TIJUANA POLICE CHIEF SLAIN IN HAIL OF GUNFIRE

Border: Gunmen Drive Up Alongside, Spray His Vehicle With Bullets. Killing
Shocks City Hardened By Assassinations.

TIJUANA--In the latest example of the murderous violence that has
gripped this border town, the municipal police chief was assassinated
Sunday morning by gunmen who sprayed his vehicle with more than 100
bullets, authorities said.

Police Chief Alfredo de la Torre Marquez, 49, was driving alone to the
office after attending Mass when three cars came alongside his GMC
Suburban and gunmen opened fire with at least one AK-47 assault rifle
and a 9-millimeter handgun.

Dozens of police officers, judges, prosecutors and others have been
murdered in Tijuana and its suburbs in recent years, a spiral of
violence linked to wars between competing drug cartels. A presidential
candidate of the ruling PRI party was assassinated in Tijuana in March
1994.

Police said they have no suspects in Sunday's shooting, although three
suspicious cars were seized in two nearby neighborhoods. One of the
cars had been reported stolen in Chula Vista, Calif.

In recent months, officers under De la Torre's command have been
conducting a crackdown on illegal-immigrant smugglers and small-time
drug users and pushers, particularly in the Zona Norte, an area near
the border known for prostitution, drugs and other criminal activities.

De la Torre was gunned down on the same expressway, Via Rapida, where
one of his predecessors as municipal chief, Federico Benitez Lopez,
was murdered in April 1994 in similar ambush fashion.

Benitez's murder, thought to have been ordered by a drug cartel
angered at his reformist ways, has never been solved.

A Catholic nun who was a close friend of De la Torre said he may have
had a premonition that he was facing death. Sister Antonia Brenner,
who was considered a surrogate mother by De la Torre, said he told her
Saturday, "Mother, if I live through this job, you and I are going to
change things for police throughout the whole state of Baja."

A tearful Brenner, who went to the Tijuana morgue to bless De la
Torre's body, told reporters: "There are three letters that describe
him: cop. He was a cop in every way. He was fearless. He was never
cruel. That's what I loved about him."

In a city with a long history of police corruption, De la Torre, a
career law enforcement officer who took over as chief in December
1998, was known for professionalism and honesty.

"He was clean, that was his reputation," said a spokesman for the
Tijuana Municipal Police.

Tijuana Mayor Francisco Vega de la Madrid expressed his "shock and
dismay" at the brazen murder and promised that city police would
assist state police, who have jurisdiction in the case, in finding the
killers. Vega also called for residents of Tijuana to remain calm
despite a growing sense of anarchy in his city.

Even in a city where violence is common, the murder of a police chief
was shocking. "I'm afraid of what is happening to my city," said
waitress Rosario Barrios.

Many in Tijuana said state authorities have been unable or unwilling
to gain the upper hand over crime. Jesus Blancornelas, editor of the
independent Tijuana news weekly Zeta, said Sunday that the state
police are "powerless or incapable" in the battle against crime.
Blancornelas survived an assassination attempt by drug traffickers in
1997. Rising anxiety over the escalating violence in Baja California
has caught the notice recently even of Mexican President Ernesto
Zedillo, who had dispatched the nation's attorney general and other
top federal officials to Baja for meetings this week on the crisis.

"Organized crime has brought to Baja California an onslaught of
violence and intimidation that has naturally and justifiably provoked
a wave of indignation among the people," Zedillo said in a speech in
the state capital of Mexicali.

Baja California Gov. Alejandro Gonzalez Alcocer said the killing may
be in retaliation for Friday's speech by Zedillo, in which he warned
that he plans to rout criminals from Baja California.

De la Torre normally was protected by bodyguards except on Sunday,
which he reserved as a day for his family, officials said. In the back
seat of De la Torre's vehicle were the bodyguards' two M-16 automatic
rifles.

Police officers, who are part of a unit whose duties are akin to those
of SWAT squads in U.S. departments, fanned out across the city
interrogating individuals in search of information. One official said
that nearly three dozen people were questioned but no arrests were
made.

"Everyone in the department is crying, no one can believe it," said
Enrique Sanchez, a veteran officer. "We have lost a friend. It hurts
all of us very much."

The killers reportedly used a classic pincer maneuver, with one car
moving in front of De la Torre's vehicle to slow him down and then two
other cars driving parallel to the Suburban, which had tinted windows
for security.

The assailants' bullets shot out all three windows on the driver's
side, a window on the passenger's side and left the windshield
riddled. The Suburban smashed into a tree, possibly as De la Torre
made a futile attempt to flee. "By the time we arrived, there was
nothing we could do to save him," said one paramedic.

The former warden of the infamous La Mesa prison outside Tijuana, De
la Torre took over as chief after the resignation of Juan Manuel
Nieves, who had crashed a police car while intoxicated, left the scene
and tried to cover up the incident.

At La Mesa, De la Torre met Brenner, an American nun who has spent two
decades tending to the needs of both prisoners and police. After the
death of his own mother, De la Torre became even closer to Brenner,
whom he addressed as "mommy."

"I prayed for him Saturday night after he said those things," Brenner
said. "He never told me he feared anything. He was my son."

The municipal chief, who commands a force of about 1,200 officers, is
responsible for issuing traffic citations and patrolling the
neighborhoods of this sprawling city, whose population may be upward
of 2 million. Historically, Tijuana police have been underpaid,
undertrained and highly susceptible to bribery.

Most felony investigations, including large-scale crimes, are dealt
with by the state and federal police.

Within hours of the killing, De la Torre's widow and teenage daughter
visited the scene of the shooting. Police cars and police headquarters
in downtown Tijuana were adorned with black bows.

In a city where violence is ever present, black bows are kept at the
ready. "Crime in Tijuana Is Our Daily Bread," read a recent headline
on a Tijuana newspaper.

So far this year, officials report 72 homicides in Tijuana. Although
comparisons are difficult because there is no officially agreed-upon
figure for Tijuana's population, the murder rate is thought to outpace
that of most big cities in the United States, with the possible
exception of Detroit.

De la Torre held numerous jobs during his career that stretched to
1973. He founded the mounted patrol for the Tijuana police and was a
federal official at the international airport and a state police
commander in a seaside neighborhood of Tijuana. He had also served a
previous term as municipal chief in 1992.

De la Torre, and his boss, Vega, have attempted to adapt
"community-oriented policing" methods used in cities such as San Diego
and New York to reduce crime, including "neighborhood watch" groups
and mobile mini-stations in neighborhoods. There have been random car
checks for drugs and guns and a "zero tolerance" policy for traffic
offenses.

To upgrade the professional skills of Tijuana officers, an increasing
number of them are attending training sessions run by San Diego
police. The officers are being drilled in the use of firearms and how
to make arrests of armed suspects.

De la Torre, a lanky, gregarious man, said in an interview last year
that reducing violence was his top priority as chief.

"I can't say I'm going to stop it," he said. "I'm not God and I'm not
Superman."