It finally happened, Mexicans invaded the US… or not. Anyway, depending on which news you read or watched, something happened on the US side of the Mexico/US border involving people with guns and people doing something illegal.
Texas troopers involved in standoff with Mexican Army soldiers
— reported by KHOU CBS Channel 11
Men dressed as Mexican Army soldiers, apparent drug suspects and Texas law enforcement officers faced off near the U.S.-Mexican border after three suspicious SUVs attempted to flee state authorities, officials said Tuesday.
Andrea Simmons, an agency spokeswoman in El Paso, told The Associated Press that Texas Department of Public Safety troopers chased three SUVs, believing they were carrying drugs, to the banks of the Rio Grande during Monday’s incident.
Men dressed in Mexican military uniforms or camouflage were on the U.S. side of the border in Texas, she said.
Simmons said the FBI was not involved and referred requests for further details to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
[snip]
U.S. officials who pursued three fleeing SUVs to the Mexican border saw what appeared to be a Mexican military Humvee help one of the SUVs when it got stuck in the river, he said.
When that didn’t work, a group of men dressed in civilian clothes started unloading what appeared to be bundles of marijuana from the SUV, and the stuck vehicle was then torched, he said. A second SUV had a flat tire and was left behind in the United States and its occupant ran across the border, he said.
Glancey said he could not confirm whether the armed men seen at the site were Mexican Army, police officers, or drug dealers, and would not detail what markings deputies may have seen on the men’s uniforms or the Humvee.
[snip]
Standoff raises questions on both sides of border
— reported by the Houston Chronicle
Men in Mexican military-style uniforms crossed the Rio Grande into the United States on a marijuana-smuggling foray, leading to an armed confrontation with Texas law officers, authorities said today. No shots were fired.
The men retreated and escaped back across the border with much of the pot, though they abandoned more than a half-ton of marijuana as they fled and set fire to one of their vehicles, authorities said.
The Mexican government denied its military was involved.
The confrontation took place Monday and involved three Texas sheriff’s deputies, at least two Texas state troopers and at least 10 heavily armed men from the Mexican side of the Rio Grande, said Rick Glancey of the Texas Border Sheriffs’ Coalition.
Gov. Rick Perry ordered an investigation.
[snip]
Monday’s incident follows a story in the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin in Ontario, Calif., on Jan. 15 that said the Mexican military had crossed into the United States more than 200 times since 1996. Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff has said reports of Mexican incursions into the United States were overblown and most were just mistakes.
[snip]
