California and the West : Man Killed by Border Patrol Was Legal U.S. Resident, Mexico Says

SAN DIEGO —  A man shot to death this week by a Border Patrol agent during an alleged rock-throwing incident was a legal U.S. resident who suffered from mental illness, Mexican officials said Thursday.

San Diego County coroner’s investigators identified the man as Raymundo Sanchez, a 30-year-old resident of El Cajon, a San Diego suburb.

A spokeswoman at the Mexican Consulate in San Diego said Sanchez was born in Mexicali, Mexico, and immigrated to the United States years ago. The spokeswoman, Rebeca Romero, said members of Sanchez’s family reported that he was suffering from depression and blackouts and had arranged to see a doctor next week.

“What the family told us was that he was very nervous lately, but that he was a very calm person,” Romero said. “It’s very sad because he was ill.”

Sanchez was shot after allegedly pelting Border Patrol agents with rocks the size of softballs along a remote stretch of eastern San Diego County that is frequently traversed by undocumented immigrants from Mexico. U.S. officials speculated at the time that he may have been an illegal border-crosser or a smuggler.

The fatal shooting, the first involving Border Patrol agents in San Diego this year, took place near the Loveland Reservoir about 30 miles east of San Diego and more than 10 miles north of the border.

A Border Patrol agent fired two shots from his service pistol at about 15 feet, sheriff’s investigators said. One struck Sanchez in the chest, killing him, said coroner’s investigator Michael Ellano.

The incident began early Tuesday after a water district employee reported being pelted by rocks. Sanchez also allegedly hurled rocks at a Border Patrol agent, smashing the window of the agent’s patrol vehicle before fleeing, barefoot, into the rugged countryside.

Four other agents who located Sanchez about an hour later also allegedly came under attack. One agent, struck in the chest, fired after Sanchez picked up another rock, ignoring orders in English and Spanish to stop, authorities said.

The agent was treated at a Chula Vista hospital for the chest injury and is to be placed on administrative leave pending an investigation into the shooting by the San Diego Sheriff’s Department, the FBI and the U.S. attorney’s office.