I read and enjoyed the article by Okke Ornstein after seeing a link to it in AM Costa Rica today. It's quite a story.

I lived in Key West for three years recently, and managed to lose a couple of thousand dollars to a scammer there. It wasn't in an investment scheme, and it wasn't my life savings, but I can understand the motivation of the two investors who tracked down Bleasedale.

We managed to have our scammer arrested and convicted, but we've only recovered a few dollars from her despite a restitution order in her probation.

I've also been following the Villalobos story that AM Costa Rica has been reporting for many months

What is it about the Carribean tropics that attracts scammers and other assorted lowlifes? Probably the same thing that attracts the rest of us, the climate, the easy life style, and the relative lack of government interference in our affairs. So they are merely using their nefarious talents in the same way that I would apply my not-so-nefarious ones.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to following the case in future installments. Nice job of reporting.

Regards,

Bob Kelly
New Hampshire

The piece on McMurrain and company reads like a bad spy novel. I was one of those Americanos who went down last New Years to take a look at what was on the Internet, a very nice spread and sales pitch. I wanted to spend some time in a warmer place so why not look San Cristobal over. I was duly wined and dined and really treated nicely by McMurrain and company. I'm no spring chicken and when on the last night in Panama City I was subjected to intense pressure to buy immediately before the "opportunity slips away" by Ian Calvert, it was deja vu (all over again like in a used car lot) and I smelled a rat. In short, I told him that there was no way I was going to buy anything that night and had a lot of homework to do before I bought anything. I immediately contacted a Panamanian attorney to check them out. It was discovered that they had no property registered anywhere and certainly none that was fee simple as promoted. I considered my legal fees well spent but kept in contact with the company just to draw them out and Mr. "Calvert" pressed on with the pitch until he mysteriously stopped some several weeks ago. Maybe that's when he "relocated" to Costa Rica. My only comment about this sad affair is that anyone who fell for this scheme must have more money than brains, but I do feel a little chagrined about living it up on the victims' dime but at the time, I did not know any more than they did. Live and learn.

Paul Johnson,
Rogue River, Oregon

Editor's note: "Fee simple" is a property concept found in countries using the Anglo-American Common Law, but not in Civil Code jurisdictions like Panama. Yes, certain analogies can be made, but when someone starts trying to sell you land "in fee simple" in Panama, it's time to walk out of the negotiations.

I am surprised that you would publish press releases by the group CASA ALIANZA in your on-line addition? After all, is this not the organization that once had a shelter in Panama City for street kids but closed it? I also just read one of your recent issues whee you published a Casa Alianza press release no doubt about the violence in San Pedro Sula where again, said organization has no shelter or home for adolescent youth that I know of? Why TALK about the violence in San Pedro Sula when your organization is supposed to be directly helping street kids! Covenant House/Casa Alianza was founded for this purpose. Did you not know this?

As I have said before, it is a shame that an organization that was founded with the aim and mission of helping street kids has been turned into an organization of social activism and advocacy. This may be the perfect pretense for the director of Casa Alianza to reside in beautiful peaceful Costa Rica and live on a six- figure salary but it does little to help kids who are living on the streets. Very few by the way who live in Costa Rica!!

I have no doubt that Casa Alianza does have some excellent local employees WHERE Casa Alianza has actual shelters to provide direct relief for street kids but this social advocacy a la Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International is really pathethic. This is your newspaper but I would not include Casa Alianza news releases in your publication because Casa Alianza has lost its focus and mission.

Brian Tatarka
Aurora, Colorado

Editor's note: Casa Alianza did indeed come to Panama a few years ago, but found that this country doesn't abandon kids to the streets to the extent that is done in Guatemala and Honduras and that we have homegrown groups like Casa Esperanza doing many of the things that Casa Alianza does in other places. Thus Casa Alianza has for the most part left Panama.

It seems to me that a foreign charity that comes into a country with a preconceived notion of what it can and should do, and which then sticks to this mission plan regardless of the facts it encounters, may be a lot less useful than a group that maintains the purity of its "focus and mission." I thus find it hard to condemn Casa Alianza for its brief involvement in Panama.

Meanwhile, the group does some worthy things in the Central American countries where it does operate, and if death squads are going around killing kids that Casa Alianza seeks to serve, I'd think less of them if they didn't raise their voices in protest.

This is not the first criticism that The Panama News has received from Mr. Tartaka for publicizing Casa Alianza's activities, and I wonder why this is so.

Just found your Panama News. My wife is from Las Tablas. This year we have been in Panama twice for weddings already. I sure am glad you are doing the Panama News.

El Panama America emails my wife their paper everyday; when I "read" the El Panama America I get the general idea of what their articles are about, but it is a heck of a lot better to read the Panama News in English.

Do you think that the American Consulate is really going to take over Bldg 519 on Clayton?! Last month I went walking around Fort Clayton and walked up to Bldg 519. I will say this: it is going to take a fortune to get that building back in livable condition. Many thanks for your "News".

George E. Bush
Jonesboro, GA

I'm looking for someone I knew in Panama in the 1960s. His name is Cristino Gallardo and he must be in his late 40s or near 50. He lived with me in Panama in the 60s. He was just a child. I wanted to bring him back to the States, at that time but my stay there was interrupted by presidential elections going on and it was a bad time. Please help me find him.

Beverly Hanks McCluskey
PO Box 211
Gilchrist, TX 77617
409-286-5053
msbev1269@aol.com

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