"If Love Could Have Saved You, You Would Have Lived Forever" opens next week, and will feature "art and objects that reference the aesthetics, material culture and traditional gestures surrounding death and remembrance." A video by  Tanyth Berkeley and Todd Chandler will remember Will, who was shot and killed during a teachers' strike in Oaxaca. The depiction of his own fatal shooting was partially captured on his camera.

Will's death remains a source of controversy on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border. No one has ever been prosecuted for his death. Brad's parents, Kathy and Hardy Will, who have campaigned tirelessly for justice since the death of their son, rejected an investigation into his death earlier this year which alleged that the journalist had been shot at close range.

The Wills believe that their son was shot by plainclothes government agents and have launched an independent investigation into the matter.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

But other than a difference in tone and Obama's opposition to free trade, there's not much difference between their approaches to the region, writes Lourdes Heredia.

Both McCain and Obama support United States interventions in the fight against drug trafficking throughout Latin America, with both candidates behind Plan Colombia and the recently approved Merida Initiative.

Obama -- who apparently has never set foot in Latin America -- has a higher profile here because he is perceived as representing a fresh start for a region in which the Bush administration is unpopular.

Read the rest of the BBC's assessment of the rivals here...

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom is having to handle the fallout caused by the escape of eight young undocumented drug dealers from unguarded facilities in San Bernardino County as he prepares to run for governor.

"San Francisco has a legal and moral obligation to notify us, and they didn't," said Michelle Scray, assistant chief probation officer for San Bernardino County. "We have requested a list from San Francisco of any other offenders placed in our county. They assured us they would not be sending any more."

For years, San Francisco, a sanctuary city since 1989, has been shielding juvenile offenders from federal authorities, either escorting them to their home countries at city expense or transporting them to group homes, including locations in San Bernardino County.

Mayor Gavin Newsom reversed the policy Wednesday saying minors in the country illegally who commit crimes will be turned over to immigration authorities.

Read the full report here...

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

During his visit to Mexico this week, John McCain reiterated his support for allowing more immigrant workers to enter the United States on a temporary basis. But he said broad immigration reform should come only after the U.S. government has tightened the border adequately, including by building fences, reports the L.A. Times' Ken Ellingwood from Mexico City.

Migration is a big issue in Mexico, the main source of undocumented immigrant labor to the United States. Mexican migrants in the United States sent home about $24 billion in remittances last year.

"We must have comprehensive immigration reform, but the American people want our borders secured first," McCain said.

McCain's visit to Mexico, seen by some commentators here largely as a play for Latino votes in the United States (as was reported in La Plaza yesterday), came as the Calderon government has pursued a crackdown on drug trafficking. That crackdown will receive additional funding from the recent U.S-approved Merida Initiative aid package, which McCain also praised during his trip.

Click here to read Ellingwood's full report on McCain's visit.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Photo: Sen. John McCain gets a blessing from Msgr. Diego Monroy Ponce at the Basilica de Guadalupe in Mexico City as McCain’s wife, Cindy, looks on. The basilica, built where a 16th century Indian peasant described a vision of the Virgin of Guadalupe, holds strong symbolism for Latino voters; credit: L.M. Otero / Associated Press.

Another report from our man Chris Kraul in Colombia this morning provides further information about Wednesday's rescue of 15 hostages from the hands of the FARC leftist guerrilla group. As the three American hostages that were liberated arrived on American soil, details emerged about the operation which led to their rescue as well as that of former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt.

Kraul writes that a fake humanitarian organization was created, complete with a special logo and a website. 

For several weeks Colombian armed forces constructed a fake universe, and with help from U.S. intelligence and equipment, managed to fool the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia insurgent group.   

Had the operation failed, the United States was prepared to participate in a "Plan B," which would have sent, within 15 minutes, 2,000 Colombian troops and U.S. advisors aboard 39 helicopters to within half a mile of the site.

According to Kraul, the rescue was planned and executed by the Colombians, and benefited from equipment, intelligence and years of training from the United States government, but the left-of-center NarcoNews claims that it was the U.S. government in the driver's seat all the way.

"A U.S. military special-operations unit carried out the recent rescue of three Defense Department contractors being held by the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC)," according to a source who has firsthand knowledge of the operation, writes Bill Conroy on the site. The site does not reveal the source, but says it has never been led astray by that source in the past.

NarcoNews claims the operation was in fact led by the United States with Colombian support and that, in fact, the tracking of FARC communications was thanks to satellite phones planted within the group by the U.S.

Al Giordani, who writes for the Huffington Post as well as NarcoNews, wrote on his blog The Field that the record of the Colombian military in these sorts of raids is poor: "The success of yesterday's raid is how we know that Washington's fingerprints were all over this one."

Meanwhile, other media sources are asking whether the hostages' release was obtained not through a heroic rescue operation, but through the payment of money (i.e. a bribe). Read about it here. Meanwhile, the Guardian of London speculates that the hostages' release could be the end, or at least the beginning of the end, for the FARC. The British newspaper says that the event underscores the disarray of the FARC's command structure, and greatly reduces the FARC's leverage in dealing with the Colombian government.

Maybe we'll never really know what happened on Wednesday, but interest in the event promises to keep the accounts mounting for days to come.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City and Reed Johnson in Los Angeles

Photo: Gerardo Aguilar Ramirez, alias “Cesar,” a rebel commander in charge of guarding the high-value hostages, in custody at a Bogota, Colombia, military base. Soldiers arrested him during the rescue; credit: William Fernando Martinez / Associated Press

The youths are from Honduras and were convicted in San Francisco which, as we reported yesterday, is changing its policy on deporting undocumented juvenile offenders.

"On Wednesday, Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Redlands) demanded that San Francisco officials turn over all convicted illegal immigrant drug dealers to federal authorities instead of shipping them 'out to San Bernardino County, where they can escape and victimize the neighborhoods in my district.' "

"In a strongly worded statement, Newsom said Wednesday that he has directed his administration 'to work in cooperation with the federal government on all felony cases. And I urge the district attorney, the public defender and the courts to do the same.' "

On top of that, Newsom must persuade Californians that he is more than just the mayor of a famously liberal city, the man who ushered in same-sex marriage, reports the L.A. Times' Maria L. LaGanga.

Read on...

Update, July 3, 10:50 a.m. PST: The Los Angeles Times' David Kelly is reporting that furious San Bernardino County officials will announce new measures to prevent "any future shipments" to the county of convicted juvenile offenders who are illegal immigrants.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City and Reed Johnson in Los Angeles

At around 8 a.m today, the presumptive Republican presidential candidate of the United States paid a visit to Mexico City's Basilica de Guadalupe, a major center of worship for the nation's millions of devout Catholics, where he signed the visitors' book and toured the religious site.

Commentators said that McCain's visit to Mexico could impress the millions of Mexicans currently living in the United States.

"Images of Mr. McCain at the basilica are being directed at the Mexican community in the United States because they are symbols Mexicans over there also identify with," said political commentator José Antonio Crespo in the Dallas Morning News.

McCain will also meet with President Felipe Calderón during his time in Mexico, at which point the two politicians will no doubt discuss the recently approved yet controversial cash injection from the United States of $400 million U.S. -- known as the Merida Initiative -- aimed at helping Mexico in its fight against powerful drug cartels and organized crime networks.

He is also expected to address the thorny issue of illegal immigration to the United States during his time here -- an issue about which detractors say the presidential candidate has flip-flopped.

Click here for our coverage of Merida Initiative developments.

Read the Dallas Morning News report on McCain's visit here.....

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

The crackdown on gangs in California continues this week. This dispatch from Francisco Vara-Orta reports that more than 120 officers raided the homes of suspected members of a Rialto street gang yesterday as San Bernardino County officials prepared to file the first gang injunction in county history against the targeted group.

Earlier this week, reports from Orange County and Los Angeles provided further details on the current battle being fought by California lawmakers and police against violent gangs.

Read on...

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Photo: LAPD gang Det. Chris Vasquez helps pack up the command post in the parking lot of Dodger Stadium, where suspects were brought to be processed. The chart has pictures of the alleged gang members targeted, most of whom are now in custody. Credit: Annie Wells / Los Angeles Times

But investigators in the limited probe commended officials at Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the agency that oversees immigrant detentions, for adhering to standards they are supposed to follow after detainees have died.

Critics said that although the report's recommendations mirrored their concerns about detainee care, the narrow scope of the inquiry reinforced how little information Homeland Security provides about detainees and the overall lack of accountability for their care.

The deaths of legal and illegal immigrants in detention have drawn widespread attention in the last year, resulting in lawsuits, investigative reports, the attention of a special United Nations investigator and two bills in Congress. This Washington Post series took a close look at the state of immigrant detention.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

There are more dispatches from our staff around the world this morning on the rescue of 15 hostages in Colombia yesterday.

Geraldine Baum and Anne-Marie O'Connor of the L.A. Times report from Paris on the rescue of Ingrid Betancourt, the French-Colombian former presidential candidate.

"Ingrid Betancourt is a rare politician whose personal ordeal made her a heroine in two countries, a charismatic idealist whose endurance through six years of captivity created a shared sympathy between her native Colombia and France, where she grew up and held dual citizenship," they write.

Meanwhile, Erika Hayasaki in New York reports on the three American hostages who were among those liberated yesterday. She focuses on Jo Rosano, mother of Marc Gonsalves, who was one of the three American employees of Northrop Grumman Corp. taken hostage after their plane developed engine trouble and crashed during a drug surveillance mission in southern Colombia in February 2003.

"Rosano, a Bristol resident, had traveled to Colombia three times seeking her son's release and has visited Washington a dozen times to beg lawmakers to help.

"In September, she met with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe at the United Nations," she writes.

And here's how the Colombian newspaper El Heraldo covered Betancourt's reunion with her children.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Photos: Top -- Colombia's President Alvaro Uribe pauses as former hostage Ingrid Betancourt wipes her eyes during a news conference at the presidential palace in Bogota on Wednesday. Fernando Vergara / Associated Press.
Bottom -- Keith Stansell, Marc Gonsalves and Thomas Howes inside an airplane after being rescued Wednesday. EPA/U.S. Embassy/Handout.

Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos said the military today rescued former presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, three Americans employed by a subsidiary of Northrop Grumman Corp. and 11 others held for years by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.

"This was an unprecedented operation," Santos told reporters. "It will go down in history for its audaciousness and effectiveness."

According to Colombian officials, the military tricked guerrillas into bringing the hostages together to be transported to a FARC commander by helicopter. The military also infiltrated a security cordon surrounding a jungle camp in southeast Colombia.

-- Reed Johnson in Los Angeles

Writing in Opinion today, Alberto R. Gonzales, former attorney general of the United States, has his say on what Latinos want from their next president.

"Sen. Barack Obama's presidential campaign has reignited an examination of race relations in America. It has led some to question how deep the divide is between black and white Americans. From my perspective, the question ignores the reality of our diverse society. We must also consider the divide between the majority from another group, one that I happen to belong to: Latinos,"  Gonzales writes.

"I have said often that Latinos share a common prayer: 'Just give me a chance to succeed.' I believe that the candidate who will win Latino votes is the one who understands that desire and who will engage the issue of racial equality for Americans of all colors. It's politically wise. More important, it is the right thing to do for our nation."

In June, a Gallup Poll summary of surveys taken in May showed Obama winning 62% of Latino registered voters nationwide, compared with just 29% for McCain, according to this report in The Times by Peter Wallsten.

Read the whole Opinion piece here ... and leave your own thoughts.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Photo: Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times

The country has struggled to eliminate torture in law enforcement.

Following the emergence of the tape, human rights investigators in Guanajuato state are looking into the matter and the National Human Rights Commission also expressed concern.

"It's very worrisome that there may be training courses that teach people to torture," said Raul Plascencia, a top commission inspector.

There are some things that don't seem to be worrying officials here. For example, where these videos came from and why they emerged now, just when Mexico City Mayor Marcelo Ebrard of the rival PRD party (León's mayor is from the PAN, President Calderon's party) is embroiled in political upheaval following the News Divine nightclub tragedy. And what about the authenticity of the tapes?

Meanwhile, the Washington Post rightly elaborates on a point we raised Tuesday, which is that Mexico's law enforcement branches are currently waiting to receive a cash injection from the United States as part of the Merida Initiative.

Around U.S. $200 million will go to Mexico's Armed Forces, according to this analysis by Laura Carlsen, director of the America's Policy Program. But will it be used to "retrain" them, as the Merida bill stipulates, or just put more money to bad use in the hands of corrupt officials?

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Photo: A screen grab of the leaked videos, in which a policeman is shown being forced to roll in his own vomit.

The city's sanctuary city ordinance, enacted in 1989,  requires that the city turn over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement adult illegal immigrants with felony records or those who have been accused of felonies. But the ordinance is murkier on the subject of juvenile offenders. See here for a report from last year on the controversial issue of sanctuary cities.

However, after several recent embarrassing incidents in the area, this famously liberal enclave has been forced to reconsider how it deals with young undocumented criminals.

Maria L. LaGanga,  David Kelly and Anna Gorman of the L.A. Times have the details.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Photo: Richard Hartog / Los Angeles Times

Speaking in the historic coastal city of Cartagena, the presumptive Republican presidential candidate voiced pro-free-trade views at a time when such policies are increasingly unpopular in Congress and with the U.S. public, writes the L.A. Times' Chris Kraul.

Today, McCain focused his attentions more specifically on the illegal drug trade, touring a port to look at interdiction efforts.

But according to the Huffington Post this morning, one of McCain's key supporters has a complex personal relation to Colombia's war against drugs and rebel groups.

Among McCain's prominent supporters and fundraisers in Ohio is Carl H. Lindner Jr., a billionaire Cincinnati businessman, former CEO of Chiquita Brands International and co-host of a recent top-dollar fundraiser. Under his direction the company funded both the paramilitary and the leftist FARC and ELN,  as the L.A. Times has reported, and commented on in this editorial.

"Beginning under his tenure, Chiquita executives paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (known by the Spanish acronym AUC), which is described by George Washington University's National Security Archive as an 'illegal right-wing anti-guerrilla group tied to many of the country's most notorious civilian massacres,' " according to the Huffington Post's.

Chiquita "had been making similar payments to the leftist FARC and ELN guerrillas" since 1989, also on Lindner's watch,  the report continues.

McCain thanked Colombian President Uribe "for the progress" he had made against FARC (the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia), noting that Colombian armed forces had killed and captured several rebel leaders over the last year.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

"Why, as an American, do I have to push a button to speak English or hear English?"

The audience, a sea of mostly white faces, erupted in deafening applause.

Read John McCain's response here...

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

One of the videos shows members of a tactical unit trying out methods on a fellow officer. They appear to squirt water up his nose and dunk his head in a hole said to be full of excrement and rats. The man gasps for air and moans repeatedly.

In another video, an unidentified English-speaking man who appears to be training the group forces one exhausted agent to roll over into his own vomit, the Associated Press is reporting.

The news, which was on the front page of today's edition of one of Mexico's leading newspapers, Reforma, will do little to improve the bad reputation that Mexico's police have both nationally and internationally.

It may also trouble those opposed to the recently approved Merida Initiative, which promises to put millions of United States dollars toward funding Mexico's police and army in their fight against the country's drug cartels. On the other hand, the film could back up the new aid package by providing evidence of the need for more training and supervision of Mexico's police and army. The cash injection from the Merida Initiative proposes fund "technical advice and training to strengthen the institutions of justice."

But Vincente Guerrero Reynosa, the mayor of León* (an earlier version of this post misidentified him as the governor of the state of Guanajuato), said that the exercises were held so the police could resist torture rather than give it, and that they were preparation for "extreme situations."

You can watch the videos, which are also on Reforma's subscription site, here on YouTube at the following links; they may disturb some viewers:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XrdL6ggkcUw

and

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g60tfTHOOpI

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Photo: A screen grab of the leaked videos, in which a policeman is shown being forced to roll in his own vomit.

McCain is expected to focus on the issues of free trade and illegal immigration during his trip south.

McCain is a strong supporter of NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement, among the U.S., Canada and Mexico. But the trade deal has proved unpopular with many on both sides of the border.

Although trade has grown since the agreement was signed, Ohio’s manufacturing-heavy economy has suffered some of the steepest job losses of the last decade. It is hard to say precisely which losses were attributable directly to NAFTA, but Robert Scott, a trade expert at the liberal Economic Policy Institute, estimates that about 50,000 jobs in Ohio were lost between 1994 and 2004 as a result of NAFTA, says this report from the Los Angeles Times.

Likewise, Mexican farmers were out in force in February protesting the lifting of trade restrictions, thanks to NAFTA, on agricultural commodities like corn, rice and oats (see a video below). The farmers claimed lifting the restrictions will put them out of work because they won't be able to compete with powerful U.S. agribusinesses. They wanted the pact rewritten.

McCain is also a strong supporter of the stalled free-trade agreement with Colombia.

Illegal immigration is his priority discussion topic for his visit to Mexico City -- his comments will be noted by Democrats and Republicans alike back home, where detractors say he has flip-flopped on the issue.

"McCain co-sponsored Senate legislation that would have allowed illegal immigrants to stay in the U.S., work and apply to become legal residents after learning English, paying fines and back taxes, and clearing a background check. The measure failed last year and McCain since has talked primarily about the importance of boosting border security, and less so about a pathway to citizenship for those in the country illegally."

Read the Associated Press report here...

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

The two men, Diego Ortiz, 30, and Hernando Riascos Torres, 38, were illegal immigrants from Colombia, and the case has stirred a national debate over whether Horn was a vigilante or a hero.

"The incident in Pasadena, a city of about 140,000 east of downtown Houston, outraged some activists, who staged protests in the neighborhood.

"They argued that if Horn -- who was not arrested -- were not white and his victims not dark-skinned, he would have been taken to jail immediately."

Read the full report here...

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Venezuelan regulators are forcing a local TV station to show public service announcements as punishment for broadcasting "The Simpsons" during a time slot reserved for children's programs, reports the Associated Press.

Hugo Chavez's Venezuela banished the series from morning TV, saying the satirical saga of a yellow-hued, dysfunctional family wasn't fit for children, as this Plaza post reported. The series was replaced with "Baywatch Hawaii."

Venezuela's National Telecommunications Commission on Monday said it will choose short segments, including two 30-second "cultural and educational messages" per day, that the station must broadcast for 30 days as a sanction.

Read the report here...

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Photo: Twentieth Century Fox, Matt Groening via Associated Press