She’s the youngest police chief in Mexico’s history. But serious threats against her life have forced the young law enforcer to resign and seek asylum in the United States.
20-year-old criminology student Marisol Valles Garcia made international headlines when she accepted the top law enforcement job in Praxedis G. Guerrero, a township near the Texas border that has been overrun by drug violence. The fact that she was willing to accept the job at all was surprising, since her predecessor was kidnapped, murdered and decapitated in July 2009. But apparently the pressures and threats of the job became just too much for the young woman who is just shy of her 21st birthday.
Garcia is now in the U.S. to present her case to an immigration judge and initiate a formal asylum petition. Citing privacy and security concerns, no one would say exactly where Garcia is staying while her petition is under consideration.
