Risk of Chasing Border Crossers

Re “Weigh the Risk of Chasing Border Crossers,” Commentary, April 29: Attorney Claudia E. Smith has it wrong about who poses a threat to human life. Twenty or more people in a pickup truck are a threat to human life--with or without any chase.

The criminals are the smugglers and the illegal immigrants--not the Border Patrol. To characterize illegals as “men who just want to earn a living” and “women and children who just want to reunite with husbands and fathers” is presumption. They wouldn’t need to reunite if the husbands and fathers stayed home in the first place. It’s an attempt to idealize criminals and to demonize the Border Patrol, which is trying to meet the expressed will of the California people--stop illegal immigration.

ROBERT D. McCONNELL

Manhattan Beach

* Mark Fineman’s April 28 front-page article, regarding the Temecula accident, was timely and touching. However, his April 27 article dealing with the Mexican population explosion should also have been front-page material. The Mexican population crisis was well documented in the August 1984 issue of National Geographic magazine, wherein Mexico City was predicted to be the fastest growing Third World city. Fineman’s article appears to bear out that prediction.

Although it is important to report the tragedies of illegal migrants, it would seem to be just as important for The Times to address some of the root causes of the “people” crisis facing the state.

I. KURT WEBER

Pacific Palisades

* I’m getting sick of the weekly body counts. This is not what my tax payments are intended to accomplish. Let’s all take a deep breath, count to 10, step back and calmly consider the following:

The Mexicans will never stop chasing the American Dream. In the “good old days,” people fled to these shores in the holds of transoceanic ships, risking disease and death to chase the American Dream. Today, they do it in pickup trucks and vans; same procedure, different mode of transportation.

When a vehicle full of hopefuls refuses to stop at one of the San Diego checkpoints, why don’t we eliminate the brown-shirted “adrenaline rush” by carefully following them with a helicopter and a radio. Sooner, rather than later, the offending driver will have to either urinate, eat, sleep or refuel. At that point, pull up next to the vehicle and calmly communicate.

No one dies, no one races past taxpayers at breakneck speeds on the highway, no one has to face or fund investigations, litigation and funerals.

LYNNE HAGERUP

Hollywood