8 DEATHS TARNISH HOLY DAY IN JUAREZ

Killings Cap Off Bloody Week In Border City; Police Force In Town Near
N.M. Quits Amid Threats

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico - The killers arrived at the motel in the predawn gloom.
Dressed in military-style uniforms and armed with automatic weapons, they
forced the manager to hand over a guest list, then stormed from room to room,
pointing their guns at the terrified occupants. In Room 49 they opened
fire on the man and woman inside. The woman's body was on the floor
next to the bed, and the man was in the bathroom. At least 100 bullet
casings were found, police said. The killers escaped in three
late-model SUVs.

These were but two of eight killings in this grim border city as Good
Friday turned to Black Friday, culminating one of the bloodiest weeks
in memory, officials and residents said.

"Good Friday? Where?" asked Jaime Torres, spokesman for the Juarez
Police Department. "We thought this would be a more tranquil day to
reflect, but no such luck. This has been one of the deadliest weeks in
recent history, and the day hasn't ended yet."

In addition to the eight killings, a police officer was in critical
condition at a hospital after being shot three times while on patrol.
Also on Friday, Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Alcohol,
Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives agents seized a semiautomatic
.50-caliber weapon and 23 other guns from border arms traffickers.
Motives were unclear, though Mexican officials have long said drug
kingpins use these smuggled weapons for their bloody turf wars.

Most of the killings Friday were believed to be related to the ongoing
battle between the Juarez and Sinaloa drug cartels, U.S. and Mexican
officials said. More than 160 people have been slain in Juarez since
Jan. 1, including about 30 in the past week.

The brutality unfolding in this region bordering Texas is generating
debate regarding President Felipe Calderon's strategy to take on the
cartels using more than 30,000 troops and federal police. More than
3,800 people have been killed in drug-related violence since Mr.
Calderon took office Dec. 1, 2006, according to the Mexico City
newspaper Reforma. Among the dead were 334 police officers and 39
soldiers. This year, drug killings are up 30 percent compared with
last year, the newspaper said.

"I don't know that Calderon had any choice," said Tony Payan, a Mexico
expert at the University of Texas at El Paso. "He has to fight back,
and he's doing that, forcing a disruption within the cartels, which is
leading to the violence we're seeing."

About 100 miles to the west, in and around the town of Palomas, just
across the border from Columbus, N.M., 40 people have been killed this
year. Earlier this week, hitmen left two bodies, their hands tied
behind their backs, at the entrance of the city. Police Chief Emilio
Perez, whose force has had two officers killed, was threatened by
phone and told that he would be next. Within hours, the six remaining
police officers quit their jobs. Mr. Perez drove across the border and
asked for political asylum, a U.S. law enforcement agent said,
speaking on condition of anonymity. Mr. Perez was probably in the
protective custody of ICE, the official said. Columbus Mayor Eddie
Espinoza described the situation in Mexico as "out of control." "We're
telling tourists going into Mexico, 'Enter at your risk,' because
there are no reliable authorities there," said Mr. Espinoza, who
speaks from personal experience. As he was undergoing a root canal
during a visit to his dentist in Palomas last weekend, two hooded
gunmen stormed into the office and robbed the dentist, Dr. Felipe
Salazar, as Mr. Espinoza waited nervously in the dentist's chair.

"I understand they got a couple of grand from the doctor, and what's
really scary is that they knew the layout of the office," Mr. Espinoza
said. Mr. Espinoza was unhurt but returned to Columbus a changed man,
he said. Although he grew up on both sides of the border and has
relatives in Palomas, he promptly warned family and friends to "stay
away from Mexico. It's lawless over there."

He reported the incident to the office of U.S. Sen. Jeff Bingaman,
D-N.M., and requested that local, county, state and federal law
enforcement agencies, including the U.S. Border Patrol, keep a 24-hour
vigil over Columbus. The town is best known for being invaded by
Francisco "Pancho" Villa, the border bandit who became a hero of the
Mexican revolution, on March 16, 1916.

Across the border in Palomas, Ivonne Romero, who along with her
husband, Sergio, owns the Pink Store, a popular tourist destination,
played down the current threat, saying that the mayor's actions and
U.S. media attention were "not very balanced."

"Yes, there have been some killings, but the city is not lawless,"
said Ms. Romero, who added that sales are down by more than 30 percent
during a peak season, when retirees head for the border in their
recreational vehicles. "We have state police patrolling the streets.
Things are calm today," she said Friday.

Ciudad Juarez was anything but calm, as police reported the eight
killings on a day when long lines of traffic snaked through the city
with Holy Week shoppers eager to cross international bridges into El
Paso. Local and state police officials said the shootings at the Motel
del Rio took place about 5:30 a.m. Friday. Police did not identify the
man and woman who were killed.

Earlier Friday, three men were shot and killed at a bar called La
Mentira, and a man was shot and killed at the corner of Kenia and
Tercera streets. The bodies of two men were found overnight in an area
known as La Colonia Leyes de Reforma.

Hours later, police Officer Jorge Luis Osorio Caraveo was traveling in
patrol car 288 when he was shot in the back, arm and chest, police
said. Mr. Osorio, 38, was in critical condition at a hospital.
Officials are also bracing for possibly widening violence. Chihuahua
state police and other state officials have received threats; one
official received a type of floral arrangement used at funerals, law
enforcement officials said.

Juarez is no stranger to violence. The city has attracted worldwide
notoriety for the killings of hundreds of women and girls beginning in
1993. Most of those cases remain unsolved. In the past eight years, 64
bodies have been dug up from the back yards of several homes. Since
February, authorities acting on an anonymous tip have unearthed the
remains of 38 people in the yard of an abandoned property.

"I have always said that El Paso is one huge warehouse, ideal for drug
traffickers to hide and transport their drugs," said Mr. Payan of
UTEP. "And Juarez is one huge graveyard where bodies are buried
underneath bathrooms, kitchen and bedrooms."