horned - Laredo Morning Times

Drugs
for Texans
HORNED
Longhorns get past Aggies in
Texas-sized blowout SPORTS | 1B
Bill would allow medicine
from Canada PAGE 5A
Hariri
buried
Thousands of mourners attend
funeral in Beruit PAGE 7A
Laredo Morning Times
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 2005
ON THE WEB: LMTONLINE.COM
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COURTS | FEDERAL INDICTMENT
US-VISIT | BORDER CROSSINGS
Bribery, fraud
charges hit
city official
ID checks to toughen
By ADRIANA ARCE
LAREDO MORNING TIMES
New requirements for entering country take effect in 3 years
By SUZANNE GAMBOA
ASSOCIATED PRESS
An employee of the city’s Planning and
Zoning Department has been arrested on
charges of obstruction of justice and mail fraud
in an alleged bribery scheme, federal officials
said Wednesday.
Juan Segovia, 43, made his initial appearance before U.S. Magistrate Judge Marcel
Notzon on Wednesday morning. Bond was set
at $100,000.
A warrant for Segovia’s arrest in the FBI
investigation was issued late Tuesday, after a
grand jury returned a five-count indictment
dating back to 2003 incidents.
“The message today is simple: We will use the
full measure of federal law to hold accountable
any public official, who abuses his position for
personal gain,” said U.S. Attorney Michael Shelby.
The first two counts of the indictment charge
that Segovia, as a public servant, “accepted a
bribe in exchange for providing his recommendation and other exercise of discretion to secure
a zoning reclassification from Mixed
Residential District to a Community Business
District,” for a property on 2401 Arkansas
Avenue.
After he accepted the bribe, the indictment
states, Segovia mailed notices about the zoning
change to neighboring residents between
January 2003 and August 2003.
WASHINGTON — In three years,
U.S. citizens and Canadians will have
to show passports or a federally
issued ID card linked to Homeland
Security databases to re-enter the
country from across the border.
The intelligence bill passed by
Congress last year mandates the new
identification requirements be in
place by Jan. 1, 2008.
It also requires that the
Department of Homeland Security
have by then a registered traveler program for border travelers like those
now being tested at five airports. The
programs allow frequent travelers to
avoid extra security inspections by
volunteering for background checks.
The airports testing the registered
traveler program are Houston Bush’s
Intercontinental Airport; Boston’s
Logan Airport; Ronald Reagan
National Airport in Washington,
D.C.; Los Angeles International
Airport; and Minneapolis-St. Paul
International Airport.
Jim Williams, US-VISIT program
director, said this week that
Homeland Security wants to develop
a system that would expedite travelers, immigrants and visitors entering
and exiting the country.
He said the agency’s concept is to
develop a type of travel card for frequent border crossers. The card
would be designed so when swiped it
would provide information about the
traveler to the homeland security
border protection and immigration
agencies and State Department
workers in real time.
“All those people should have easy
access to the same information about
See CHECKS | PAGE 10A
NATIONAL AFRICAN-AMERICAN HISTORY MONTH | CELEBRATION
See CHARGES | PAGE 10A
AMERICA | TERROR THREAT
Officials warn
of future
terrorist acts
By KATHERINE SHRADER
ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON — Speaking with one voice,
President Bush’s top intelligence and military
officials said Wednesday that terrorists are
regrouping for possible new strikes against the
United States.
They said the best defense was for Congress
to approve the president’s military and anti-terror budget. But some in Congress, including
prominent Republicans, were questioning some
of that spending.
Offering few specifics on terror threats,
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld told a
House hearing that the government could reasonably predict attacks would come from terrorism,
weapons of mass destruction and other means.
Meanwhile, new CIA Director Porter Goss
told the Senate Intelligence Committee the Iraq
war was giving terrorists experience and contacts for future attacks, and FBI Director Robert
Mueller expressed worry that a sleeper operative in the U.S. may have been in place for years,
awaiting orders for an attack.
“I remain very concerned about what we are
not seeing,” Mueller said in remarks he submitted to the senators.
Photo by Cuate Santos | Laredo Morning Times
Gethon Robinson, right, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) Pilot, talks with CBP Assistant Chief Patrol Agent Daniel Molina Jr., during a luncheon honoring Robinson as part
of National Africian-American History Month. The event was held Wednesday at the National Guard Armory.
Border Patrol pilot honored at luncheon
By ERICA CORDOVA
LAREDO MORNING TIMES
Gethon Robinson Jr. never gave up on his
childhood dream, and today he’s turning heads.
Robinson, 36, is the first African-American
pilot for U.S. Customs and Border Protection,
and he told colleagues and others at a luncheon Wednesday that his love for the skies started at age 4.
“I had at least 100 model airplanes hanging
all over my room on top of my dresser drawers,” Robinson said. “My mom would go out
and she’d buy a couple of models and I’d put
them together in 20 or 30 minutes. She’d say,
you need to take your time on stuff like that.”
The Dallas native was honored Wednesday
for his achievements as part of the agency’s
celebration of National African American
History Month.
Robinson said he received his first pilot’s
license after going through a high school program
that allowed students to focus on various fields.
He learned about air dynamics and aircraft
classifications.
“I was an artist,” Robinson said. “I loved
building war planes.”
Shortly after, he enrolled in Mountain View
College in Dallas and graduated with a degree
in aviation technology. He went on to attend
several other schools and soon earned his
bachelor’s degree in Aeronautical Science.
He then received his commission as a naval
officer, graduated from flight school and
received his professional pilot’s license.
But then he hit a wall, landing at the unemployment office a few years later.
“I was unemployed for six months at the age
of 25,” Robinson said. “There was congressional downsizing … and they got rid of my aircraft
See HONORED | PAGE 10A
See TERRORIST | PAGE 10A
SPORTS | LABOR DISPUTE
Salary cap issue ends National Hockey League season
By IRA PODELL
ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK — The NHL canceled what little was
left of the season Wednesday after a series of lastminute offers were rejected on the final day of
negotiations.
A lockout over a salary cap shut down the game
before it ever got a chance to start in October. Now
the NHL, already low on the popularity scale in the
United States, becomes the first major pro sports
league in North America to lose an entire season to
a labor dispute.
“As I stand before you today, it is my sad duty to
announce ... it no longer is practical to conduct even
an abbreviated season,” commissioner Gary Bettman
INSIDE
Related story/Page 4B
said. “Accordingly, I have no choice but to announce
the formal cancellation of play for 2004-05.”
“This is a sad, regrettable day that all of us wish
could have been avoided,” he said.
Bettman said the sides would continue working
to get an agreement.
“We’re planning to have hockey next season,” he
said.
A few hours later, NHLPA executive director Bob
Goodenow stressed that the players had given a lot
of ground. “Every offer by the players moved in the
owners’ direction,” Goodenow said at a press conference in Toronto, where the union is based.
“Keep one thing perfectly clear,” he said. “The
players never asked for more money — they just
asked for a marketplace.”
“The scary part now for hockey is do the fans
come back? We’re not baseball, we’re not the national pastime,” Nashville forward Jim McKenzie said.
The league and players’ union traded a flurry of
proposals and letters Tuesday night, but could never
agree on a cap. The players proposed $49 million per
team; the owners said $42.5 million. But a series of
conditions and fine print in both proposals made the
offers farther apart than just $6.5 million per team.
“We weren’t as close as people were speculating,” Bettman said.
Although Bettman was unequivocal in announcing the cancellation, Detroit Red Wings captain
Steve Yzerman held out hope that some kind of a
miracle was still possible.
“If you read into what (Bettman) said, it sounds
like there is still an opportunity to get things done,”
Yzerman said. “The principles are there to make a
deal, so I still think something can happen in the
next day or two, because we’re really not that far
apart.”
Goodenow was less optimistic.
“I think it’s a fresh start and everything is off the
table,” he said. “It’s a totally new environment. That
much is for sure.
“As far as anything happening this afternoon, it’s
not happening.”
See SALARY | PAGE 10A
OPINION | PAGE 4A THEATERS | PAGE 6A OBITUARIES | PAGE 9A SPORTS | SECTION B COMICS | PAGE 6A FEATURES | PAGE 7A WEATHER | PAGE 8B CLASSIFIED | SECTION C ON CAMPUS
123rd Year,
No. 249, 52 pages