In this monthly series, we republish a few of the headlines from our August editions 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50 years ago.
1968
False policemanbilks Americans
The “False Policeman” is back at work in Guadalajara and his most recent haul was 5,000 pesos from some unsuspecting Americans. He passes himself off as a “plain clothes” officer searching for counterfeit U.S. bills. He stops Americans,claiming that their money must be inspected and that they can pick it up at the U.S. Consulate General or the police station. Sometimes he even gives a receipt. His English is fair. Vice Consul Dan Turnquist says if this man accosts you, tell him you will accompany him to the U.S. Consulate or to the police station, but don’t give him your money. You will never see it again.
1978
Spa shutdown controversy
The Jalisco Judicial Police took two men into custody after the state Department of Health ordered the shut down of the Touch of Eden health spa operating inside the Hotel Real in Ajijic. An investigation which led to the police action was prompted by complaints lodged at two Mexican consulates in California and at local government offices by U.S. citizens who had taken treatments at the self-styled “rejuvenation spa.” The two men arrested were Richard Shaar and Ernesto Cordova Ibarra, who had been operating the facility, administering a variety of “youth” treatments, mostly to North Americans.
Shaar, according to literature distributed by Touch of Eden in Pasadena, California, is a U.S. citizen, who holds a degree in naturopathy and credentials in dermal therapy and cosmetology.
Among the allegations against Shaar are that he distributed illegal drugs, fraudulently claimed to cure patients of arthritis, rheumatism and senility, lacked the proper documents to either visit or work in Mexico and did not have credentials as a doctor. Cordova, a surgeon who graduated from the University of Guadalajara, is said to have given medical services as well as spa treatments. He was held for investigation.
Touch of Eden offered U.S. residents week-long package trips to Chapala, with treatments including manual and electrical massage, therapeutic baths and sauna, vitamins and injections of the controversial drug Gerovital H-3. The latter is a combination of buffered procain, benzoic acid and potassium. This drug has been banned by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
1988
Silt fills lakebed
Silt, not contamination, is the most difficult problem facing Lake Chapala, according to ecology expert Jose Briseño of the Institute of Astronomy and Meteorology at the Universidad de Guadalajara. He noted the silt brought by the Rio Lerma has raised the lake floor and turned the lake into a thin sheet of water, ever more susceptible to solar heating and rapid evaporation.
The Rio Lerma washes industrial wastes, garbage and sewage, which kill the fish, into the lake. But just two percent of it is mud, which kills the lake. At the beginning of the century the lake depth was measured at 12 meters; in 1920 at 9-15 meters; in 1973 at seven meters and in 1988 at four meters.
1998
City evacuates thousands
The 1992 sewer explosions that ripped open parts of Guadalajara’s east side cast a long shadow. At the least smell of diesel fuel or gasoline, the area’s residents recall the terror six years ago when more than 200 people died. In July, the nerves of residents of Calle Gante and neighboring streets were on edge again as those odors, all too familiar, floated in the air. Workers dug exploratory holes and found diesel oil in the subsoil of the area that was devastated in 1992. Streets and buildings had been reconstructed after the blasts, but someone had failed to remove all the contamination. Official assurances that there was no danger of explosion were not enough to calm people’s fears.
Than a second shock hit the city August 7, when workers monitoring the sewer at Avenida Juarez and Calzada de la Independencia discovered diesel fuel from an unknown source. Half an hour later, word came from railroad company, Ferromex, that one of its locomotives had accidentally dumped fuel oil more than 20 blocks away. Ferromex said the spill was 800 liters, but city officials estimated it at 4,500 liters.
Taking no chances, authorities closed off surrounding streets for five hours and evacuated Mariachi Plaza and El Parian commercial center, as well as some 2,700 merchants and hundreds of shoppers from the Libertad Market. Workers pumped thousands of liters of diesel fuel and water out of the sewer and flushed it with detergent and then pumped in carbon dioxide gas to reduce the risk of explosion in case more flammable materials appeared.
City, state and federal officials later this week decided to check the nine-kilometer sewer on Calle Gante from end to end for explosive substances and possible leaks.
Officials at the time of the 1992 explosions were blamed for not evacuating the area when they had advance warning of the risk. But the leader of the Libertad Market merchants has said they will sue whoever is responsible for evacuating the area of last week’s diesel spill because his association lost sales and 18 of their stores were robbed while the market was closed.
2008
Prez vs. kidnappers
Responding to public alarm following the grizzly murders last month of two young men from affluent families, President Felipe Calderon enacted a series of measures intended to stem a recent surge in kidnappings and address the growing perception that his government is unable to cull criminals from the ranks of its own security forces.
He announced that 300 specially trained and vetted officers will form anti-kidnapping units in five regional centers. He promised that investigators would be armed with advance technology and be routinely scrutinized for potential corruption and illicit activity. A gang called La Banda de La Flor, rumored to have deep ties to Mexico City law enforcement, is suspected of coordinating 14-year-old Fernando Martí Haik’s abduction from a federal investigative police checkpoint. The boy’s decomposed body was found in the trunk of a car August 1. Locally, an investigator in Jalisco’s anti-kidnapping unit stands accused of planning the extortion and murder of 17-year-old former kidnap victim Roberto Bernardino Campos and five other members of his family late last month.
Interior Minister Juan Camilo Mouriño said the federal government would assist state and local police agencies to sift through their ranks for bad seeds. There has been an 80-percent rise in kidnappings since 2007. The National Human Rights Commission estimates that less than one in three kidnappings are reported to police, largely due to distrust of officers.