Kidnappings along border are rarely random acts

By Alicia A. Caldwell / Associated Press
El Paso Times
Article Launched:01/06/2007 12:00:00 AM MST

A 29-year-old father of three disappears and turns up dead two weeks later. A prominent Laredo businessman and four others, including his son, are kidnapped and his hunting ranch is cleaned out.

These incidents three years apart offered examples of why Texas border residents might fear the worst, but retired federal agents who spent much of their careers investigating Mexican drug cartels said those behind such attacks are rarely interested in random acts and that Americans are seldom accidental victims.

"I don't think anything is random with these people," said Terry L. Nelson, who worked for customs. "They are professionals, they know their business. If they pick you up or stop your car, they know who you are and how much you can pay."

Janet Padilla disagrees.

Her husband, Luis, was killed three years ago in a crime linked to the Vicente Carrillo Fuentes drug cartel. Padilla never returned from work, and a friend called Janet Padilla to say he might have been shoved into the back of a police car in Juárez.

Two weeks later, she was asked to identify one of about a dozen bodies buried in the yard of a house in Juárez.

Most victims of cartel violence have some connection, if only by association, to the cartel, said Nelson and fellow retired customs agent Lee Morgan.