FOIA Request Involving Juarez Murders

UTEP professor is suing the federal government, hoping to force the release of documents surrounding the case of “Lalo,” the former Immigration and Customs Enforcement informant involved in drug-related murders in Juárez. Bill Weaver, an associate professor of political science at UTEP, filed the suit in mid-November against the Drug Enforcement Administration and the Department of Justice because the agencies did not answer his Freedom of Information Act requests from 2005, court documents showed. Weaver is seeking the never-released conclusions of an internal audit looking at the conduct of special agents and prosecutors who monitored the informant, Guillermo Eduardo Ramirez Peyro, 35, known as “Lalo,” as 12 men were tortured, killed and buried in a Juárez backyard in 2003 and 2004. eaver also wants a sound recording made by the informant of the gruesome killing of an associate, a Mexican lawyer named Fernando Reyes, in August 2003. The professor said he wants to use the information for a forthcoming book. Click here for the El Paso Times story.

KJ