Mexico Urged to Probe Killing of Reporter

He was nicknamed “Agent True,” a reporter so enthusiastic he seemed boyish, even into middle age. His fearless drive led Philip True deep into the Sierra Madre--and to a brutal death.

The slaying of the San Antonio Express-News correspondent, whose body was found in a ravine earlier this week, has horrified Mexicans and raised fears that the California native may have been killed for doing the work he loved.

International news organizations are calling on the government to conduct an exhaustive investigation. “The majority of similar cases in Mexico continue to go unpunished,” the Inter-American Press Assn. said in a letter to President Ernesto Zedillo.

On Friday, two days after his body was found, mystery continued to shroud the death of True, a 50-year-old native of San Fernando who was about to become a father for the first time. Authorities said Friday that they had established no motive and arrested no suspects.

An experienced hiker, True had set out alone Nov. 29 for a 10-day hike into the rugged mountains of western Mexico, intending to write about the little-known Huichol Indians. But when he failed to return as scheduled to Mexico City, authorities, friends and colleagues launched a search in the remote area.

True’s body was discovered at the bottom of a 330-foot ravine near the boundary between Jalisco and Nayarit states.

Authorities initially believed that the correspondent had fallen. However, officials said an autopsy indicated True had been struck on the head, strangled and sexually abused. His body was then dragged to the remote spot, apparently to suggest that he had fallen to his death.

A second autopsy was performed Friday in Mexico City by the federal attorney general’s office.

Media advocates said they feared that True had been killed for doing his job.

“It seems to be that either he stumbled on something he wasn’t supposed to stumble on, or he somehow angered the local people with questions he asked, or taking photos,” said Joel Simon of the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists.

True’s editors said robbery could not be ruled out. The journalist had been stripped of his backpack, camera, boots and a wallet containing 4,000 pesos--about $400. His watch and wedding ring, however, had not been stolen.

Mexico has suffered an unprecedented crime wave in recent years, but the area where True was hiking was not known for bandits or drug traffickers, officials said.

Robert Rivard, the executive editor of the Express-News, praised the efforts of the Mexican government to find his reporter.

“We have the Zedillo administration to thank that we’re at the stage now where we know Philip was brutally murdered [and] that there was a staged accident,” he said. “It’s up to the government now to go in there with the same intensity and determination and establish what happened and bring his murderers to justice.

“I’m confident they’re going to do that.”

John MacCormack, a reporter at the Express-News, recalled how colleagues nicknamed the slain journalist “Agent True” for his gung-ho attitude.

“He had a very intrepid, enthusiastic approach to the job. He was 50 but had the enthusiasm of a 25-year-old reporter,” he said. A graduate of UC Irvine, True worked at the Brownsville Herald before joining the Express-News in 1992 as a border correspondent in Laredo.

His dream, however, was to work in Mexico, colleagues said. He was fascinated by the culture and married a Mexican woman, Marta. She is five months pregnant with the couple’s first child.

“He loved being out in rural Mexico. He hiked everywhere. Nothing scared him,” MacCormack said. “The sad thing is, the country he loved so much somehow took his life.”