Pastor Freed After Detour to Mexican Prison

When Rev. Ronald Conway Shackelford was freed from a Mexican prison after four days and nights, he wasted no time in recrossing the border and heading home.

The San Clemente minister, who was arrested after he allegedly passed a counterfeit $100 bill at a toll booth near Rosarito Beach, told Mexican authorities “ muchas gracias, “ forgot his Bible in his cell, and headed north.

“I wanted to cross over the border before I began to jump up and down,” Shackelford said Wednesday during an interview at the San Clemente Presbyterian Church.

Shackelford was released from prison Tuesday night after Mexican authorities determined the minister had unwittingly used the counterfeit U.S. bill to pay the toll booth operator.

The 46-year-old father of two said being thrown in jail was the last thing he expected when he and 20 other church members left San Clemente Saturday morning on a goodwill mission to the Welcome Home Orphanage near rural Colonia Guerrera Vicente, about 180 miles south of Tijuana.

But Shackelford found himself in trouble shortly after he tendered a $100 bill to pay a $3.50 charge on the Tijuana-Ensenada tollway. Mexican police stopped the pastor’s 12-passenger van at the next stop and escorted him back to the first toll booth.

There, they showed Shackelford the bill.

“I told them that there was nothing wrong with it,” he said. “But when I examined it closely, I noticed that both the paper and color were different. I thought, ‘Well, this is going to be the beginning of a nightmare.’ ”

Shackelford was taken to a downtown Tijuana prison where he was placed in a cramped cell with six Mexican men, he said. The toilet in the cell didn’t flush and the blare of the stereos, VCRs and radios supplied by prisoners’ relatives often awakened him, he said.

“It was like a game of charades,” said Shackelford, who doesn’t speak Spanish, about his attempts to communicate with his cellmates. “I didn’t know why they were in there, and we had to communicate by sign language.”

Jackie Hodgkins, a founder of the orphanage who was with Shackelford when he was arrested, telephoned the San Clemente Presbyterian Church to alert them. Senior pastor James Farley then began making a series of moves to free Shackelford.

On Monday, authorities transferred Shackelford to a nearby federal prison after they determined that his alleged crime was a federal offense. There, Shackelford’s cellmates included two teen-age car thieves, a dentist who was caught driving an unregistered vehicle and a man accused of possessing marijuana.

The minister said he prayed constantly and began to preach to his cellmates.

“I felt sorry for those guys . . . I thought about how (in the Bible) when Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers, how he adapted so well,” Shackelford said. “I began to think about the hostages in Lebanon and how they must knock their heads against the wall everyday. God! I hope they get out.”

By Monday, the U.S. Consul in Tijuana, the office of Rep. Ron Packard (R-Carlsbad), Shackelford’s Mexican lawyer and church officials in San Clemente and Mexico were all working for the pastor’s release.

Concerned that the Mexican judicial system was moving too slowly, Farley used the church’s prayer line on Tuesday to tell his parishioners about Shackelford’s arrest, urging them to join in the campaign. Many of the 1,100 church members bombarded the consulate and the congressman’s office with appeals for the pastor’s release.

On Tuesday night, the Mexican district attorney told Shackelford that he did not find any criminal intent and was dropping the charges.

Shackelford was hugged and kissed by church workers when he reported for work Wednesday morning.

“I am not a hero,” the pastor later protested. “The people who are running the orphanage are the heroes. I hope all this publicity makes people aware that they need basic things like food and blankets.”

Shackelford said the experience will not prevent him from returning to Mexico early next year.

“But this time I’m going to take smaller bills,” he said. “And I’m going to let someone else pay the tolls.”