Man Killed in Fall Near San Onofre Checkpoint : Accident: A King City man tumbles 80 feet into a drainage ditch while trying to hide from Border Patrol. A Mexican immigrant friend suffers injuries in the fall.

A King City man was killed and his companion injured Saturday night when they fell 80 feet into a drainage ditch while attempting to hide from the Border Patrol near the San Onofre checkpoint along Interstate 5.

Gonzalo Perez, 21, was found lying dead in a pile of rocks at the bottom of the ditch, his head immersed in the creek water, according to a witness and investigator Chuck Bolton of the San Diego County coroner’s office. Gabriel Gurerro, 21, identified only as an immigrant from Mexico and a friend of Perez, suffered a mild concussion and bruises on the pelvis. He was treated at Mission Hospital Regional Medical Center in Mission Viejo and released Sunday morning.

Border Patrol officers found the two about 10:35 p.m. in a ditch about a quarter mile south of the checkpoint, a coroner’s office spokeswoman said.

Border Patrol officials did not respond to requests for comment.

Gurerro’s fall had been broken by brush along the hillside, saving him from serious injury, a hospital spokeswoman said.

Saturday’s incident marked the second consecutive weekend during which suspected illegal immigrants have been injured in the rugged coastal hillsides just west of the freeway near the checkpoint.

In this case, however, Perez and Gurerro were apparently being watched by Border Patrol agents--and not pursued--as they attempted to make their way north, according to a witness who asked not to be identified. The witness quoted Gurerro as saying he and Perez had been dropped off by a border smuggler south of the checkpoint and directed to the coastal bluff as a route north.

A week earlier on Saturday night, three illegal immigrants from Mexico were injured in a 35-foot fall at a flood control channel a little farther north in San Onofre State Park. In that case, the men told paramedics and hospital officials that they were being chased by Border Patrol agents, but immigration agents denied it.

The Feb. 13 incident prompted a trauma surgeon, who treated the men at Mission Hospital Regional Medical Center, to charge that Border Patrol agents recklessly pursue immigrants without regard for the immigrants’ safety. Dr. Thomas Shaver, who heads the hospital’s trauma unit, said Border Patrol officials consistently refuse to take responsibility for injuries stemming from such chases because the agency wants to avoid liability and hospital costs.

Five people have been killed trying to avoid immigration officials in the San Onofre checkpoint area throughout 1992, including a 20-year-old Guadalajara man who fell off a cliff during a chase. The others were pedestrians who were killed on the freeway while crossing it in the dark.

A new $30-million, 16-lane checkpoint facility scheduled to be built in Horno Canyon in Camp Pendleton, just south of the current checkpoint, has been funded by the federal government. Because of environmental concerns and bureaucratic red tape, however, it could be a decade before construction begins, according to Caltrans estimates.

Shaver, a longtime critic of the checkpoint nearly 100 miles north of the Mexican border, suggested it should be abandoned.

“It just isn’t worth the problems it brings,” Shaver said. “Maybe 30 years ago it was feasible. But these days it isn’t.”