Mexican Youth in Crash Denies Murder Counts : Hearing: The illegal migrant claims smugglers forced him to drive recklessly while fleeing border agents.

A 16-year-old illegal immigrant charged with murder claims that the van accident that killed five people in Temecula was caused by smugglers who forced him to drive recklessly through a residential neighborhood, Mexican consulate officials said Friday.

The teen-age Mexican national denied five counts of second-degree murder at a hearing. An administrative officer of the Mexican consulate in San Bernardino said afterward that the youth admitted that he was driving the stolen Chevrolet Suburban at the time of the accident but that he wanted to stop.

“The other man didn’t allow him to stop the van; rather, he was pushing down on his foot on the accelerator,” said Luis Sanchez of the Mexican consulate, who identified the smuggler as “Flores.”

Investigators confirmed that one of the 11 passengers in the van is another smuggling suspect named Alfredo Flores Tapia. Flores, 27, has a record of smuggling illegal immigrants and other crimes.

Sanchez said Flores was going to pay the youth an undisclosed amount of money for driving the van, which was loaded with illegal immigrants. Minors are often used in smuggling to avoid the harsher criminal penalties assessed to adults.

But Riverside Supervising Dist. Atty. Craig Datig on Friday entered a motion in Riverside Juvenile Court to have the teen-ager tried as an adult. A hearing on that request will be held June 25.

“Given the gravity of the offenses, I am certain that the court will make the correct ruling and try him as an adult,” Datig said.

The 16-year-old allegedly fled from Border Patrol agents on Tuesday while driving the van carrying 11 other suspected illegal immigrants. He allegedly ran a red light at an intersection near Temecula Valley High School, crashing into a smaller vehicle, tearing it in half and killing the three occupants of the car.

The van then flipped and skidded up to a sidewalk, killing two students on their way into school. Four of the illegal immigrants received serious injuries. Five are still hospitalized, while the others were treated for minor injuries and released.

The tragedy has reignited protests against the high-speed chases by Border Patrol agents, prompted anti-Border Patrol outcries from Temecula residents and city officials, and prompted two congressman to ask for an investigation and an evaluation of whether the freeway checkpoints south of San Clemente and Temecula are worth the danger.

On Friday, the Immigration and Naturalization Service confirmed that the I-15 freeway checkpoint near Temecula where the chase began has been shut down and will remain closed indefinitely, “out of deference to the community,” said INS spokeswoman Virginia Kice.

Kice said Border Patrol Chief Gustavo de la Vina regrets that agency leaders failed to attend a meeting that had been scheduled with Temecula city leaders Thursday. The absence provoked more criticism in the community, but Kice said officials decided the meeting should not take place until local investigators and the INS have completed their investigations.

The agency is also reviewing its policy regarding high-speed chases and freeway immigration checkpoints.

“We want to sit down at the table with them,” Kice said. “But we want to make sure we have something to put on the table when we sit down.”

Border Patrol agents at the Temecula station, many of whom live in or near the isolated semirural city, have been devastated by the accident and the anger it has unleashed, officials said. There have been death threats phoned into the checkpoint and some agents report having been denied service in local convenience stores.

“There has always been a very strong sense of community and esprit de corps in that station because it’s off by itself,” Kice said. Since the accident, she said, “virtually every agent at the station has undergone some kind of grief counseling.”

Riverside prosecutor Datig said he is unsure what role the 16-year-old youth had in smuggling immigrants and that he was not sure whether there were other smugglers in the van.

“If we find more smugglers in the van, they too could be charged with the murders,” Datig said.

INS officials and investigators say they believe both Flores and fellow passenger Eddie Uriquez Rodriguez, 23, of San Ysidro, were involved in bringing the other men north from a San Ysidro motel that is a known staging area for smugglers of illegal immigrants near the Mexican border.

Flores, who is from Cuatitlan, Mexico, was arrested in 1985 and 1986 for smuggling illegal immigrants, officials said. He was arrested in El Segundo in 1987 for kidnaping for ransom, an offense that officials said occurred in connection with the smuggling of illegal immigrants, as well as for resisting arrest and fighting. He was arrested most recently in 1989 for kidnaping for ransom, officials said.

Flores told authorities that he is a butcher and laborer, officials said.

Uriquez has also been arrested for kidnaping for ransom--in Pomona in 1989, officials said. He was arrested in 1990 for failing to appear in court and in 1992 for possession of a stolen vehicle, officials said.

Sanchez of the Mexican consulate conceded that the 16-year-old youth had been in the country illegally, but emphatically said the youth “was never involved in smuggling.”

“As with many other young men, he comes to this side (of the border) and then gets deported and then comes back,” Sanchez said. He said the youth had been deported “many times.”

Martin Swanson, the public defender assigned to the case, must shoulder the burden of proving that the youth should not be tried as an adult, given the severity of the accusations against him.

Swanson described the youth as “a very scared person. He sits there and shakes.”

On the other hand, investigators said the youth has been uncooperative in interrogations and said his account as provided by the Mexican consulate official was new to them.

“If he’s talking, that’s the first time,” said Riverside County Sheriff’s Sgt. Jim Domenoe. If he is tried and convicted as an adult, the youth faces a maximum of 15 years imprisonment for each of the murder charges. If he is tried and convicted as a juvenile, he could be held in the California Youth Authority until he turns 25 in the year 2000.

Five of the passengers in the van remained hospitalized Friday. Encifero Vargas Gomez, 21, was in critical condition at Riverside General Hospital, where Everett Rodriguez Pineda, 21, and Cristino Figueroa Gonzalez, 24, were listed in stable condition. Juan Andres Romero Ibarra, 19, and Martin Morales Palacios were in stable condition at Sharp HealthCare Medical Center in Murrieta.

The other six men were taken into custody by the Border Patrol as material witnesses, and some may face state or federal charges. In addition to Flores and Uriquez, they have been identified as Celso Rodriguez Torales, 36; Jose Manuel Contreras Pineda, 22; Rodolfo Ontario Pineda, 19, and Jesus Salazar Gutierrez, 29.

Times staff writer Sebastian Rotella contributed to this report.