Plan calls for ex-law officers to help in fight against cartels
By Kevin Johnson
USA Today
WASHINGTON — The U.S. and Mexico are drawing up plans to dispatch up to 300 former U.S. law enforcement officials to Mexico this year to train thousands of Mexican police investigators in their fight against drug cartels, U.S. officials said.
Mexican officials would select about 9,000 Mexican police for training at undisclosed locations there, one U.S. diplomatic and one law enforcement official said. The goal would be to quell corruption and violence fueled by warring drug groups.
The officials have been briefed on the plan but asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to comment. They said it would create a law enforcement academy where Mexican investigators could learn about narcotics and weapons trafficking, money laundering and fingerprint examination. The State Department would oversee the U.S. side of the program. Among the issues that still need State’s approval: how the costs will be shared by the two governments, the full scope of the curriculum and how soon training could begin.
William Esposito, a principal in a consulting firm run by former FBI director Louis Freeh, said that Mexico’s secretary of public safety, Genaro Garcia Luna, contacted the firm about six to eight weeks ago to discuss the training operation. “They were looking for advice,” said Esposito, a former deputy director of the FBI. “They are trying to change the whole policing structure.” He said the proposal is an opportunity for the U.S. and Mexico to collaborate on a threat to both sides of the border.
Garcia Luna did not return calls for comment.
Scott Erskine, executive director of the Society of Former Special Agents of the FBI, said recruiters have approached his group about the availability of former agents to serve as trainers.
“This is a major step,” Ed Nowicki, executive director of the International Law Enforcement Educators and Trainers Association, said when informed of the plan. “Law enforcement in Mexico is in a sad state; training is terribly inadequate. It’s like a patient with wounds all over the body.”
Claremont McKenna College professor Roderic Camp said the plan is a “radical change” in Mexican policy that has resisted large-scale training of its military and police forces by U.S. personnel.
The training plan is the latest step the U.S. is taking to help stop the violence that has claimed 7,000 lives in Mexico in the past 14 months. “They have got to attack” cartel violence, said David Wilson, a former U.S. drug agent. “The place is on fire.”
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