FAR FEWER BODIES FOUND IN MEXICO THAN FBI OFFICIAL INDICATED

MEXICO CITY -- Nearly two months after a senior FBI official sparked a
frenzy by reporting that 100 bodies were believed to be buried on ranches
near the Mexican border town of Ciudad Juarez, authorities have discovered
the remains of nine humans, two dogs and a drug-processing laboratory.

The original body count, based largely on what officials said was
information from a Mexican informant for the FBI, focused international
attention on the problems of Ciudad Juarez, a primary point for illegal
drugs to enter the United States. But now, Mexican and U.S. officials say
the FBI hyped evidence in the case, thereby exacerbating political friction
between the countries and frustrating residents, human rights officials and
others who have witnessed a decade of unsolved disappearances, murders and
other drug-related violence.

"People were expecting body after body to be unearthed -- like digging up
carrots," one Mexican government official said. Instead, days of digging
yielded corpses. The excavation has now tapered off substantially, and the
FBI is no longer participating in the digging operations.

FBI spokesman John Collingwood declined to comment on criticism of the
agency's original decision to quantify the number of bodies, but said,
"Nobody could say with certainty how many bodies would actually be located."

"Information came at various times from a variety of sources," Collingwood
said. "Regardless of the ultimate number of murder victims discovered, the
FBI had an obligation to investigate the disappearances of American
citizens."

When the FBI offered the figure of 100 in late November, other U.S. law
enforcement and congressional officials were skeptical. Although violence
associated with Mexico's most powerful drug cartel, headquartered in Ciudad
Juarez, has contributed to hundreds of murders and disappearances in recent
years, experts said drug traffickers generally prefer that their victims be
found, serving as warnings to enemies, traitors and informants. Mexican drug
organizations have never been known to perform mass burials.

'Some memory'

Mexican and U.S. officials familiar with the case said the high body count
first offered by FBI Deputy Director Thomas Pickard on Nov. 29 was based on
interviews with an informant -- allegedly a former Mexican law enforcement
official who said he had participated in some of the burials -- combined
with estimates that nearly 200 people have disappeared from Ciudad Juarez
and neighboring El Paso, Tex., in the past several years.

In a briefing with some senators and their staff members, FBI officials
indicated an informant had provided the agency with the names and locations
of up to 100 bodies. "We said to each other afterward, 'Boy, this guy had
some memory,' " said one official present at the meeting.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), dubious of the information,
refused FBI requests to participate in the Ciudad Juarez operation,
according to a DEA official familiar with the discussion. "We didn't want to
touch it," the official said.

The FBI announcement initially was encouraging to the families of scores of
the disappeared who hoped, with trepidation, that the excavations might
close the unresolved cases of their loved ones. In the first two weeks of
digging, numerous family members and friends stood along the perimeters of
the suspected burial sites in anticipation of information.

So far, Mexican and FBI forensics officials examining the remains have made
no positive identifications, although Mexican newspapers have reported that
several bodies were found with identification documents such as driver's
licenses. In addition, no suspects have been identified in the killings.

However, the FBI's Collingwood said, "Resolving a tragic loss for even one
family makes the effort worthwhile."

U.S. and Mexican law-enforcement officials familiar with the investigation
said they believe the FBI informant, hoping to win concessions from the
agency, oversold the extent of his information.

Mexican authorities said they have scaled back operations and now have only
a small crew of representatives from the attorney general's office
continuing investigations at one of the four sites on the outskirts of
Ciudad Juarez. The Mexican army is no longer participating in the
operations, according to a spokesman for the attorney general.

Mexican officials said the attorney general's office originally believed
that the investigation could be kept secret and that officials were dismayed
when the FBI went public with its information.

The case created a political furor in Mexico, with television networks and
newspapers attacking the FBI involvement in the case as an inappropriate
intervention in Mexican affairs. But in recent weeks, both the FBI and the
Mexican attorney general's office have billed the continuing, but slower
paced, investigation as a significant cooperative effort between the
countries.