First Contact: Reaching Out In Search

What is it like to lose someone? It’s a question we dodge like wisecracking heroes under fire in an action movie – if we’re fast and witty enough, we tell ourselves, we’ll never have to know. Most of the time, for most people, this works pretty well. When it doesn’t, we have questions that need answers. I responded to Eddie’s email with a list of contact information collected during my reporting – law enforcement, humanitarian volunteers, medical examiners and website listings that had formed a resource sidebar in one of my stories.

“Fidel” Arrested in Sonora, Mexico

Mexican law enforcement arrested suspected cartel member Mancinas Fidel Franco near Cananea on Saturday, January 21, 2012. He has been transferred to Mexico City and may face extradition to the United States on human trafficking charges in part related to the deaths of 11 immigrants killed in car accidents in 2009. Fidel is described as a leader in the Pacific Cartel, also known as the Sinaloa cartel and using the alias Labrador Roberto Lopez. Most reports included Fidel’s arrest as a minimal addendum to high-ranking Sinaloa aide Luis Alberto Cabrera Sarabia’s death in Durango gunfire a day earlier – but on these details, they all agree. My source, Eddie, called Thursday to tell me the news and discuss his family’s reactions.