Mexico's Cardinal Report Questioned Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit Mexico's Cardinal Report Questioned By Niko Price Associated Press Writer Monday, May 24, 1999; 8:46 p.m. EDT MEXICO CITY (AP) -- On the sixth anniversary of the slaying of a Roman Catholic cardinal during a drug-related shootout, the government released a report Monday that left many questions unanswered and conspiracy theories raging. Since the 1993 death of Cardinal Juan Jesus Posadas Ocampo in the western city of Guadalajara, many Mexicans have believed the government was either covering up or failing to uncover a plot to kill him -- or that the cardinal was targeted because he was involved in drug smuggling. But a special commission of church representatives, Jalisco state government officials and the federal attorney general indicated Monday that their investigation pointed toward the accidental shooting of a man who was at the wrong place at the wrong time. The report indicated that the cardinal got caught in the cross fire of two groups of drug smugglers. ``With the existing evidence at this time it isn't possible to believe in the existence of a plot to assassinate Cardinal Posadas Ocampo,'' Jalisco state government secretary Fernando Guzman read from the report. He stressed that a final report would be issued later. He gave four theories that left a lot of wiggle room: a coincidence, an attack by one drug gang on another, a plot to get the two groups together so Posadas Ocampo would be killed in the cross fire or something else. No one took questions when the report was released Monday and the attorney general's office wouldn't say why church representatives did not attend the news conference. However, on Sunday, Posadas Ocampo's successor, Cardinal Juan Sandoval Iniguez, who was a member of the commission, said he rejected the findings and might issue his own later. He accused the government of trying to protect ``big fish'' by failing to pursue certain lines of investigation. Two other church representatives on the commission, Archbishop Jose Fernandez Arteaga of Chihuahua and Bishop Luis Reynoso Cervantes of Cuernavaca, said Monday they agreed with the report. The vagueness of the report and the failure of the commission to achieve consensus will no doubt fuel the conspiracy theories swirling around the case. In a poll published Monday, 83 percent of those questioned said they didn't believe that the cardinal was accidentally shot. The newspaper Reforma, which conducted the survey of 400 people on the streets of Guadalajara, didn't give a margin of error. (c) Copyright 1999 The Associated Press ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= nytcamer-05.26.99-12:25:18-9731