CONTROVERSIAL MEXICAN POLITICIAN FREED ON WEAPONS CHARGES

MEXICO CITY-A federal judge dropped weapons charges against a
controversial opposition politician and gambling mogul Tuesday and
then a state judge refused to hold him on a murder investigation,
dealing an embarrassing one-two punch to Mexico's government.

"Jorge Hank is free and at home," the politician's lawyer, Fernando
Benitez, said.

Mr. Hank, the former mayor of Tijuana, was detained June 4 by Mexican
soldiers who said they found an illegal arsenal of 88 weapons,
including automatic rifles at his compound in Tijuana. Mr. Hank is a
pillar of the opposition Institutional Revolutionary Party or PRI, and
his arrest coming less than a month before elections in the key State
of Mexico, where the PRI holds a wide lead, was seen by PRI
politicians and some political analysts as being politically motivated.

Since Mr. Hank's arrest, officials of President Felipe Calderon's
government and his center-right National Action Party said Mr. Hank's
arrest showed the government would not stand for "impunity."

The attorney general's office said it would appeal the judge's ruling
dismissing the arms charges and freeing Mr. Hank and 10 of his
employees who had been held along with him. A spokesman for the
presidency declined to comment.

After the arms charges were dropped on Tuesday, Mr. Hank was
immediately seized by state police who held him under house arrest for
investigation on an alleged and unrelated murder in Tijuana, his
lawyer said. His arrest last week led to angry protest demonstrations
in Tijuana by supporters and employees. Local Catholic bishops wrote
letters of support.

But late Tuesday, a state judge freed Mr. Hank. A spokesman for the
state prosecutor, Marco Vinicio Blanco, said the judge cited a lack of
evidence in deciding not to hold Mr. Hank, the Associated Press said.

Rommel Moreno, the attorney general of Baja California, whose biggest
city is Tijuana, said Mr. Hank was being investigated for the 2009
killing of 24-year old Angelica Munoz, who Mr. Moreno said was the
girlfriend of Mr. Hank's son Sergio Hank. Mr. Moreno said the
allegations against Mr. Hank connecting him to Ms. Munoz' killing came
from the testimony of a protected witness.

Mr. Hank has denied all accusations of criminal activity.

For years, Mr. Hank has been a poster boy for the deep-rooted
corruption of the PRI, which ruled Mexico for seven decades until it
was deposed in 2000. Mr. Hank's company, the Caliente Group, runs
Tijuana's dog track as well as a gambling empire of casinos and
off-track betting parlors.

Mr. Hank, who was once briefly detained for trying to smuggle rare
animal skins into Mexico, is fond of rare animals and operates a
private zoo in Tijuana. But over the years, Mr. Hank, a
multi-millionaire, has been the target for accusations ranging from
charges of political corruption, ties with drug traffickers and even
the 1988 murder of a reporter who worked for Tijuana's crusading
weekly Zeta magazine.

Mr. Hank's top bodyguard and another employee were convicted of that
murder. Since then, Zeta has run weekly full page advertisements
accusing Mr. Hank of being the mastermind of the killing, which he has
denied. "Porque me mataste, Jorge Hank?" (Why did you kill me, Jorge
Hank) Zeta publishes every week.

A 2009 diplomatic cable signed by the U.S. consul in Tijuana and
disclosed by Wikileaks said that Mr. Hank "is widely believed to have
been a corrupt mayor and to be still involved in narco-trafficking."
Mr. Hank has denied those accusations.

The apparent failure of the government's case underlines the weakness
of Mexico's justice system, which is vulnerable to corruption and
where judges often dismiss weak cases brought by incompetent
prosecutors.

It marks a second large judicial defeat for Mr. Calderon's government.
In 2009, prosecutors arrested 35 Michoacan state officials, including
10 mayors in the president's home state, and accused them of collusion
with drug traffickers. All but one of the officials have since been
freed by judges.

"It's a huge political blow for Calderon, but an even bigger one for
all Mexicans who had held out hope that the government had a strategy
to deal with impunity," said Andrew Selee, the head of the Mexico
Institute at the Washington-based Woodrow Wilson Center. "It will
likely mark a turning point in the government's effort to pursue those
who aid and abet organized crime and mark a new low for public trust
in the government's ability to address the problem."

"It reinforces the distrust most Mexicans feel for the justice
system," said Mr. Selee.

Mr. Hank's apparent legal victory is a triumph for the PRI, said
George Grayson, an expert on Mexican politics at The College of
William and Mary. "They for sure are breaking out the champagne at PRI
headquarters."

Mr. Grayson said the government's inability to make the case against
Mr. Hank show its ineptitude. "Calderon despite his 30 years in
politics is a greenhorn at dealing with the PRI," he said.

The former major is the son of the late legendary PRI politician
Carlos Hank, known as "The Professor." The late Mr. Hank rose from
being a humble school teacher to being governor of the state of Mexico
as well as mayor of Mexico City. He is most remembered for coining a
famous aphorism which described the corruption of the PRI, the
political party that ran Mexico for seven decades before losing power
in 2000: "A politician who is poor is a poor politician."