Otay Mesa Stories
After a two-day manhunt, law-enforcement officials in Illinois conceded defeat in locating a prisoner who'd escaped from custody at a rest stop last week. Joshua Drinnon was being transported back to San Diego's R. J. …
The family of a Mexican man shot by a Border Patrol officer last year is seeking at least $10 million in a newly filed lawsuit, Courthouse News Service is reporting. Rocks the size of basketballs …
The nonprofit organization Casa Familiar held its 17th Safety Walk along the unpaved Otay Mesa Road on Friday, July 31, with about 20 protestors holding signs saying “Sidewalk Promised,” and “Safety For Our Children.” During …
The San Diego County Air Pollution Control Board moved on Wednesday (June 17) to allow the controversial new Pio Pico gas-fired power plant in Otay Mesa to increase periodic sulfur oxide emissions by as much …
On May 13, city planners will update a city-council committee on the long-delayed Community Plan Updates. The gist: the 12 communities’ plans slated for revision in 2008 will have to wait longer than expected. Over …
Awhile back we traveled to Nicaragua. Much of the country’s road systems are inaccessible by car, and if you wanted to explore the interior you were forced to walk, ride a bike or rent a …
Since three local scientists studying golden eagles started trying to catch the birds in October — to swab them for DNA and pathogens and release them with a GPS transmitter attached — they've gone through …
San Diego is poised to get the first new Southwest border port of entry in at least 30 years, and it's being built as a toll crossing with the main goal of improving commercial-truck wait …
One of San Diego's most notorious inmates will remain behind the walls of the state's Donovan Correctional Facility here following a federal judge's ruling that evidence of a possible conspiracy does not absolve Sirhan Bishara …
Beginning on November 1, U.S. citizens planning to stay for more than seven days in Mexico must pay a $23.50 entry fee if crossing at the Otay Mesa port of entry, according to multiple accounts …
Renovation work began at the Palm Avenue and Iris Avenue trolley stations last month as part of the Metropolitan Transit System’s Trolley Renewal Project. According to the MTS website, the $660 million project — a …
How safe from nuclear smugglers is San Diego's border with Mexico? Not enough, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office, which has released a censored version of a report to Congress. The document, entitled "Combating …
Last week at 6:30 in the morning there were already a few shoppers waiting in the parking lot of the Walmart at Dennery Road, by Palm Avenue and the 805. Some of the patrons were …
There will be shovels, most likely a ribbon of some sort, and, of course, a group of well-dressed developers and public officials. They will stand at a barren plot of land in Otay Mesa, the …
Timothy Francis Cashman, General Services Administration manager at Otay Mesa, San Ysidro, and Tecate ports of entry, was arrested July 1 and charged with taking bribes and stealing government property, according to the local office …
Of the more than 20,000 people apprehended by the U.S. Border Patrol in San Diego in the first eight months of this fiscal year, 3321 of them had a total of 6329 criminal convictions for …
A popular and vital connector trail in the Sweetwater Regional Park that was closed in December by the unexpected arrival of endangered fairy shrimp may be open again soon. "Everything is going the way we …
A group of five possibly armed Mexican military came through the drug tunnel under the border the night of April 1 and tried to exit in an Otay Mesa warehouse being guarded by the Department …
A protest against the proposed expansion of Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility brought over 60 people carrying signs and chanting slogans to a remote corner of Otay Mesa on March 29th. The new building is …
Ramon Dorado adjusted the tassel on his graduation cap as he stood stiffly in front of a group of about 35 people he would soon lead 200 yards north to the U.S.-Mexico border. Flanked by …
It’s OK if the words “Border X” conjure little more than question marks for you. Nano-sized Border X Brewing Company opened only a few short months ago. Adding to its relative anonymity is its extreme …
A little-noticed report by the inspector general’s office of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has found that software problems lasting almost a year, from September 2012 through August 2013, prevented U.S. state officials from …
Environmental health activists on February 6 decried the approval of the Pio Pico power plant by the California Public Utilities Commission in San Francisco the day before, saying that the fossil-fuel-burning plant isn't needed and …
A contractor hired to revamp Otay Mesa's Silver Wing Recreation Center is suing the City of San Diego, saying staffers targeted the small minority-owned business and demanded additional work for no pay and impeded progress …
More than 150 bicyclists, hikers, and equestrians heard less than good news Tuesday night, December 3, as the general manager of the Sweetwater Authority explained that a popular trail may be closed by the U.S. …
A group of conservation and environmental groups sued the City of San Diego a week ago, claiming that the city's development plans at Brown Field would destroy burrowing owl habitat at Brown Field. Organizations such …
The first person executed by the state of California — José Gabriel — might have been an innocent man.
There was enough evidence to hang Indian Jose Gabriel for the killings of the Geyser family on Otay Mesa in 1892…at least by mob standards.
Attempted reconstruction of the scene of a double murder on Otay Mesa in the 1890s. They blamed the Indian, José Rafael.
Sunday, October 16, 1892Thomas Smallcomb got the news around 11:00 p.m. Trouble up at the Geyser’s. A double murder. The deputy constable flicked the reins and steered his two-horse buckboard east on Otay Valley Road. …
Ever since the “shutdown” of the U.S. government, maquiladoras have experienced plenty of extra expenditures, including fuel costs, keeping vehicles in “overnight” lots, and fines for delivering merchandise late. Gabriel Merino Fausto, president of a …
An 18-year-old Spring Valley resident was arrested on Monday, September 23, after U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers discovered what they suspected was heroin in the trunk of her car as she entered the United …
It took a long time for San Diego’s southernmost reaches to get homegrown craft beer to reach for. The first opportunity came in 2008 when The Brew House at Eastlake brewpub opened. Last year, that …
A translation of a front-page headline on Baja’s daily El Mexicano on Tuesday, April 23, reads, "They Might Charge to Cross to the U.S.” beginning in 2014. The story was about the U.S. Department of …
San Diego’s southernmost brewery adding home brew supply store.
It’s been only a few months since controversial South Bay water board president Jaime Bonilla stepped down from the Otay Water District, but it’s easy to see that his former position is just a speck …
I went back to Tijuana last week to participate in a poetry reading at a small university. I say “back” because, from 1999 through 2007, I lived there pretty much full time. I still rent …
The U.S. government may be laden with debt, but that hasn’t kept the feds from looking for an artist to help ornament the soon-to-be completed Broadway courthouse downtown. “In addition to a new courthouse, the …
Downtown’s F Street X-rated bookstore has vacated its longtime premises in the Gaslamp Quarter on Fourth Avenue. The business got its start just around the corner on F Street in the 1970s, in a narrow …
"Basically,” says Aaron Meleen, a deputy sheriff traffic investigator working the night shift in Poway, “we don’t have much going on right now.” It’s a Monday evening, the onset of his 12½-hour shift, and we’re …
The ex-mayor of Brawley, Daniel Paramo, has been appointed acting warden at the Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility in Otay Mesa. A San Diego State University graduate and a former Brawley city councilman, Paramo has …
The former district director for ex-Democratic state senator Denise Ducheny has turned up as a new lobbyist for billionaire Sam Zell’s Otay Mesa border crossing complex, planned to connect Tijuana’s airport with the United States. …
Almost no information is available to voters about Proposition A. The East Otay Mesa Recycling Collection Center and Landfill Ordinance, a countywide proposition on the June 8 ballot, requires a simple majority to pass. Aside …
U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers working at the three ports of entry in San Diego County seized over 5000 pounds of marijuana valued at 3.2 million dollars on Thursday afternoon, January 28. According to …
The evidence was hidden in a cargo of fish, but authorities at the Otay Mesa border crossing sniffed out 708 pounds of marijuana anyway. According to a U.S. Customs and Border Protection press release, the …
There is the curbside view of the Mexican border: severed heads on nightclub floors, migrant corpses in the mountains, fingers lopped off, armies in pursuit of drug lords, fleeing fugitives, gangs of money-washers, set to …
Seven months of countywide conflicts, calamities, and curiosities, part 2.
Border Patrol agent Richard Gonzales pushes a button in the shiny white Chevy Tahoe he’s driving. In response, a gate rolls open to allow entry to the no-man’s-land between the secondary fence and the old …
On March 17 at 4:05 p.m., an SDPD helicopter circled the neighborhood at I-5 and Tocayo Avenue. Police announced over their P.A. system that they were in pursuit of a suspect described as a black …
On March 5, the South Bay Union School District voted to eliminate 80 teaching positions, but it was not the slam-dunk many expected. District superintendent Carol Parish addressed those attending, saying, “We had to start …
Francisco Castaneda came to the United States from El Salvador during its civil war of the 1980s. Fleeing the violence, his mother crossed the U.S.-Mexico border illegally in 1982 with Francisco, aged 10, and his …
When it comes to crossing the border, Carlos Hermosillo plays it by ear. As he gets close to the San Ysidro crossing, he calls 700-7000 on his cell phone, and a recording gives him the …