Mexico Police Figures Slain in Separate Attacks

Los Angeles Times, 7/30/2009
The lead investigator in the slaying of a prominent Mexican journalist was killed when gunmen intercepted him as he arrived home, authorities said Wednesday.
In a separate incident, gunmen also killed a police commander and his family, including four children. They opened fire on the man’s house as the family slept, then pummeled [...]

Immigrant Detainees Hunger Strike Over Conditions

Associated Press, 7/30/2009
A group of detainees at a Louisiana immigration detention center have begun three-day hunger strikes to protest poor conditions there, immigrant advocates said.
The news comes just days after Department of Homeland Security officials dismissed a report critical of conditions at its immigration holding centers nationwide.
About 100 detainees contributed to a report released Thursday [...]

OECD Says Mexico May Need to Cut Rates Further

Reuters, 7/30/2009
Mexico’s struggling economy may benefit from further interest rate cuts despite signals from the central bank that it is done easing monetary policy for now, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said on Thursday.
The country, whose fate is tightly linked to its neighbor the United States, is on track for its worst recession [...]

Arizona Cops Find 97 Migrants in Refrigerated Truck

Reuters, 7/30/2009
Arizona police pulled over a refrigerated truck and found 97 illegal immigrants in the back among near-freezing produce, police said on Thursday.
No one was harmed. The immigrants were handed over to Border Patrol agents, who processed them for deportation.
“These people were treated like cargo. They were crammed inside this truck and subjected to near [...]

Bar: Mexican Athletes Names Used to Seek Visas

Pamela Manson, Salt Lake City Tribune, 7/30/2009
Although a South Salt Lake plastering company hired attorney James Hector Alcala to prepare applications for work visas for its seasonal foreign employees, immigration officials spotted a problem.
Some of the prospective employees at Los Sauces Stucco & Plastering apparently shared the names of prominent Mexican athletes.
The discovery led [...]

Analysis: Procampo Accentuates Poverty (In Spanish)

El Universal, 7/30/2009
The purging of registration lists of the Program for Direct Assistance to the countryside, announced by the secretary of Agriculture, will have little impact on the future of the Mexican countryside.
The system of payments and subsidies from these programs will multiply levels of extreme poverty in rural areas and will eventually increase [...]