‘Exiles’ Seek Peace Far From Mexico City’s Mean Streets

Azalia Correa came a long way to escape from crime in the city where she grew up. Last year, the aspiring actress and film director moved to an apartment in Culver City, 1,500 miles from the muggings and murders that have terrified millions in her hometown--Mexico City.

You can’t talk to anybody in the Mexican capital who hasn’t been a victim of violence, or doesn’t know a victim among family and friends. Correa’s case is typical. She’s the youngest of five siblings living in the sprawling federal district, and not a single one has been spared the trauma of crime and its long-term psychic ravages.

She has a brother who was tied up and robbed on a hijacked minibus while perpetrators raped the driver’s girlfriend. She has a sister whose home was burglarized by thieves who took her jewelry and coin collection, then came back for the hot-water heater.

Two years ago, Correa was kidnapped at gunpoint from a swanky area known as San Angel and held for more than an hour along with her hysterical girlfriend. Their two assailants released them unharmed, at least physically.

Correa, 29, is here on a three-year student visa, taking courses at the Theatre of Arts in Hollywood. But she’s also a refugee from the rampant assaults that have scarred Mexicans at all social levels--from secretaries to celebrities, bus drivers to bank executives, drug peddlers to top-ranking anti-drug police.

The petite and high-spirited woman has sought her private asylum in Southern California, joining what one Mexican publication dubbed “the exile of fear.” Unlike the laborers and peasants who cross the border looking for work, these latest immigrants are often Mexicans of means. Among them are mariachi singers and wealthy ranchers who moved to the United States to escape the threat of crime that hangs over their metropolis like a toxic cloud.

Nobody knows how many have come here since the brutal crime wave started rampaging through Mexico in the mid-1990s, driven by the country’s economic collapse. Most people don’t have the luxury to abandon their jobs and their families for safety. But the very fact that prominent Mexicans were publicly discussing the option was a sign of the panic unleashed by unchecked delinquency.

Leaving Mexico is a strategy that was once unthinkable to the country’s elite. These are people who were once proud of the relative safety of the Aztec capital, compared to other world capitals.

My uncle used to boast about Mexico City’s safe streets when I visited one summer in the mid-1960s. He would swagger down the sidewalk near the Angel of Independence, the country’s soaring monument to freedom, and challenge me to name one major city in the U.S. where people could walk around after midnight without fear of being attacked.

It was hard to argue with him when Mexican newspapers were carrying front-page pictures of the Watts riots. For a city its size, Mexico City was surprisingly secure, and I loved exploring the dynamic capital from one end to the other.

Sadly, that tranquillity is gone. Today, Mexicans are afraid to venture into the subway, hail a taxi or drive to dinner in their own neighborhoods. They are routinely carjacked, kidnapped, mugged, raped and murdered.

My family isn’t bragging any more.

In fact, two of my uncle’s grown grandchildren, who were little when I first visited, have themselves moved recently to the United States. They too needed a respite from the daily terror and a safe harbor for their own small children.

“You always left home in fear, even in broad daylight,” says my niece, Sofia, who settled near Las Vegas with her husband and baby boy. “I was always scared to death, and I just can’t live like that.”

The government has had some success in fighting crime, says Miguel Angel Isidro, the new Mexican consul in Santa Ana. Corrupt police are being fired, new units are being trained, and there have been some high-profile arrests, like the capture of the kidnapping kingpin whose MO was to chop off the ears of victims he held for ransom.

As the economy improves, Isidro told me last week, crime has gradually started to drop. Still, public fear is as high as ever.

“Unfortunately, gaining back the confidence of the citizenry will be a task that will take time,” the consul said.

Public trust in Mexico might be restored if police started catching more criminals than they did in 1996, when they made arrests in only 4% of reported crimes. Otherwise, who knows how many more Mexicans will try to find sanctuary across the border?

Correa, the visiting drama student, said she has temporarily found in L.A. the one thing her kidnappers got away with: “They didn’t steal anything from me, but they took my peace of mind.”

Agustin Gurza’s column appears Tuesday. Readers can reach Gurza at (714) 966-7712 or [email protected]