Yup- everything is much better these days... Now I really feel for that family hoping their kidnapped son will be returned alive.
USA Today
Videos allegedly show Mexican police taking part in torture
MEXICO CITY (AP) — Videos showing city police practicing torture techniques on a fellow officer, dragging another through vomit and jumping on a
suspect created an uproar Tuesday in Mexico, which has struggled to eliminate torture by lawmen.
Two of the videos — broadcast by national television networks and displayed on newspaper Internet sites — showed what Leon city Police Chief Carlos
Tornero described as training for an elite unit that must face "real life, high-stress situations."
But many Mexicans saw a sinister side, especially at a moment when other police and soldiers across the country are struggling with scandals over
alleged abuses.
"They are teaching police ... to torture!" read the headline in the Mexico City newspaper Reforma.
The Guanajuato state human rights commission said it had opened an investigation.
One of the videos, first obtained by the newspaper El Heraldo de Leon, shows police appearing to squirt water up a man's nose — a technique once
notorious among Mexican police. Then they dunk his head in a hole said to be full of excrement and rats. The man gasps for air and moans repeatedly.
In another video, an unidentified English-speaking trainer has an exhausted agent roll into his own vomit. Other officers then drag him through the
mess.
"These are no more than training exercises for certain situations, but I want to stress that we are not showing people how to use these methods,"
Tornero said.
He said the English-speaking man was part of a private U.S. security company helping train the agents, but he refused to give details.
A third video transmitted by the Televisa network showed officers jumping on the ribs of a suspect curled into a fetal position in the bed of a
pickup. Tornero said that incident, which occurred several months earlier, was under investigation and that the officers involved had disappeared.
Mexican police often find themselves in the midst of brutal battles between drug gangs: Officials say that 450 police, soldiers and prosecutors have
lost their lives in the fight against organized crime since December 2006.
That may have eroded some of Mexico's gains in fighting decades of police brutality through the creation of federal and state human rights agencies
and repeated shakeups of police departments.
The uproar in Leon comes at the same time Mexico City police are struggling with a scandal over a botched raid on a disco. Investigators say police
forced panicked youths toward an exit that was blocked by other officers. Twelve people were trampled to death, including three officers.
Federal human rights groups are probing several cases of alleged illegal shootings and searches by soldiers.
George Grayson, a Mexico expert at the College of William & Mary in Virginia, said practices on the Leon video look like "techniques learned or
being taught to extract information from those apprehended by the police" rather than the practices of drug gangs.
He said it shows Mexico still has a long way to go in cleaning up its police.
"The police are just egregiously corrupt, and the corruption tends to be greater the further down the line you get," he said. "In municipalities,
there are few constraints."
[Edited on 7-1-2008 by Woooosh]Bajabus - 7-1-2008 at 12:38 PM
love the American trainer reference...at least we are exporting something to Mexico eh.DENNIS - 7-1-2008 at 12:54 PM
Quote:
Originally posted by Woooosh
"These are no more than training exercises for certain situations, but I want to stress that we are not showing people how to use these methods,"
Tornero said.
This guy has done so much dope he talks like one. Is anybody supposed to believe him?DENNIS - 7-1-2008 at 12:55 PM
Quote:
Originally posted by Bajabus
love the American trainer reference...at least we are exporting something to Mexico eh.
Blackwater has arrived.Woooosh - 7-1-2008 at 02:05 PM
So this is where Rummy has been. It's Guiliani time again? Has anyone seen the premium is for kidnap insurance in Mexico? I got a quote from a
London insurance outfit. $12K a year.
Police training is rough in Mexico. I filmed it front of my own house in Rosarito once. I couldn't believe the near drownings (in full uniform) and
abuse they were inflicting on the trainees. It look like my summer camp gone bad. We just watched in stunned disbelief.
[Edited on 7-1-2008 by Woooosh]Iflyfish - 7-2-2008 at 01:36 AM
At least they are following US model and not torturing, only using interview techniques.
