Stricken Man Taken to Tijuana : Farm Worker’s Body Returned for Autopsy

A witness to the fatal collapse of a Mexican farm worker at a farm in Jamul said Saturday the farm’s owner took the stricken man to Tijuana without notifying a doctor or U.S. authorities.

The United Farm Workers Union had the body of 32-year-old Juan Chabolla Casillas brought to San Diego Saturday for an autopsy, and has called for an investigation into his death.

Farm owner Fred Hatashita said he was just trying to get medical help for the man when he ordered that Chabolla be taken to Tijuana. He said he didn’t think of summoning paramedics.

“I didn’t know whether he was gone or not,” Hatashita said. “My mind was blank. The first thing I thought was to take him somewhere.”

Chabolla collapsed about 3 p.m. Monday in a tomato field at a Hatashita’s Mirada Farms after telling fellow workers that he smelled a strong odor and felt dizzy, co-worker Paulino Osorio Lopez said. Osorio said Chabolla was an illegal alien from Maneadero. A UFW spokesman said the field had been sprayed with pesticides at 7 a.m., and that workers entered the fields at 8 a.m.

After Chabolla collapsed, workers took him to Hatashita, who used a van to take him to Tijuana along with Osorio and farm foreman Jesus Sanchez. Osorio said he believes Chabolla was dead before he was placed in the van.

“He died in the field,” Osorio said. “We asked (Hatashita) that they take him to a doctor, but instead of taking him to a doctor, he took him to Tijuana.”

Hatashita said he thought Chabolla had fainted and wanted to take him to Grossmont Medical Center in La Mesa. Hatashita’s said he was told by Chabolla’s co-workers to take Chabolla to Tijuana.

Hatashita told Mexican border officers that Chabolla was sick and needed medical attention.

The van reached an emergency medical clinic in Tijuana about 4 p.m., where a doctor pronounced Chabolla dead. A report on an autopsy performed in Mexico said Chabolla died from asphyxiation caused by massive vomiting. An official in the Mexican district attorney’s office said when children die from vomiting it is often linked with ingestion of pesticides or other poisons.

Hatashita said no other workers at the farm reported illnesses.

A telegram from UFW leader Cesar Chavez to state Atty. Gen. John Van De Kamp on Friday asked for an investigation into the use of pesticides at the farm and the transporting of Chabolla to Mexico. Chavez asked that Chabolla’s body be returned to the United States for an autopsy.

“I don’t want everything to be buried with the body,” Chavez said, before the body was delivered to the San Diego County coroner’s office Saturday afternoon. A deputy coroner said an autopsy would be performed today.

Assistant Atty. Gen. Harley Mayfield said he was looking into the matter along with officials from the state and county agriculture departments. Mayfield said he was unsure of all the facts in the case but said transporting Chabolla into Mexico would not necessarily be unlawful, although “on its face, that seemed odd.”

Chabolla is survived by his wife and four children. His widow accompanied his body to San Diego.

“I want an investigation so I can be tranquil,” she said.