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Wednesday, May 3, 2023

US Man, 79, Beaten To Death In Mexico While Delivering Donations To The Poor

"Sol Prendido" for Borderland Beat

Rudy Lazo, who immigrated to the US from El Salvador in the 1980s, would regularly deliver clothes, food and toys to Tijuana

Rudy Lazo in 2021

A 79-year-old American man who transported clothes, food and toys into Mexico to donate to the poor was beaten to death during a delivery trip in Tijuana, family members and authorities said.

Rudy Lazo’s killing during an apparent robbery in mid-April happened a couple of months after the US state department warned Americans to avoid Mexico, citing elevated kidnapping and homicide risks in areas including Baja California, the state Tijuana is in.

As his family said on NBC Los Angeles and Telemundo, Lazo moved to the US from El Salvador in the 1980s. He started a family, worked as a truck driver and settled in San Bernardino, California, but never forgot the financial struggles faced by people in other parts of the world.

Lazo frequently drove trucks packed with clothes, food, toys and other basic donations to Tijuana, about 125 miles (200km) from San Bernardino, then gave them to families in need.

“He was always a very generous person – helped anyone out,” Lazo’s son, Juan Carlos, told NBC Los Angeles.

Lazo’s family realized something was amiss when he didn’t return home from a donation run last month. Mexican authorities soon notified the family that he had been beaten to death and seemingly robbed of his truck as well as other belongings, none of which have been found.

Juan Carlos Lazo traveled to Mexico to identify his father’s body.

“What I didn’t tell him in life, I told him there with my heart: ‘Forgive me, and that in the end I didn’t let you down,’” the grieving son said, according to Telemundo.

Juan Carlo Lazo also said: “He didn’t deserve this. Actually, no human being deserves this.”

Authorities have not announced any arrests.

Lazo’s children told reporters that helping families in Tijuana meant so much to their father that he had plans to try to build a community center there.

“He probably thought he wasn’t going to have problems because he was a senior citizen,” his daughter, Claudia Hernandez, told NBC.

The US state department advisory warning travelers to avoid Mexico came after a Los Angeles-area public defense attorney, Elliot Blair, died in suspicious circumstances while vacationing in Baja California.

An attorney for the family of Blair, 33, has said his skull was fractured and it appeared he had road rash on his skin. The injuries caused Blair’s family to wonder if he had been beaten and dragged despite Mexican authorities’ claiming he may have fallen from a hotel balcony, hours after the couple reportedly paid $160 to local police officers to let them go after they were pulled over for running a stop sign.

In March, two Americans accompanying a friend to a cosmetic abdominal surgery in Mexico died in a kidnapping near the border with Texas.


The Guardian

26 comments:

  1. Que pinche atrocity. This story angers me. I am so sick and tired of all these good hearted folks getting murdered by Satans helpers. Que desmadre.

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  2. Ruhe in Frieden ♥️

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  3. Mexico is a “stay away zone”. People never listens or read Mexican news.

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    Replies
    1. Hi senior
      I need my teeth done, they say dentist offer good prices in Tijuana, I want to go in the daytime, Do you think it's safe?
      Then perhaps have some tacos afterwards.

      Delete
    2. your biggest worry are the municipal police, hoping you might be generous enough to at least spring for dinner and drinks, if not pay for their kids' school uniforms..
      the state police, federal po-po, all military type patrols will ignore you.
      Keep a couple bucks in your wallet, but the majority stashed..
      obviously, we aren't gonna flash any bling..
      forget the Yellow cab, use taxi libre, 14 peso bus, or Uber...
      DO NOT use ATMs, that's a recipe for disaster..
      don't stumble down any alleys that don't have cameras..
      find doctor that's good at practicing dentistry, not necessarily good at practicing English..
      if there's a raucous crowd of happy campers mulling around the taco stand, that's a sign the chow is good and the perishable foods get rotated out regularly..
      ask for "tortilla blanca", and they won't dip it in the grease, less of a gutbuster that way..
      DO NOT get conned into adding habañeros to your guisado, that path can only lead a wero to a life of terrible sadness..
      🦎

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    3. 851 💯😎 Like a seasoned pro. Border cities like Tijuana are a whole nother beast.

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    4. 8:51 senior thanks for the tips.
      Looks like it has gotten worse, than I imagined.
      I haven't been there like 12 years ago.
      Back then I was looking for parking, in my 99 Toyota Tacoma, near downtown Tijuana, on a residential street, made a uturn to a parking space, no cars coming, no sign that says no U-turn, and guess what low and behold, the municipal Police light me up with the Blue and Red lights, I suddenly felt like a criminal, even though I didn't do nothing.
      They said I did an illegal U-turn.
      They said pay the ticket at the office or here, they wanted $100, told them I have 50, I gave it to them and left.
      The irony is they had no licence plate on the car, no nameplate on their uniform. Like you say police are still bad.

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    5. don't get me wrong, tj is cool, welcoming to border crossers and daytrippers, just don't be a jerk, keep a situational awareness about you, if it's daylight and you're not up in some hillside barrio, you're good to go.
      🦎

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    6. 8:51/10:44 this must be SIR

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    7. 2:12 Sorry to inform you, it's not SIR.
      SIR had a weird carrisma in his comments. Last I heard he went to Ukraine to help in the war, hope he is still alive.

      Delete
  4. GOOD. When USA put travel restrictions to certain locations in Mex, people should listen.

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    Replies
    1. In no way is this “good”. I’m sure he knew the risks but he accepted the risks in order to help others and he paid the price for it. He didn’t deserve this fate so there is nothing “good” about it.

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  5. The old man would not hurt a fly.
    Minding his own business and gets killed for his car. Life is worth very little to the criminals.

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  6. Then Americans think there are no good people in Mexico?
    There are hundreds of thousands of Mexican people that do good in Mexico. You just have to be extremely careful of where you do such things less you end.ip like this guy here sadly.

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  7. what a shining example of an exemplary life, selfless, kind, a man who would rather light a candle than curse the darkness..
    "when he shall die, take him and cut him out in little stars,
    and he will make the face of heaven so fine,
    that all the world will be in love with night, and pay no worship to the garish sun"
    ...Romeo y Julieta
    🦎

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  8. This world is getting worse by the day.
    RIP

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  9. Sad to hear! Unfortunately it happens everywhere even here in the U.S. Just look at stories from coast to coast everyday about people trying to live daily life and getting shot. Society in a whole is jacked up!! In Mexico, U.S, Europe and China.

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  10. Prolly thought he was cjng handing out toys and got peeled.

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  11. Poor guy.
    He preferred to die of old age, rather than getting killed for his truck.

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  12. Fuck me. What he was doing is golden, should be held in great esteem and seen as a hero. Sacred stuff. RIP

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    Replies
    1. Driving Ms. H
      I am sorry 😞 to say there are still no Avacado related articles.

      Delete
    2. ....and yet I wait, ceaseless waiting for my beloved Michoacan Haas green orb.

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    3. fun fact:
      didja know, the happy-faced aguacate, or "alligator pear" named after los bizabuelos' word for testicle, is loaded to the gills with 20 vitamins & minerals, more nutrition dense than almost any other food?
      don't be foolish and buy the watery Fuertes from florida.. 🥑
      Oily Haas is the way to go, creame..
      🦎

      Delete
  13. I’m sure he made a pit stop in La coahuila for some of the finest Chinese/Mexican food in Mexico adelitas and Hong Kong. Nobody goes to tijuas w out stopping by for some spring rolls and tortas. Best in Mexico . May he Rest In Peace

    ReplyDelete

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