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Wednesday, January 3, 2024

Arizona Man Shot 16 Times Driving Home From Mexico

From the Daily Mail: "Arizona man is shot at SIXTEEN times while driving home from Mexico on Christmas Eve after taking different route to avoid roadblock caused by migrant crisis that left him in at mercy of rival smuggling gangs"--Daily Mail. 

    An Arizona man was shot at 16 times as he traversed a section of the U.S.-Mexico border plagued by gang violence.

    Craig Ricketts, 68, was heading to Tempe to visit his son on Christmas Eve when he took a much-cautioned route outside Oquitoa, Sonora and was assailed by a spray of bullets.

     'The first thing I noticed was my left window was shattered. I saw a bullet hole through my front window, and my radio was blown out with a bullet,' Ricketts told KTVK.

    Normally, Ricketts would have headed through the Lukeville Port of Entry, but that checkpoint was closed on December 4 when U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers were reassigned to process asylum seekers.

    The businessman said his 'target goal' was to go through the port at Nogales, but his GPS redirected him to a route near the Sasabe Port of Entry that is highly contested by rival smuggling gangs.

    'We have a notification if the traffic is slow, or there is an accident ahead. There is nothing that tells you you’re going to a danger,' Ricketts said.

    Suddenly, his car was peppered with bullets - nearly 20 shots. Two bullets hit the 68-year-old, one shattering the bone in his ankle. 

    'I got hit once in my arm, which feels like a bicycle scrape when you’re a kid, and the other is my left leg,' Ricketts said.

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