Mexican Asylum Applications Reflect 'Systematic Takeover' - Spector

"The emptying of Guadalupe comes at a time when officials in Ciudad Juárez, about 30 miles away, are promoting tourism and celebrating a decrease in bloodshed after years of carnage that claimed thousands of lives.  Many Guadalupe residents have fled to Texas cities including Fabens, directly across the border, and El Paso.  Among them is Gerardo Gamez, the former city leader of the main political group here, the Institutional Revolutionary Party, which is also the party of the Chihuahua governor, César Duarte Jáquez, and of President Enrique Peña Nieto.  Mr. Gamez left Guadalupe with his parents and is seeking asylum in Texas.  They are being held in an immigration detention center in El Paso, said his El Paso-based lawyer, Carlos Spector, who has represented at least 300 Mexican citizens seeking asylum in the United States.  Mr. Spector said Mr. Gamez’s flight after being threatened by criminals highlights the continued and systematic takeover of municipalities in Mexico by organized crime.  And it is happening right under the government’s nose.  “It’s a new era of violence that we’ve seen in the Valley of Juárez and in Guerrero,” Mr. Spector said at a recent news conference. Mr. Spector is trying to draw attention to the situation in Guadalupe by comparing it to the higher-profile violence in the southern Mexican state of Guerrero, where 43 students went missing after a protest in the city of Iguala.  At least 56 people, including some police officers, have been arrested in connection with the missing students.  The state’s governor resigned last month, and the city’s mayor and his wife have been named as suspects.  The Guerrero unrest shows that the Guadalupe violence “is not an isolated incident,” Mr. Spector said." - Texas Tribune, Nov. 2, 2014.