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Mexico asks investigation of detentions of immigrants in Arizona
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Posted on September 27, 2001 By Ignacio Ibarra ARIZONA DAILY STAR The incidents, the first reported in months in Cochise County, come as the Texas-based Ranch Rescue organization prepares for Operation Hawk, a repeat of its fall 2000 mission to aid Arizona ranchers repair fences and help resist an "invasion of illegal immigrant criminal trespassers." Arizona Law Enforcement officials said this week they were unaware of the Texas group's planned visit this fall. Arizona Attorney General Janet Napolitano warned that "Arizona has no room for vigilantism." Jack Foote, founder and spokesman for Ranch Rescue, said members and volunteers are invited by local property owners and conduct their activities only on individual property owners' land. He said they have more in common with the spirit of frontier barn-raisers than vigilantes. Last year the group spent the last week of September and the first week in October at Roger Barnett's Cross Rail Ranch, east of Douglas, fixing fences and doing other chores aimed at cleaning and repairing damage done by illegal entrants. In the first incident Saturday, three armed men in all-terrain vehicles, one identified as Roger Barnett, intercepted a group of five migrants about 8 miles northeast of Douglas and ordered them to walk to Highway 80. The Border Patrol was there to take the group into custody. On Sunday, John Petrello and a friend, Phillip Mathews of Tucson, used a handgun and a rifle to round up between 14 and 16 illegal entrants they spotted outside his Whetstone-area home at about 8:30 a.m. As Petrello detained the first group, Mathews stopped a second group of about a dozen migrants. When Border Patrol officers did arrive, they ordered Petrello and Mathews to surrender their weapons and called the Cochise County Sheriff's Department. Cochise County records show no previous contact with Petrello on any issue, but Petrello says that in March he fired nine rounds from a .40-caliber pistol into the ground to stop a group of what he suspects were drug mules from running down his pregnant wife and daughter. He called and reported it to the Sheriff's Department, he said, but was told it was a Border Patrol matter and no report was ever taken. The illegal entrants detained by Petrello and Mathews told sheriff's investigators the pair never pointed their weapons at them, said Cochise County Sheriff spokeswoman Carol Capas. "We are going to be submitting this report to the County Attorney for review," she said. Mexican Consul Miguel Escobar Valdez said when he interviewed members of the group detained by Petrello they indicated they had not been physically harmed. But when they were asked if they had felt intimidated about being detained by two men with weapons in their hands, he said "their response was the Spanish equivalent of 'absolutely, hell yes!' " The Border Patrol has since deported the 26 migrants detained in the Whetstone incident. |