Edward O’Connor, Southern Region INS Chief, Dies

Edward O’Connor, Southern Region commissioner of the Immigration and Naturalization Service since 1983 and prior to that the San Pedro-based chief INS officer in the Southwest, is dead at 58, the Justice Department said this week.

He died Friday at Baylor Medical Center in Dallas, after what a spokesman described as “a lengthy illness.”

O’Connor joined the INS as an associate commissioner in 1972 in Washington, before moving to California in 1975. He came here because of allegations of corruption among the federal officers who patrol the 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexican border.

O’Connor was elevated to Southern Region commissioner in 1983, with responsibility for INS border stations and offices in 13 states, from New Mexico to Florida and along the East Coast to North Carolina.