Tijuana - Gerard Brown. Date of travel: Jan 2007
Yesterday we arrived home from Los Angeles. We visited Mexico in the town of Tijuana just off San Diego and this visit I persuaded a friend and his wife to go . He was driving a Hummer four wheel drive which he hired in LA We bought products in the town and as we were leaving we were pulled in by two motorcycle policemen. One started looking for my friends licence in a fairly intensive way. Eventually he started looking for insurance and when my friend could not produce this he said there there were two ways it could be dealt with: one was two hundred and fifty dollars on the spot and the other was confiscation of the vehicle . My friend objected and said he had no money and he said that they told him they would take him to an ATM I got the money off my friends wife and went out and paid the policeman. He said two hundred dollars would do and he told me not to hold it in the lights of passing cars as there was a long very slow moving traffic jam. This was corruption but all we wanted to do was get out of Mexico and never come back. I know this is not what the tourist board want . We have told many and they have all said nothing will be done about this incident as there is so much corruption in Mexican police. These corrupt men in authority are selecting tourists and are putting such fear into them that they will never again visit Mexico nor will any of their family or friends! Gerard brown