Immigrants Testify on Border Robbery That Led to Shooting

Eight undocumented immigrants from Mexico recounted in court Monday how they were ambushed last month by a group of thieves--all allegedly U.S. citizens--in a rugged area just north of the U.S.-Mexican border in San Diego.

“I thought that perhaps they were going to kill us,” Graciana Shino Parra, 17, testified after recalling how the assailants forced her and seven others in her group to lie face down on the ground, and then began to kick several migrants and demand la feria-- slang for money.

“When I was stretched out on the ground, they kicked me and they said, ‘Money!’ ” testified Roberto Rodriguez Parra, 18. “I was frightened.”

Unbeknown to the thieves, however, two San Diego police officers attached to a border detail were following the immigrants that evening, Jan. 30, setting the stage for a bloody encounter when the lawmen confronted the robbers.

The two officers ultimately fired eight rounds from their 9 millimeter, semi-automatic handguns, killing a 22-year-old suspect, Roger Varela, and wounding a 16-year-old. Police arrested eight people, including the wounded teen-ager.

Authorities say the officers fired when Varela, brandishing what appeared to be a rifle--it turned out to be a toy replica--approached the two officers with the bogus weapon and refused to drop it even after the lawmen, with their handguns drawn, identified themselves as police officers.

A few minutes before the shooting, the immigrants said, the two policemen had stopped and questioned the group, informing them that they were police officers and would not turn them over to la migra-- U.S. immigration authorities.

Instead, the two officers told the group that they were looking for thieves, the migrants testified. The police directed them to continue on their way, and the two lawmen followed closely, according to testimony.

“They said they were there to protect us,” testified Victor Hugo Gurrola Ruiz, 21.

The immigrants recalled events Monday during a preliminary hearing for two of the accused assailants, Scott McLintock and Tony Lee Lanham, both 19, who are jointly charged with conspiring to rob the immigrants.

The two men, who live in the South Bay, have each pleaded not guilty. Both could be sentenced to up to five years in jail if convicted.

None of the eight undocumented immigrants could identify either man, both of whom were arrested at the scene, police said. None testified that he had seen the officers as they fired their weapons, as all were lying face-down on the ground in the dark, according to testimony.

Six other suspects, all younger than 18, have been directed to Juvenile Court on robbery-related charges.

The preliminary hearing for McLintock and Lanham was scheduled to resume Wednesday.

On Monday, Frank Martinez, a veteran San Diego police homicide sergeant who helped investigate the case, told reporters outside the courtroom that McLintock yelled “White power!” “White power!” after he was taken into custody on the night of the shooting.

However, authorities have said that the crimes were not motivated by racism. The dead suspect, Varela, is a Mexican-American, as is his younger brother, who was among the juveniles arrested and charged in the incident.

According to Sgt. Martinez, most of those involved in the attack admitted to police that they had also gone to the border area on the previous night and had likewise attempted to rob immigrants.

On the night of Jan. 30, the eight immigrants targeted by the thieves said they set out for the north sometime after dark, led by a guide as they left in a group from the border fence.

En route, as the guide was scouting farther ahead, the migrants said, the two police officers stopped them and informed them that they were on the lookout for thieves.

After about five minutes, during which the officers appeared to be speaking with colleagues on portable radios, the immigrants testified, they were permitted to continue their march north. The guide never returned, the immigrants said.

A few minutes after having set off again on the broken trail, the migrants said they were attacked by the screaming group of assailants. Shortly after, they heard the shots, according to testimony.

Although most robbers operating along the border strip are believed to be Tijuana residents, authorities say that some U.S. citizens are also involved in the thievery.

Each day, officials say, thousands of undocumented immigrants enter U.S. territory from Tijuana, usually en route to Los Angeles and elsewhere in the U.S. interior.

They are often easy targets in the no-man’s-land of the border strip, where there is little lighting and the rough terrain provides excellent cover for wrongdoers.

Both officers who fired the shots were attached to the San Diego Police Department’s Border Crime Intervention Unit, a special squad whose members are assigned to the border strip.

The border anti-crime outfit, which has been posted to the area for more than a year, is the latest in a series of law enforcement efforts designed to protect immigrants traversing the rough border terrain.

A previous squad, composed of police and Border Patrol agents, was disbanded two years ago after critics charged that officers had wrongly shot and killed two Mexican suspects.