[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 148 (Tuesday, October 21, 2003)]
[Senate]
[Pages S12964-S12965]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    MISCARRIAGE OF JUSTICE IN MEXICO

  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, as one Member of Congress who believes that 
we have a strong interest in broadcasting and strengthening our 
relations with Mexico, I was appalled to read a recent Washington Post 
article entitled ``Three Americans Jailed in Bizarre Mexican Land 
Dispute.''
  Mexico is a country of 100 million people. We share a border. We 
share a wide range of cultural, economic, political, and other 
interests. Yet our history has been a troubled one, and the election of 
Vicente Fox offered an historic opportunity to begin to build a new 
relationship based on trust, mutual understanding, and shared goals.
  Regrettably, President Bush, who shortly after his inauguration spoke 
convincingly of his intention to give a high priority to U.S.-Mexican 
relations, has failed to turn those words into action. Little has been 
accomplished. I am afraid that once again, the hopes and aspirations of 
both Mexicans and Americans will be for naught.
  The President needs to recognize that as important as the Middle East 
and the Persian Gulf are to U.S. and global security, we have vital 
interests right here in our own hemisphere. I remember how during the 
1980s we spent billions of dollars to wage proxy wars in Central 
America. Yet when those wars were over, we turned our back. Today, with 
the exception of our counter-drug programs in the Andes, which as we 
have seen recently in Bolivia are of dubious merit, we spend a pittance 
to support economic and political development in these countries the 
majority of whose people remain impoverished and without meaningful 
political or legal rights. Our policy is short sighted and it will cost 
us in the long run.
  Of all countries in the hemisphere, none is more important to U.S. 
interests than Mexico. it would be difficult to think of any issue--
immigration, tourism, trade, infectious disease, water security, 
environmental pollution, democracy and the rule of law, organized 
crime--that does not cry out for broader cooperation. I hope President 
Bush, and his capable new Assistant Secretary of State for Western 
Hemisphere Affairs, Roger Noriega, will give renewed attention to these 
issues during the remaining years of President Fox's term.
  I mention this because earlier this year, I sponsored, with Senator 
Reid, Senator Daschle and others, an amendment which authorized $100 
million to be spent in Mexico to promote micro credit programs, small 
business entrepreneurship, private property ownership, and support for 
small farmers who have been affected by adverse economic conditions. I 
felt it was important to make a strong statement, through legislation, 
that we need to devote significant resources to help address these 
problems. Our amendment was adopted, and it is my hope that we can 
include a portion of those funds for Mexico in the fiscal year 2004 
Foreign Operations Act.
  But my support for providing those funds will depend on whether the 
case which is the subject of the Washington Post article I mentioned is 
satisfactorily resolved. The three Americans who have been arrested are 
the victims of an absurd miscarriage of justice. Fortunately, according 
to the article, the American Embassy in Mexico is following the case 
closely, and recognizes that these three people have done nothing 
wrong. To the contrary, they have generously cared for an ailing, 
elderly American, Russell Ames, who lost his wife Jean Ames three years 
ago. Jean Ames was a wonderful woman, and her death was a great blow to 
Russell Ames. Ames, already in his late eighties at the time of his 
wife's death, would never have been able to continue to live in his 
home in a small village near Oaxaca, Mexico, without the around-the-
clock care of Mary Ellen Sanger and the other Americans who lived on 
the property.

  My office has conveyed my concern about the unlawful arrests and 
detentions of these three Americans to the Mexican Embassy in 
Washington. These people should be immediately released and the cases 
against them dismissed. And, just as important, President Fox, who has 
repeatedly said that his presidency stands for the rule of law, should 
determine whether the Mexican official who is responsible for this 
travesty should be removed from his position.
  I ask unanimous consent to print the aforementioned article in the 
Record.
  There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

               [From the Washington Post, Oct. 18, 2003]

         Three Americans Jailed in Bizarre Mexican Land Dispute


caretakers of man, 91, held in standoff involving a member of president 
                             fox's cabinet

                          (By Kevin Sullivan)

       Oaxaca, Mexico--Three U.S. citizens, including a man dying 
     of cancer, have been jailed here and face up to 14 years in 
     prison in a land dispute involving a member of President 
     Vicente Fox's cabinet.
       The Americans, two men and a woman, are long-term friends 
     and caretakers for a former U.S. college professor, Russell 
     Ames, 91, who has lived in Oaxaca since 1959. Ames and his 
     late wife sold their land to the University of the Americas 
     in Mexico City in 1988 in exchange for lifetime rights to 
     remain on the property. But now the university, whose 
     president, Alejandro Gertz Manero, is on leave serving as 
     Fox's minister of public security, is trying to force Ames 
     off the land.
       A municipal judge and a squad of state police officers 
     arrived at Ames's property on Friday in an attempt to evict 
     him. Neighbors said about 60 people who live in a nearby 
     village, including the mayor and police chief, came to 
     support Ames, blocking his removal.
       Ames said that arresting his three friends on charges of 
     trying to take over the land for themselves was a 
     ``ridiculous'' attempt to intimidate him into leaving.
       ``These three Americans are innocent bystanders and the 
     embassy feels what has happened to them is an outrage,'' said 
     Laura Clerici, consul general at the U.S. Embassy in Mexico 
     City, which has sent officials to monitor the case.
       U.S. Ambassador Tony Garza has complained about the case to 
     Gertz, who is also a university trustee. Gertz said the 
     arrests were legal and that he has not improperly used his 
     influence in the case.
       The case is one of a number of land disputes involving 
     Americans who live or own property in Mexico. Earlier this 
     year an American couple was forced off land they owned in the 
     southern state of Chiapas by local residents wielding 
     machetes. Three years ago scores of U.S. citizens lost 
     millions of dollars in investments when they were evicted 
     from oceanfront homes they bought in Ensenada in the western 
     state of Baja, California. U.S. officials at the time blamed 
     the losses on a lack of consistency and transparency in 
     Mexican property laws. At least half a dozen more major 
     disputes are pending over property owned by Americans along 
     the Caribbean coast.
       ``We are being held hostage,'' Mary Ellen Sanger, one of 
     the three jailed Americans, said in an interview in a state 
     prison here. Sanger, 45, a native of Schenectady, N.Y., said 
     she had been assigned latrine-cleaning duty in the prison and 
     slept on a concrete floor with 44 other women in a communal 
     cell.
       Sanger has been a caretaker, feeding, dressing and walking 
     with Ames for almost three years. Joseph Simpson, widower who 
     is about 72 and suffering from late-stage terminal throat 
     cancer, has been a caretaker on the property for more than 
     a decade. He is now under police guard at a Oaxaca 
     hospital, where U.S. Embassy officials who visited him 
     said he was in grave condition. John Barbato, 58, from 
     Nevada City, Calif., a poet and artist who has known Ames 
     since 1985, rents a small house on the property and is in 
     prison with Sanger.
       Despite their longstanding ties to Ames and the property, 
     the three were arrested on Oct. 6 and charged with violently 
     taking possession of the land on May 1. U.S. officials said 
     the arrest warrant claimed the three Americans moved onto the 
     property that day in a conspiracy to take the land for 
     themselves, charges that carry a penalty of three to 14 years 
     in prison.
       ``That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard,'' said Ames, 
     who was being fed dinner and ice cream by Sanger when a squad 
     of police arrived at his house to make the arrests. ``They 
     took care of me for several years. I felt enormously lucky to 
     be taken care of by them. Most people my age don't have 
     anybody, or are just miserable.''
       The underlying issue behind the arrests is the dispute over 
     the land where Ames lives, a parcel worth an estimated 
     $250,000 in one of Mexico's most popular tourist 
     destinations.
       Ames said the sale of his land to the university was part 
     of a charitable donation. Records show that the property was 
     in the name of his wife, Jean Ames, who transferred ownership 
     to the university for $60,000, half of its assessed value at 
     the time. Ames said he and his wife never received that 
     money; the listed purchase price was simply a legal formality 
     for tax purposes. In return, Ames said the university agreed 
     to allow him and his wife to live on the land for the rest of 
     their lives, and to pay them up to $4,000 a year.

[[Page S12965]]

       Gertz, who became president of the university in 1995, said 
     in an interview that the land deal was made with Jean Ames 
     only. The notarized sale agreement specifies that only she 
     would have lifetime rights to the land. But numerous letters 
     contained in Ames' files show that his wife intended that 
     both of them be allowed to live out their lives there.
       ``If he's saying that I have no rights here at all, that's 
     ridiculous,'' Ames said. ``We were dealing with splendid 
     people at the university back then. And they made a provision 
     for me that I could live here for the rest of my life.''
       Ames and his wife lived together on the land until Jean 
     Ames died in 2000 at age 92. Then, in May of this year, Ames 
     was served with an eviction notice by the university, giving 
     him nine days to vacate the property and ordering him to pay 
     nearly $40,000 in back rent--$1,000 a month since the death 
     of his wife. Ames said he was stunned and angry. He hired a 
     lawyer and filed a civil suit against the university, saying 
     he no longer wanted it to have his land. That case is 
     pending.
       Gertz said that following the death of Jean Ames, Russell 
     Ames should have sent the university a letter asking 
     permission to remain on the property. However, despite the 
     eviction notice, Gertz said Ames would ``of course'' be 
     allowed to stay on the property until he dies if he seeks 
     university permission now.
       Gertz said Sanger, Simpson and Barbato never asked the 
     university's permission to live on the land, so they were 
     trespassing and deserved to be arrested. But Ames said he 
     believes the three Americans were jailed on trumped-up 
     charges to intimidate him into leaving his property and 
     dropping his civil suit.
       ``I hope this is a big bluff, but I'm scared,'' Barbato 
     said.

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