Police Allegedly Attacked U.S. Narcotics Agent in 1986 : Little Progress in Mexico Torture Case

The case against state policemen in Guadalajara accused of torturing a U.S. narcotics agent last year is virtually marking time, and American officials here say they do not know when, if ever, it will go to court.

Of the 11 policemen accused in the case, five are in custody, warrants have been issued for two others and Mexican officials say there is not enough evidence to detain the other four.

The incident took place in August, 1986. Mexican police detained Victor Cortez Jr., an agent of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration stationed in Mexico, on a street in Guadalajara. According to the U.S. Embassy here and statements by Cortez, the police beat him, applied electric shocks to his body and forced water up his nose.

The incident created an international stir because it took place as Mexican President Miguel de la Madrid was in Washington on an official visit that was highlighted by his and other Mexican officials’ pledge to cooperate in cracking down on drug traffic.

Cortez was released after six hours in custody and allowed to return to the United States. Last spring, he provided written testimony to a Guadalajara court. Little has been heard of the case since.

“We were told, ‘You’ll be happy to know that the suspects in custody will never serve as policemen again,’ ” said Vincent Hovanec, a U.S. Embassy spokesman here.

Following Cortez’s release, Mexican Secretary of Foreign Relations Bernardo Sepulveda promised that the case would be resolved “quickly and expeditiously.” But it immediately became bogged down in political controversy.

Several Mexican politicians complained that the problem was not torture but the presence of DEA agents in Mexico. It was suggested that Cortez should face prosecution because the car that he was in bore false license plates and there were machine guns in the trunk.

The DEA operates in Mexico under agreements between the U.S. and Mexican governments. It carries out investigations in Mexico but does not make arrests. Cortez was reportedly meeting with an informant in front of a bowling alley at the time of his detention.

More than a year after the incident, it is not considered likely that the case will reach court soon, given present political preoccupations. Atty. Gen. Sergio Garcia Ramirez is running for president, and by tradition Mexican presidential candidates try to keep a low profile on controversial matters.

Garcia Ramirez was meeting with his U.S. counterpart, Edwin Meese III, when the Cortez incident happened. A spokesmen in Garcia Ramirez’s office declined Tuesday to comment on the state of the Cortez case. He handed a reporter a statement on the incident that was issued shortly after Cortez’s release.

Slow-paced prosecutions have long frustrated American officials in their joint attempts with Mexico to fight drug trafficking. The arrest two years ago of suspects in the 1985 torture-murder of DEA agent Enrique Camarena have been followed by snail’s-pace prosecution. Camarena and a DEA informant were slain in Guadalajara.

There has been only one conviction: that of a Guadalajara policemen accused of accepting a $300,000 bribe to let suspects in the slayings flee the country. Last May, the policeman, Armando Pavon Reyes, was released on $300 bail pending appeal of his four-year sentence.

Cases against other suspects in the Camarena case appear to be stalled indefinitely. Rafael Caro Quintero, a drug figure and prime suspect in the killing, has been jailed but has not been brought to trial. Other suspects remain at large.

The case became a major irritant in U.S.-Mexican relations when John Gavin, then the U.S. ambassador, pressed for arrests and prosecutions. Charles J. Pilliod, who replaced Gavin last November, has mentioned neither the Camarena case nor the Cortez case in public, according to Hovanec.

About a third of the marijuana and heroin used in the United States comes from Mexico, which is also a way-station for shipments of cocaine from South America.

Mexican officials have expressed irritation at charges made in the United States that widespread corruption in Mexico eases the flow of drugs north. President De la Madrid recently rejected reports that a lawyer in the Camarena case bribed a supreme court official. He said that such charges are like “the pot calling the kettle black.”

“Narcotics traffic is a crime that originates in, is fed by and benefits from the large industrialized markets,” he said, “principally those in the United States.”