Jailed Sheriff Takes a Shot at Redemption

There’s an old sheriff in town.

Twenty-one months after going to prison on federal bribery charges, Eugenio “Gene” Falcon Jr. returned to the impoverished borderlands he once ruled. It was the eve of Independence Day, but he locked himself behind the wrought-iron gates of his walled ranch house, ignoring the speculation swirling around his next move.

“When I see him, I think I’ll still call him Sheriff Falcon,” said Beda “Bea” Baxter, a 78-year-old community matriarch, ordering another beer at Chucho’s cantina rather than venture out in the 102-degree afternoon.

For 17 years, Falcon was not just Starr County’s top cop but also its most popular politician, defender of a Rio Grande outpost best known for its hellish superlatives. Dusty, clannish and remote, Starr County has been called a smuggler’s paradise, a snake pit of corruption and “Texas’ Little Colombia.”

But the county--located in the state’s southernmost tip, about 100 miles west of the Gulf of Mexico--is also a bastion of Old World pride and nobility. Surnames can be traced to the Spanish explorers who claimed this land 2 1/2 centuries ago, their cowboy traditions and familial alliances still shaping life in a place that remains 97% Latino.

Contrary to the view from Washington, Starr County’s 86 miles of international riverfront are seen here as terminally porous, the line of demarcation anything but absolute. While the U.S. government was declaring war on drugs, Falcon was trying to keep peace with the drug traffickers. To survive--politically and physically--he had to not merely enforce the law but coexist with the lawless, to accept that a ribbon of water was no match for supply and demand.

“If you were to look in every person’s closet, I would say that 98% of the public would have skeletons,” Falcon, a ninth-generation Starr County descendant, told The Times in a lengthy profile last year. “We all fall short. To what degree? There’s different degrees. But, basically, none of us is pure.”

The outside world was not so charitable. To the journalists who parachuted in--and to the federal agents who regularly confirmed suspicions with massive indictments and roundups--Falcon looked dirty. Although Falcon never made more than $38,000 a year as sheriff, he lived on a 10-acre spread once owned by Starr County’s most notorious narcotraficante. And so, in 1997, shortly after being reelected to his fifth term, the FBI set a trap.

Falcon thought he was meeting with the proprietor of Linda’s Bail Bonds, Homero Arturo Longoria, who recently had opened an office in Starr County. Longoria, however, was working for the feds, having earned more than $109,000 over two decades as a confidential informant. In exchange for referring inmates to Longoria, Falcon accepted about a dozen payments totaling $11,050.

Caught on tape, he pleaded guilty and, on Sept. 14, 1998, began serving a two-year prison sentence.

“It was like a play, produced by the government, and everybody knew their role,” said Jerry Lozano, an ex-journalist and businessman who until recently was city administrator of Rio Grande City, the Starr County seat. “Gene was the antihero, a good man from a good family who gave in to his weaknesses. I don’t want to paint him as the victim--he made a mistake and got caught--but the whole thing was so hollow.”

It would be hard to argue, indeed, that Starr County has become a better or safer or more prosperous place as a result of Falcon’s absence.

The palm trees lining the median strip of U.S. 83 still end the moment the road reaches Starr County. The unpaved colonias still flood in the winter and melon pickers still risk their lives under a triple-digit sky in the summer. The unemployment rate has dropped slightly but still hovers between one-quarter and one-third of the work force. Per-capita income has inched up--to $8,225--but Starr County still ranks as one of the poorest counties in America.

And drugs? On March 25, a car chase here led officers to a 7,264-pound stash of marijuana. On May 3, U.S. Customs inspectors discovered 89 pounds hidden in the tires of a pickup truck at the international bridge. On May 18, U.S. Border Patrol agents, following a trail of footprints, came across 1,037 pounds bundled near the river. On June 15, spotting another truck speeding away from the waterfront, agents seized a 1,188-pound load.

“The problem in Starr County was never Gene Falcon,” Lozano said. “It was a bigger disease--called poverty.”

As for Falcon’s status in town, little has changed, either. His five-pointed star is now pinned on the chest of the man who was once his chief deputy. Falcon is required to report to a parole officer for the next two years, and he is barred from possessing a firearm. But he still enjoys a level of respect not often granted to a 47-year-old convicted felon.

“That ol’ Gene--he could run again and win,” said Baxter, ordering another round at Chucho’s horseshoe-shaped bar. She reaches into her purse to pay. “I’d like to make a bet on that.”