One reason why visiting Mexico may be a not-good idea

**Posted by Phineas

That little problem of being caught in the middle:

A Valley mother says night terrors and fear are all she has left after armed men stole her sense of security. The woman says she’s trying to stay strong for her seven children.

She ran the gates, breaking them, at the Donna International Bridge to get away. The hardest part for the mother is that her 8-year-old daughter watched as a man pointed a rifle at her. She promised the girl they weren’t going to die.

“My life changed and I want to be the same person that I was, you know?” the woman says.

Apparently Mom and daughter had stumbled across a gang robbing the bridge crew. Wisely, the mother decided not to wait around to see if there was a “no witnesses” policy in force; she jumped the median and crashed her van through the gates on the US side of the bridge. MyΒ assumptionΒ is that surprising the Mexican gunmen like this probably is what saved her and her child’s life.

Though I have to ask: For what reason, barring an emergency, would anyone cross the border into Mexico these days, when violence is rampant and government authority barely exists in the border region? And why on Earth take your child?

(Guessing: She has relatives on the other side and thought it would be safe.)

Take a look at this map: the bridge is just east of McAllen, site of the Border Patrol station that was the subject of an excellent book, Patrolling Chaos. On the other side is the, to put it nicely, “troubled” city of Reynosa, a primary battleground between the Zeta and Gulf cartels, and occasionally the Mexican military. There have been grenade attacks; a nearby town was abandoned because of cartel violence.

Pardon me, ma’am, but while I admire your bravery and while I sympathize with your fear, your common sense leaves a little to be desired.

(Crossposted at Public Secrets)

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