Actually, no, Lisa. Tahmooressi isn't the only ex-military guy to have had this happen to him. It will all work out. It takes time:
Has something like this happened before?
Yes, there have been several cases of people jailed after accidentally crossing into Mexico. Tahmooressi’s case is not an isolated instance of this, CNN reports:
It is difficult for the U.S. State Department to quantify how many arrests are due to accidental crossings at the U.S.-Mexico border, a spokeswoman told CNN, but Andrew Tahmooressi's case is not all that unique. According to the AP:
In 2008, an active-duty Army soldier was jailed in Ciudad Juarez, across from El Paso, Texas, for driving into Mexico with guns, knives and ammunition. Former Army Spc. Richard R. Medina Torres also said he was lost and missed the last U.S. exit. He spent a little over a month in jail before being released. According to The San Diego Union-Tribune:
In 1999, a Camp Pendleton Marine was detained for two weeks in Tijuana after driving into the country with firearms. The Marine claimed he did so by mistake, and a federal judge ordered his release after the Mexican Attorney General asked that all charges be dropped. According to a State Department warning, dozens of US citizens are arrested each month for “unintentionally violating Mexico’s strict weapons laws.” The warning also said, “claiming not to know about the law will not get you leniency from a police officer or the judicial system.”
Lawyers for Tahmooressi told The San Diego Union-Tribune that Mexico’s federal code allows for the absence of intent to be used as an exception to the penalty, and Tahmooressi did not intend to possess weapons there.
Is the US government doing anything to help?
Paul and Jill Tahmooressi stand outside the Mexican Consulate in Miami, Monday, May 5, 2014, protesting the arrest of their son in Mexico. Andrew Tahmooressi, a Marine veteran who was arrested and jailed in Mexico on weapons charges for allegedly bringing guns across the border, says he never intended to leave the country but missed an exit when heading to meet friends in a border town. He told the newspaper that Mexican authorities found three guns inside the truck he had recently driven across the country to make a new start in San Diego. (AP Photo/J Pat Carter) Paul and Jill Tahmooressi outside the Mexican Consulate in Miami on May 5.AP Several US lawmakers have petitioned for Tahmooressi’s release. US Rep. Duncan Hunter, a California Republican and Marine veteran, sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry on May 2 asking for assistance in the case.
According to NBC San Diego, Hunter wrote in his letter that “Andrew is neither a criminal nor a weapons trafficker, and his incarceration is an extraordinarily unfortunate occurrence.”
4 months already,we get all Mexico's criminals crossing here illegally and all we hear is how heartless we are. We don't treat them like they do. Apparently that crossing is intentionally misleading. We could get him out if we had the will or the "compassion" But he is just a US soldier not a deserter ,not exactly a priority
You're mixing apples with oranges, Lisa. Bergdahl is still employed by the U.S. military, and the U.S. military leaves no soldier behind. Tahmooressi is a civilian, who like other civilians, "mistakenly" crossed the border into Mexico with unsecured, loaded firearms (BTW illegal in California, from where he crossed the border). Bringing firearms is illegal in Mexico.
But there's more to this story than what you and others see as a parallel situation. There is no parallel situation between a civilian who broke U.S. laws and Mexican laws and a U.S. soldier who was taken prisoner by the Taliban during an active conflict with Afghanistan. You and others are trying to make these two cases similar. They are not even close.
From the LA Times: "Tahmooressi, who served two tours of duty in Afghanistan before retiring, told Greta Van Susteren that after spending the day in Tijuana (where he checked into, then out of, a hotel), he returned to the U.S. side of the border, and got into his truck.
He made a wrong turn, he said, and ended up accidentally crossing back into Mexico, where he tried to turn around but was stopped by Mexican border guards. He told them he had three guns – all legal in the U.S. – whereupon they arrested him because guns are illegal in Mexico, whether you entered the country by accident or not.
According to Vice News, Tahmooressi entered Mexico with a 5.56mm rifle, a 12-gauge shotgun and a .45-caliber pistol, as well as more than 400 rounds of ammunition. The chief Mexican customs officer at the San Ysidro crossing told Vice that the guns, all loaded, were "just wrapped up in his belongings" rather than locked away and unloaded as required by California law. Vice also reported that "the rifle was found behind the driver’s seat, the shotgun on the passenger seat, and the pistol was in the driver-side door pocket, along with several cartridges."
"It's pretty hard to accidentally end up in Mexico. Especially with guns. There are big signs on the U.S. side telling travelers that guns are illegal in Mexico. There’s plenty of warning that the border is approaching. Is it plausible that Tahmooressi crossed by accident in the dark? Maybe. I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, even though he admitted that he lied to Mexican officials about how many times he'd crossed the border.
Tahmooressi’s mother, Jill Tahmooressi, has been campaigning in the media for American officials to secure her son’s release. A nurse, she told Vice News that her son needs specialized treatment. She said she had observed signs of paranoia in him, and that he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder at the Veterans Affairs facility in La Jolla on March 12. She said he is “hypervigilant” and in 2013, suffered from “hunter-prey syndrome; he was the prey.”
There's more to this story, Lisa, than simple-minded effort to make President Obama look like a fiend for not rescuing Tahmooressi. Many other civilians, as reported, have illegally crossed into Mexico with firearms.
Do you suggest that the U.S. president involve himself in each case? It seems as though you do.
Was it proper for Mexican authorities to arrest him on suspicion of violating the country's gun laws? Of course it was.
Should Mexico release the former Marine? Yes. I think Mexico should, and I think Mexico will.
And then every effort should be made to get this young man into treatment, and to separate him from his guns and ammo before he hurts himself or anyone else.
As my colleague Tony Perry has reported, at least 24 members of Congress have called on the State Department to work with Mexican authorities to free Tahmooressi. Last month, Secretary of State John Kerry brought up Tahmooressi's plight in talks with Mexican officials, and the case is being monitored by the U.S. Consulate in Mexico.
Still, that hasn’t stopped the partisan noise machine from trying to use this unfortunate young man’s plight as a cudgel against the president.
“This Administration went to unprecedented lengths for Bowe Bergdahl by making a lopsided deal with an untrustworthy partner,” U.S. Rep. Duncan Hunter told Fox News. Meanwhile, “Andrew Tahmooressi is still stuck in a Mexican jail for making a wrong turn.”
On Monday, in an open letter to Obama, Veteran of Foreign Wars Commander-in-Chief William Thien wrote that the charges against Tahmooressi "appear to be a desperate attempt by a failing nation-state to project strength against the United States." You don't insult an ally, especially when you are asking it for a favor.
This situation requires diplomacy, and diplomacy requires restraint. No country wants to be told how to administer justice, or bullied into ignoring its own laws.
Those who try to link this hapless Marine’s situation to the release of Bergdahl are not doing Tahmooressi any favors. He's been incarcerated for just over two months. They should stop comparing him to a soldier who spent five years in captivity.
The louder they yell, the more they imply that Mexican laws are expendable (or should be overlooked just this once), the longer it’s going to take to get Tahmooressi home.
the president of Mexico can get him out if Obama ushes for it. How about we trade them a few thousand gang members for him?Maybe then he would take the deal
Why should the president negotiate for Tahmooressi and not other civilian Americans in Mexican jails? You're advocating that the president do this just for one person? Why him and not all Americans? Then you and your friends can accuse President Obama is wasting money and time trying to interfere with Mexicans and Mexican laws.
You haven't thought this through. I'm guessing you're on this because it's an easy way to bash the president.
Hey Chaw, which "Ripley's Believe It Or Not" franchise will display the worst lady's tail once we evict her and all her loathsome minions from the White House?
Are your really serious Miss Shaw”? That man was given a job to do and a rifle to protect the United States from these creeps crossing our boarders illegally ! Perhaps you people “Progressives” don’t understand what ILLEGALLY means, and now you want to arrest him for owning a version of the rifle he used to protect you? Shame on you. It seems your poTUS only cares about letting Illegal’s in the country, for every reason under the sun, but he is NOT CONCERNED about getting his WAR VETERANS home. It also seems to me that he is only cares about things that are not in the interest of this country. If you care, I’ll be very happey to list them.... if I can find that much time. And if we the American’s who care about America really cared, we wouldn't have our current problem with all these illegal’s flooding our borders and ruing our country! Just because Obama is not interested, it doesn’t mean that we American’s are not!! I’m sure that you are aware of what happens in other countries to anyone who breaks the law!
Dearest DD, I'm sure you're a very nice person and that your family likes you very much, but I'm sorry to say that you have no reading ability. Where you got the idea that Tahmooressi was "protecting" the border is a mystery, because that's simply not true. Did you read that on another conservative blog, because if you did, that would explain why you are so completely wrong in that. But then you really went off the rails when you wrote "...you want to arrest him for owning a version of the rifle he used to protect you?" Because, my dear man, I wrote nothing of the sort. I don't mean to be rude, but perhaps you were hallucinating when you wrote that? Because, dear sir, absolutely nothing in my comments has anything to do whatsoever with border problems.
I'm so sorry you completely and extravagantly missed the entire meaning of my comment.
I don't have to "think" it through Shaw.it's a no brainer. Apparently we know where the liberal allegiance is. It is with criminal illegals and Army deserters who by all accounts we still don't know what his story is
Sorry to hurt your feelings Shaw but I think that you are way off base on this one. I think that your argument is a stupid one. .. okay, Ex-Marine Andrew Tahmooressi was arrested on weapons charges crossing the Mexican boarder with a weapon and violated Mexico’s strict gun law. First of all, why would a gun smuggler try to sell guns that he purchased legally and had them registered in the USA? How come Mexico citizens cross OUR Borders daily and they are rewarded by Mr. Obama with welfare, hospitalization, health benefits, and so many other entitlements? An American crosses THEIR Border as he claimed and there is no proof that he wasn’t telling the truth, that he took a wrong turn and didn’t mean to cross the border. and he ends up in prison on a weapons charge. I feel that it’s pretty ironic that Eric Holder isn’t in prison down there, since he sent all those guns into their country? Call me old fashioned I for one find that to be very interesting!
Actually, no, Lisa. Tahmooressi isn't the only ex-military guy to have had this happen to him. It will all work out. It takes time:
ReplyDeleteHas something like this happened before?
Yes, there have been several cases of people jailed after accidentally crossing into Mexico. Tahmooressi’s case is not an isolated instance of this, CNN reports:
It is difficult for the U.S. State Department to quantify how many arrests are due to accidental crossings at the U.S.-Mexico border, a spokeswoman told CNN, but Andrew Tahmooressi's case is not all that unique.
According to the AP:
In 2008, an active-duty Army soldier was jailed in Ciudad Juarez, across from El Paso, Texas, for driving into Mexico with guns, knives and ammunition. Former Army Spc. Richard R. Medina Torres also said he was lost and missed the last U.S. exit. He spent a little over a month in jail before being released.
According to The San Diego Union-Tribune:
In 1999, a Camp Pendleton Marine was detained for two weeks in Tijuana after driving into the country with firearms. The Marine claimed he did so by mistake, and a federal judge ordered his release after the Mexican Attorney General asked that all charges be dropped.
According to a State Department warning, dozens of US citizens are arrested each month for “unintentionally violating Mexico’s strict weapons laws.” The warning also said, “claiming not to know about the law will not get you leniency from a police officer or the judicial system.”
Lawyers for Tahmooressi told The San Diego Union-Tribune that Mexico’s federal code allows for the absence of intent to be used as an exception to the penalty, and Tahmooressi did not intend to possess weapons there.
Is the US government doing anything to help?
Paul and Jill Tahmooressi stand outside the Mexican Consulate in Miami, Monday, May 5, 2014, protesting the arrest of their son in Mexico. Andrew Tahmooressi, a Marine veteran who was arrested and jailed in Mexico on weapons charges for allegedly bringing guns across the border, says he never intended to leave the country but missed an exit when heading to meet friends in a border town. He told the newspaper that Mexican authorities found three guns inside the truck he had recently driven across the country to make a new start in San Diego. (AP Photo/J Pat Carter)
Paul and Jill Tahmooressi outside the Mexican Consulate in Miami on May 5.AP
Several US lawmakers have petitioned for Tahmooressi’s release. US Rep. Duncan Hunter, a California Republican and Marine veteran, sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry on May 2 asking for assistance in the case.
According to NBC San Diego, Hunter wrote in his letter that “Andrew is neither a criminal nor a weapons trafficker, and his incarceration is an extraordinarily unfortunate occurrence.”
4 months already,we get all Mexico's criminals crossing here illegally and all we hear is how heartless we are. We don't treat them like they do. Apparently that crossing is intentionally misleading. We could get him out if we had the will or the "compassion" But he is just a US soldier not a deserter ,not exactly a
ReplyDeletepriority
Obama has a personal relationship with Mexico's president. He' s been quite aware of this since it happened . We don't need a petition
ReplyDeleteHe can make a deal with the taliban to spring the deserter(so they said) but we can't spring Tahmoorisi in our next door neighbor's POW prison
ReplyDeleteYou're mixing apples with oranges, Lisa. Bergdahl is still employed by the U.S. military, and the U.S. military leaves no soldier behind. Tahmooressi is a civilian, who like other civilians, "mistakenly" crossed the border into Mexico with unsecured, loaded firearms (BTW illegal in California, from where he crossed the border). Bringing firearms is illegal in Mexico.
ReplyDeleteBut there's more to this story than what you and others see as a parallel situation. There is no parallel situation between a civilian who broke U.S. laws and Mexican laws and a U.S. soldier who was taken prisoner by the Taliban during an active conflict with Afghanistan. You and others are trying to make these two cases similar. They are not even close.
From the LA Times: "Tahmooressi, who served two tours of duty in Afghanistan before retiring, told Greta Van Susteren that after spending the day in Tijuana (where he checked into, then out of, a hotel), he returned to the U.S. side of the border, and got into his truck.
ReplyDeleteHe made a wrong turn, he said, and ended up accidentally crossing back into Mexico, where he tried to turn around but was stopped by Mexican border guards. He told them he had three guns – all legal in the U.S. – whereupon they arrested him because guns are illegal in Mexico, whether you entered the country by accident or not.
According to Vice News, Tahmooressi entered Mexico with a 5.56mm rifle, a 12-gauge shotgun and a .45-caliber pistol, as well as more than 400 rounds of ammunition. The chief Mexican customs officer at the San Ysidro crossing told Vice that the guns, all loaded, were "just wrapped up in his belongings" rather than locked away and unloaded as required by California law. Vice also reported that "the rifle was found behind the driver’s seat, the shotgun on the passenger seat, and the pistol was in the driver-side door pocket, along with several cartridges."
(cont.)
ReplyDelete"It's pretty hard to accidentally end up in Mexico. Especially with guns. There are big signs on the U.S. side telling travelers that guns are illegal in Mexico. There’s plenty of warning that the border is approaching. Is it plausible that Tahmooressi crossed by accident in the dark? Maybe. I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, even though he admitted that he lied to Mexican officials about how many times he'd crossed the border.
Tahmooressi’s mother, Jill Tahmooressi, has been campaigning in the media for American officials to secure her son’s release. A nurse, she told Vice News that her son needs specialized treatment. She said she had observed signs of paranoia in him, and that he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder at the Veterans Affairs facility in La Jolla on March 12. She said he is “hypervigilant” and in 2013, suffered from “hunter-prey syndrome; he was the prey.”
There's more to this story, Lisa, than simple-minded effort to make President Obama look like a fiend for not rescuing Tahmooressi. Many other civilians, as reported, have illegally crossed into Mexico with firearms.
Do you suggest that the U.S. president involve himself in each case? It seems as though you do.
The end of the LA Times story:
ReplyDeleteWas it proper for Mexican authorities to arrest him on suspicion of violating the country's gun laws? Of course it was.
Should Mexico release the former Marine? Yes. I think Mexico should, and I think Mexico will.
And then every effort should be made to get this young man into treatment, and to separate him from his guns and ammo before he hurts himself or anyone else.
As my colleague Tony Perry has reported, at least 24 members of Congress have called on the State Department to work with Mexican authorities to free Tahmooressi. Last month, Secretary of State John Kerry brought up Tahmooressi's plight in talks with Mexican officials, and the case is being monitored by the U.S. Consulate in Mexico.
Still, that hasn’t stopped the partisan noise machine from trying to use this unfortunate young man’s plight as a cudgel against the president.
“This Administration went to unprecedented lengths for Bowe Bergdahl by making a lopsided deal with an untrustworthy partner,” U.S. Rep. Duncan Hunter told Fox News. Meanwhile, “Andrew Tahmooressi is still stuck in a Mexican jail for making a wrong turn.”
On Monday, in an open letter to Obama, Veteran of Foreign Wars Commander-in-Chief William Thien wrote that the charges against Tahmooressi "appear to be a desperate attempt by a failing nation-state to project strength against the United States." You don't insult an ally, especially when you are asking it for a favor.
This situation requires diplomacy, and diplomacy requires restraint. No country wants to be told how to administer justice, or bullied into ignoring its own laws.
Those who try to link this hapless Marine’s situation to the release of Bergdahl are not doing Tahmooressi any favors. He's been incarcerated for just over two months. They should stop comparing him to a soldier who spent five years in captivity.
The louder they yell, the more they imply that Mexican laws are expendable (or should be overlooked just this once), the longer it’s going to take to get Tahmooressi home.
the president of Mexico can get him out if Obama ushes for it. How about we trade them a few thousand gang members for him?Maybe then he would take the deal
ReplyDeleteWhy should the president negotiate for Tahmooressi and not other civilian Americans in Mexican jails? You're advocating that the president do this just for one person? Why him and not all Americans? Then you and your friends can accuse President Obama is wasting money and time trying to interfere with Mexicans and Mexican laws.
ReplyDeleteYou haven't thought this through. I'm guessing you're on this because it's an easy way to bash the president.
^This turd is still staining your bowl?^
DeleteHey Chaw, which "Ripley's Believe It Or Not" franchise will display the worst lady's tail once we evict her and all her loathsome minions from the White House?
Are your really serious Miss Shaw”? That man was given a job to do and a rifle to protect the United States from these creeps crossing our boarders illegally ! Perhaps you people “Progressives” don’t understand what ILLEGALLY means, and now you want to arrest him for owning a version of the rifle he used to protect you? Shame on you.
ReplyDeleteIt seems your poTUS only cares about letting Illegal’s in the country, for every reason under the sun, but he is NOT CONCERNED about getting his WAR VETERANS home. It also seems to me that he is only cares about things that are not in the interest of this country. If you care, I’ll be very happey to list them.... if I can find that much time.
And if we the American’s who care about America really cared, we wouldn't have our current problem with all these illegal’s flooding our borders and ruing our country!
Just because Obama is not interested, it doesn’t mean that we American’s are not!!
I’m sure that you are aware of what happens in other countries to anyone who breaks the law!
Easy to see why Chaw idolizes these as the good guys in her shallow, dumb, depraved mind.
ReplyDeleteDearest DD, I'm sure you're a very nice person and that your family likes you very much, but I'm sorry to say that you have no reading ability. Where you got the idea that Tahmooressi was "protecting" the border is a mystery, because that's simply not true. Did you read that on another conservative blog, because if you did, that would explain why you are so completely wrong in that. But then you really went off the rails when you wrote "...you want to arrest him for owning a version of the rifle he used to protect you?" Because, my dear man, I wrote nothing of the sort. I don't mean to be rude, but perhaps you were hallucinating when you wrote that? Because, dear sir, absolutely nothing in my comments has anything to do whatsoever with border problems.
ReplyDeleteI'm so sorry you completely and extravagantly missed the entire meaning of my comment.
Maybe next time you'll do better. Mkay?
I don't have to "think" it through Shaw.it's a no brainer. Apparently we know where the liberal allegiance is. It is with criminal illegals and Army deserters
ReplyDeletewho by all accounts we still don't know what his story is
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteSorry to hurt your feelings Shaw but I think that you are way off base on this one. I think that your argument is a stupid one. .. okay, Ex-Marine Andrew Tahmooressi was arrested on weapons charges crossing the Mexican boarder with a weapon and violated Mexico’s strict gun law. First of all, why would a gun smuggler try to sell guns that he purchased legally and had them registered in the USA?
ReplyDeleteHow come Mexico citizens cross OUR Borders daily and they are rewarded by Mr. Obama with welfare, hospitalization, health benefits, and so many other entitlements? An American crosses THEIR Border as he claimed and there is no proof that he wasn’t telling the truth, that he took a wrong turn and didn’t mean to cross the border. and he ends up in prison on a weapons charge. I feel that it’s pretty ironic that Eric Holder isn’t in prison down there, since he sent all those guns into their country? Call me old fashioned
I for one find that to be very interesting!
Simon I think you nailed it with that comment thank you
ReplyDelete