Mexico the Hunters Become the Hunted

When reports first emerged that Victor Cortez Jr., a U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent, had been tortured by policemen in Guadalajara, any words of Mexican repentance were drowned out by shouts of resentment. Mexico City's most influential newspaper, Excelsior, ran a cartoon showing two skunks, one labeled "DEA," the other "drug traffickers." An editorial asserted that the very presence of American intelligence-gathering agents created a "stinking sewer." Both the governor and the attorney general of Jalisco state, where the detention had taken place, flatly denied all charges of torture. And the country's Defense Minister, General Juan Arevalo Gardoqui, spoke for many...