Latinos Tell of Rising North County Harassment - Migrants: Some U.S. teen-agers have taken it upon themselves to verbally and physically abuse the workers as they look for day jobs along the streets of the rapidly growing area.

Incarnacion Gomez Paredes said he has become accustomed to the taunts from passing motorists who feel an urge to shout racial epithets and occasionally toss debris at the job-seeking migrant workers who man the early-morning street corners of northern San Diego County.

“I don’t really pay attention,” Gomez said early Friday as he and other men from Mexico gathered in the Rancho Penasquitos area in search of day labor.

Sometimes, though, the harassment, normally a low-level phenomenon, escalates and cannot be ignored, migrants say.

On Wednesday a group of activists alleged that the migrants, mostly from Mexico, are increasingly coming under attack from American youths wielding an array of weapons, from fists and boards to pellet guns and real rifles.

The advocates also reported a rise in assaults by teen-age thieves and gangs that prey on the immigrant workers in North County, where thousands of mostly Mexican day laborers live in crude camps, often alongside prosperous suburban developments.

Among the reported incidents cited in what is characterized as an escalating pattern of aggression: shootings, beatings, robberies, destruction of property and verbal harassment.

The immigrant advocates see the violence as an outgrowth of a growing anti-migrant sentiment in the fast-growing area, where tension between the migrants and other residents has occasionally erupted.

“Some of these kids see themselves providing a public service by running (the migrants) out at gunpoint,” said Roberto Martinez, border representative in San Diego for the American Friends Service Committee, the social action arm of the Quaker Church.

More police patrols are needed in areas frequented by the day laborers, said the Rev. Rafael V. Martinez, who runs the Encinitas-based North County Chaplaincy, which works with migrant workers.

“We want authorities to be aware of the seriousness of the problem, and we want to urge them to take some preventive measures before we have another incident like the one we had on Black Mountain Road,” he said.

On the evening of Nov. 9, two Mexican field hands--Hilario Castaneda Salgado, 22, and Matilde Macedo de la Sancha, 19--were shot to death as they walked along an isolated stretch of Black Mountain Road in San Diego, which abuts a number of farm nurseries and migrant camps. Police said the slayings were racially motivated. On Wednesday, a San Diego teen-ager who authorities say was the triggerman pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree murder. An alleged accomplice is awaiting trial.

Authorities contend that police investigate crimes against migrants, whether the migrants are in the United States legally or illegally, as thoroughly as they look into any reported criminal activity.

“I certainly wouldn’t tolerate someone harassing anybody, I don’t care who they are,” said Capt. Jay Lasuer, who commands the Sheriff’s Department substation in Poway, which provides police protection in the city to the north and east of San Diego.

Some claim there is a double standard. Roberto Martinez, the church activist, said a victim of recent pellet-gun shootings--the projectiles contained paint--reported the incident to a deputy in Poway more than a week ago but nothing was done. (Lasuer said that his office had not been informed of the pellet-gun incidents until the Wednesday press conference and that authorities now plan to investigate.)

During the past three weeks, Martinez said, at least seven migrants have been hit by the paint-filled pellets in the Poway area; most were hit while walking on streets, he said.

“We’re demanding a thorough investigation,” Martinez said. “These can no longer be considered isolated incidents. These kinds of things are probably occurring somewhere in the county on a daily basis.”

The Poway sheriff’s office, Martinez noted, acted quickly in April, 1988, when an American girl reported that she had been raped by a group of migrants. More than 80 Latinos were detained within 24 hours of the incident; six were held for up to two months. All charges were ultimately dropped; the six arrestees have filed a multimillion-dollar wrongful-arrest suit in federal court against the Sheriff’s Department, among others.

Lasuer said crimes against migrants are not reported that frequently in Poway. He estimated that fewer than 50 have been reported in the past year. In one recent case, he noted, three white youths were arrested and charged with robbing an immigrant worker.

Many of the crimes may go unreported, authorities acknowledge, because some victims are hesitant to come forward. That stems from an inherent distrust of police--a feeling imported from Mexico and Central America--as well as a fear among the undocumented that they may be turned over to U.S. immigration authorities.

On Friday, a number of migrants interviewed on street corners in North County described the harassment as usually non-threatening--most commonly insults shouted from a passing vehicle, or sometimes objects tossed from a car. Many were quick to tell a reporter that they have never had any problems with Americans; others downplayed the harassment and expressed considerably more concern about being underpaid or being cheated out of their salaries by unscrupulous employers.

“Sometimes people yell things at us, but mostly it’s in English, and I don’t know what it means,” Manuel Aguayo, a 44-year-old native of the Mexican state of Jalisco, said as he stood in a shopping center near the northern city limits of San Diego.

Some observers are troubled by the seeming equanimity that the migrants display toward the verbal harassment.

“They’ve accepted that they get yelled at; I hope it doesn’t come to the point where they feel it’s OK to get beat up, too,” said Gina Velazquez, who works with the immigrant community in North County. She has urged victims to report crimes.

Ernesto Alvaran, who was also interviewed while looking for work Friday, said he has never been physically threatened during his four years in the United States. But he is cautious; during the past year, he has avoided walking in the dark on isolated roads. He apparently has good reason: He was a good friend of Matilde Macedo de la Sancha, one of the two Mexican men killed in the November hate slayings.

Incarnacion Gomez Paredes, 21, said he and two other migrants were robbed at gunpoint in August by three Americans who had given them a ride and promised them work--apparently a ruse. Otherwise, Gomez said, he and others have become accustomed to verbal abuse, particularly in San Diego.

“I’ve lived in New York and Canada,” said Gomez, who also said he has lived outside of Mexico for the better part of 13 years, “but San Diego is the most racist place that I’ve been. Here, everyone tries to take advantage of you if you’re Mexican.”