2 Texas
missionaries found slain in north Mexico
By CHRISTOPHER
SHERMAN and KATHERINE CORCORAN | Associated Press – Wed, Feb 1, 2012
MEXICO
CITY (AP) — A missionary couple from Texas were slain in their home outside the
violence-plagued northern industrial city of Monterrey, the U.S. Embassy and
their family said Wednesday
The
embassy identified the couple as John and Wanda Casias.
Valerie
Alirez, the eldest child of John Casias, told The Associated Press from her
home in Greeley, Colorado, that one of her brothers found her father and
stepmother Tuesday dead in their home in Santiago, Nuevo Leon.
The
family was originally from Amarillo, Texas, but relatives said John and Wanda
Casias moved to Mexico in the late 1970s or early 1980s and made it their home.
John
Casias was a Baptist preacher and the couple ran the First Fundamentalist
Independent Baptist Church in Santiago, Alirez said.
Her
brother, Shawn Casias, who lives in Monterrey, said he went to his parents'
home around 4 p.m. Tuesday to pick up a trailer. After he had hooked up the
trailer outside he went into the home to say goodbye. He said he found Wanda
Casias lying on the floor with an electrical cord around her neck and a gash
from a blunt object on her head.
Missing
from the house were a couple of computers, a plasma television and a safe that
had been chiseled out of the wall.
The
couple's Chevrolet Suburban was also missing, and Casias said he initially
thought his father had been kidnapped.
But
about four or five hours later, he said, a forensic investigator informed him
that his father's body had been found in a storage room of a small building on
the property. His father also had an electrical cord around his neck.
Fighting
between the Zetas and Gulf drug cartels has inflicted a surge of violence and
other crimes on Monterrey and the surrounding area since 2010. In poorer
suburbs, entire blocks have been held up by gunmen and young people snatched
off the streets.
Casias
said a sister-in-law in Dallas had spoken to their mother around 11 a.m.
Tuesday and everything was fine. So he believes there was about a five-hour
window when the killings could have occurred before he showed up.
He
said the killers did not take everything they could have, leaving two of the
three TV sets. He said perhaps they were warned that he was coming, because
anyone watching the winding road approaching the home could have alerted them.
"They're
scum. They're not sophisticated," he said.
Speaking
from his parents' home, Casias said the house was burglarized two years ago
when the couple were on one of their periodic visits to the United States to
talk at churches about their work in Mexico.
"We're
convinced that it's somebody he knew," Casias said of the killers. He said
authorities had some leads based on people seen around the home.
John
Casias was 76. He had recently priced a knee replacement because he couldn't
walk more than 100 yards (100 meters) without having to sit down, Shawn Casias
said. Wanda Casias was 67.
Casias
said his parents held services and prayer meetings at a church about 3 miles (5
kilometers) from their home.
The
couple maintained a website, www.casias.org, with details of their lives and
their missionary work
"The
only hope for the Mexican people today is Jesus in them, the HOPE of
glory," they wrote in one dispatch from last summer. "I confess that
it's getting easier to witness to the wealthy, at least they are listening. The
wealthy are fleeing to Canada and the USA for protection. The only problem is
that when they return to re-new their visas the cartel is waiting, and either
kill them of (sic) kidnap them for thousands of dollars, in some cases
millions. The cartel has NO mercy or value for life. They are ruthless
murderers!"
It
was the second slaying involving American missionaries in a year in the Mexican
region bordering Texas.
In
January 2011, a Texas couple who had been doing missionary work in Mexico for
three decades were attacked at an illegal roadblock in one of the country's
most violent areas.
Nancy
Davis, 59, was fatally shot in the head while her husband, Sam, sped away from
suspected drug cartel gunmen who may have wanted to steal their pickup truck,
authorities said.
The
Davises were driving along the two-lane road that connects the city of San
Fernando with the border city of Reynosa in the state of Tamaulipas, which
borders Nuevo Leon.
___
Associated
Press writer Katherine Corcoran reported this story in Mexico City and
Christopher Sherman reported from McAllen, Texas.
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