is possible that the hearts of our politicians are in the right place. Perhaps they're not so good at math. COPYRIGHT 1999 UNIVERSAL PRESS SYNDICATE Both writers are authors of Gonzales/Rodriguez: Uncut & Uncensored (ISBN 0-918520-22-3 UC Berkeley, Ethnic Studies Library, Publications Unit. Rodriguez is the author of Justice: A Question of Race (Cloth ISBN 0-927534-69-X paper ISBN 0-927534-68-1 Bilingual Review Press) and the antibook, The X in La Raza II and Codex Tamuanchan: On Becoming Human. They can be reached at PO BOX 7905, Albq NM 87194-7904, 505-242-7282 or XColumn@aol.com Gonzales's direct line is 505-248-0092 or PatiGonzaJ@aol.com. Shroud of Secrecy Over Urban War Game, (posted 2/15/99) Police station torched in pitched grenade battle in Texas By David M. Bresnahan When Operation "Last Dance" began in Kingsville, Texas, soldiers arrived in unmarked helicopters. Explosions were set off. A gunbattle ensued. One building burned and another was badly damaged. It was all part of a secret training exercise that took place Monday night in a town of 25,000 not far from Corpus Christi. The local police were involved, as was the mayor, but almost no one will talk about it. The Army Special Operations Command at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, has confirmed the event was the kick off of a series of similar training operations going on in Kingsville, Corpus Christi, and Fort Sam Houston. Additional training events will take place each day until Feb. 20. Little warning was given to civilians prior to the event that startled many. The police first fibbed to local businesses early in the day, telling them that a police exercise would take place that night. One hour before the helicopters arrived they decided to go back to the businesses and tell them a military exercise would take place and not to be concerned. A warning would have helped the many residents avoid panic, but they were not told in advance. The sound of the eight or more helicopters, explosions, and rapid gun fire caused hundreds of calls to the 911 dispatch center. Additional people were placed on duty to take the many anticipated calls. City officials claim they were not permitted to warn residents. The Army wanted the exercise to be conducted in a realistic environment. "The training has an emphasis on urban environment training and land navigation. Before we even rolled into Texas we did a thorough risk assessment and a safety study to ensure risks to the local population is minimized, as well as any risk to our soldiers," explained Carol Darby, a civilian public affairs officer for the Army Special Operations Command at Fort Bragg. An unidentified soldier involved in the exercise came from Kingsville and recommended the location. Planning began many months in advance, but the actual plans for the event by the soldiers involved began only hours before they carried out the mock mission. The scenario was staged as a real event would be, with soldiers having to deal with a situation quickly and without preparation. "The benefit that this kind of training has is having something that is done in a realistic time frame. A lot of times it's a very, very short notice (to the soldiers involved)," Darby told WorldNetDaily. "We do this type of training in urban areas because of the increased urbanization of the world. Urban environments is one of the environments that we have to train in because of our deploy ability requirements to be able to conduct operations world wide. "We look at different areas because of the characteristics in those areas and the challenges that those characteristics present to our training." She said soldiers cannot always train just at the Fort Bragg facility. Soldiers need a real environment to train in, rather than the fake city used at Fort Bragg known as "Military Operations in Urbanized Terrain." The Marines have a similar training facility at Camp Lejeune, N.C. She said there will be a different scenario for each part of the exercise with many soldiers participating. The number involved, and their nationality was not disclosed. One witness to the exercise told WorldNetDaily that the soldiers appeared to be multi-national, but this could not be confirmed. This exercise was not the first, nor will it be the last. Similar events are planned form many locations all over the United States, and a "peace training" exercise is taking place in Louisiana at the same time as Operation Last Dance. "We look at different sizes of urban areas from a smaller area to a larger area because of those challenges that it presents, because we don't know where the next hot spots in the world will be," Darby explained. Although the training takes place in many U.S. cities and towns, the troops involved could be called to respond to problems anywhere in the world. WorldNetDaily requested permission to observe a future exercise. The request was turned down. "The press cannot observe because of some of the tactics that we use. We do try to protect those. Another reason is safety," said Darby. She was not aware of any coordination with other branches of the military, and she did not know if this had anything to do with President Clinton's recent proposal for a Homelands Defense Command. The purpose of the training exercise also was not disclosed. She would not say if it dealt with terrorists, hostages, domestic, or foreign scenarios. Witnesses described the exercise as extremely frightening. The estimated eight helicopters landed one after another with soldiers jumping out quickly. The helicopters left as quickly as they arrived. Explosions came from within a two-story former Exxon building, then rapid gunfire was exchanged between two warring factions. Extensive damage to the building was caused by grenades used in the explosions. A vacant police station was used by the forces as well. They were using a welding torch for some undisclosed reason and accidentally set off a fire that gutted the inside of the building. The fire department, which was notified to be on standby, was able to extinguish the blaze before damage to other buildings took place. The city has been promised it will be compensated for the damage to the old police station, which is considered to be destroyed. The Exxon building also suffered extensive damage. When asked about the damage, Esquivel first denied that it even happened, then he explained that he had not yet received a report of damages but confessed he knew of the damage. No one was injured, according to Police Chief Felipe Garza, who would not discuss the exercise. He and Mayor Phil Esquivel refused to give much information. They claimed they had been sworn to total secrecy. Residents who spoke to WorldNetDaily complained, expressed fear, and did not want such an exercise in their town again. Several spoke harshly against their elected leaders for permitting the exercise. David M. Bresnahan, a contributing editor for WorldNetDaily.com, is the author of "Cover Up: The Art and Science of Political Deception," and offers a monthly newsletter "Talk USA Investigative Reports." He may be reached through email and also maintains a website. What Happened In Kingsville, Texas Monday Night?, (posted 2/15/99) Residents Report Unmarked Helicopters, Soldiers Dropping From Ropes WorldNetDaily.com KINGSVILLE, Texas-Local residents are distraught over a near disaster during a secret Army training exercise. Local officials claim they were sworn to secrecy. Getting factual information about what happened is next to impossible. Reports from residents told of low flying, unmarked helicopters and soldiers dropping down from ropes in the center of the town after dark Monday night. WorldNetDaily was told that the police station burned and a commercial building was severely damaged. The assistant police chief confirmed what no one else would admit. "The United States Army Special Operations Command was conducting a training exercise in our area," admitted Arthur Rogers when the police chief was unavailable for comment. He refused further details. That was more than Mayor Phil Esquivel would disclose. He said he was sworn to secrecy for national security reasons. His answers were evasive and without detail. When Esquivel was asked about damage he denied there was any. When he was told that damage was reported by a witness, he revised his comments. "If there was any damage done, they were going to repair it, but I haven't gotten an assessment of the properties," the mayor stated. He then admitted there was a fire, but would not comment on the cause or the extent of damage. Was there damage to a building? "Possibly," said Esquivel. "An abandoned building that was going to be torn down anyway." It was learned from another witness that the damaged building was a commercial building that is not going to be torn down. Witnesses reported that black helicopters with no identification markings flew into the city just after dark. They arrived in the center of the city, which had been evacuated by police. The secret training exercise lasted several hours. When it was over an abandoned police station had been accidentally set on fire and the Exxon building was badly damaged when one or more helicopters landed on the roof. Windows of buildings were also broken. "I live out in the country and they flew right over us and our house just trembled. That's how low they were going," said Thelma, a resident who would give only her first name. Esquivel claims he is just being a good citizen by not giving the details. He confirmed that he had granted permission for the exercise, but he refused to say how long ago permission was granted or which branch of the military was involved. "They asked me to keep it secret," repeated Esquivel several times. "I respect national security. It was very well controlled and no one was hurt. "It didn't expend city taxpayers dollars. It did not put citizens of Kingsville in jeopardy. The police department warned all surrounding neighbors. We're supporting national security." Many residents have been complaining extensively. In between life insurance sales appointments, the mayor has been fielding angry phone calls. "I'm glad that this gets out. This is total B.S. If we don't stop it now it's going to get worse," John Rohmfeld, who lives there, told WorldNetDaily. "Apparently this was a secret operation. "They meant to come in here and see what the hell they can get away with. I'm not going to let them get away with it," he stated. The mayor tells all the concerned callers the same thing: "It was a training exercise that would insure national security if we ever need it. It was asked not to disclose what armed services or what division of the armed services it was in, but it is supporting national security." There are 25,000 residents of Kingsville, a town near Corpus Christi and home of the Kingsville Naval Station. Residents are used to seeing military people around town, but not rappelling down from helicopters. They want to know what happened in their town. Not knowing causes fear, and refusal to answer questions causes them to lose trust in their leaders. The local barber shop is usually the center of gossip and discussion of current events. The day after the exercise there were only questions and doubt, which were the result of no official word on what happened. "I don't like something like that. I don't like what was going on," said barber Joel Gant. For now, the questions remain. The army public relations officer failed to return calls from WorldNetDaily, and no one in an official position was willing to explain what happened. Potential Blow to Miranda Rights, (posted 2/15/99) Circuit court allows defendant's confession to bank robbery By Pete Williams WASHINGTON, Feb. 9 - In a potential blow to 30 years of Miranda rights, a federal appeals court has ruled that a defendant's confession to a bank robbery must be allowed as evidence at his trial, even though he had not received his Miranda warning. The ruling relies on a little-used federal law that says confessions can be admitted as long as they are voluntary. UNDER A LANDMARK 1966 Supreme Court ruling - Miranda vs. Arizona - police are not allowed to use a confession unless they warn a suspect in advance that he or she has a right to remain silent, that anything said can will be used as evidence and that the suspect has a right to a lawyer. In federal and state prosecutions ever since, failure to recite the Miranda rights most often has resulted in a valuable piece of evidence - a confession or some incriminating statement - being lost to prosecutors. In 1968, Congress rebelled against the Miranda rule, saying it coddled criminals, and passed a law that says in federal courts, a confession can be used if it was made voluntarily, even if no Miranda warning was issued. But the law has languished in legal obscurity because the Justice Department has declined to enforce it, even to the point of ordering federal prosecutors to back off when they try to get confessions admitted against suspects who didn't get Miranda warnings. In a letter to Congress two years ago, Attorney General Janet Reno called the law unconstitutional. THE RULING But now, in a blistering opinion handed down late Monday, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va., has ruled that a defendant's confession to bank robbery must be admitted as evidence in his trial, even though he had not received his Miranda warning before talking. The 2-1 majority opinion attacks the Justice Department for consistently refusing to fight to admit confessions in cases like this. That refusal, the majority says, "may have produced the acquittal and the non-prosecution of many dangerous felons, enabling them to continue their depredations upon our citizens. There is no excuse for this." The court ruled that Congress had the power to establish rules of evidence in federal courts and acted within its authority when it passed the 1968 law. "As a consequence," the ruling says, that law and not the Miranda rule "governs the admissibility of confessions in federal court." The case involves Charles Dickerson, who confessed in 1997 to robbing a series of banks in Maryland and Virginia. But shortly after giving a statement to investigators, he went to court to block its use, arguing that he made his confession before police advised him of his Miranda rights. A U.S. district court judge agreed the confession could not be used as evidence, even though it was given voluntarily. HEADED FOR SUPREME COURT? Technically, the appeals court ruling now applies only in the 4th Circuit, which includes Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina and South Carolina. But it raises fundamental questions about the Supreme Court's Miranda decision and could well wind up before the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court has shown little recent interest in overturning its Miranda decision, even though the makeup of the court today is more conservative than it was when Miranda was handed down. And some legal scholars note that police groups now generally accept the Miranda ruling as a fact of life and are not clamoring for its reversal. Still, the Miranda decision remains one of the most controversial of all the court's modern rulings on the rights of suspects in criminal cases. Legal scholars who defend the ruling say it gives "breathing space" to the 5th Amendment right against self-incrimination. "The Supreme Court was right to fashion the Miranda rule as a way to prevent abuses by police. The court cannot sit there and try to hear hundreds of cases a year about whether interrogations were conducted properly," says Professor Yale Kamisar of the University of Michigan Law School, an expert on the Miranda ruling. Pete Williams covers the Justice Department for NBC News. LAPD Officer Arrested For Robberies, (posted 2/15/99) Authorities Say Crimes Took Place While On Duty KCBS-TV Channel 2 L.A. Posted 11:10 p.m. February 8, 1999 -- A Los Angeles police officer was arrested Monday and charged with robbing six men while on duty near downtown in 1997 and 1998. Officer Ernest John Orona, 40, is accused of pulling over mostly Spanish-speaking motorists and robbing them, said news wire reports. Orona, a training officer who has worked out of the Hollenbeck Station for most of his 12 years with the department, was arrested at the station, said news wires. Orona posted $150,000 bond and was released. He is scheduled to enter a plea to the charges on March 1. Most of the crimes occurred in 1998, but detectives with the Internal Affairs and Robbery-Homicide divisions are investigating whether there are other victims. Orona faces up to six years and four months in prison if convicted. Los Angeles police Chief Bernard Parks told reporters at a news conference that detectives were unable to supply a motive for the crimes. "We would suspect (immigrants) were the most vulnerable ... not being familiar with the legal system or understanding the circumstances," Parks said, according to news wires. The amount of money involved the robberies appeared to be relatively small, but Orona committed the crimes while in a patrol car "and we presume in uniform," Parks said. The investigation of Orona began when some victims complained to police, Parks said. The probe had been going on for months, and the first composite sketch of the suspect was completed last June, he said. The chief asked other possible victims to come forward. Anyone who suspects they were robbed by Orona was asked to call (213) 485-2511 during office hours, or (213) 485-2504 after hours. Compiled by Channel 2 Staff Rural N.C. To Get Aid for LEP-Student Influx, (posted 2/15/99) LEE COUNTY, N.C., January 27 -- After four years of pleas from the state school board for assistance and an explosion in the population of non-English-speaking residents, lawmakers answered in the state's fiscal 1999 budget approved last fall. It lays out statewide standards for serving LEP students and provides $5 million to help districts meet them. (Education Week) Capitol Digest: Ron Unz Named to Finance Panel, (posted 2/15/99) SACRAMENTO, January 27 -- Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa, D-Los Angeles, has named bilingual-education foe Ron Unz and 25 others to a blue-ribbon panel to develop recommendations on state and local government finance. Unz is the Silicon Valley software entrepreneur who won passage last year of Proposition 227, the anti-bilingual education measure now in force. Villaraigosa and Unz were on opposite sides in the battle over Proposition 227. (Sacramento Bee) JSRI Home | Community Connections | Latino News Archives
|
|
|
|
For more information, contact: |
