Juan Medina

The Bordertown Memories Juan Medina

This is a true account of my life during the span of more than a decade in the '60s and '70s when I was lured into the life of a drug dealer. As a poor young boy from the barrio in the small border town of San Ysidro I wanted to make something of myself and the promise of big money and everything that came along with it was too attractive an offer to pass up.

It was during this time that marijuana and cocaine deals were making way for the major Mexican and Latin American gangs and notorious drug cartels that were to come.

Cash from the drug sales flowed back into Mexico to payoff the drug dealers. What grew into the biggest border crossing in the world by 2011 was once the playground for my friends and I, exploring in the once deserted hills and canyons that later became a "no man's land" according to author Joseph Wambaugh in his book "Lines and Shadows".

Mr. Wambaugh writes about an original task force put together to fight the lawlessness occurring along the hills, of the border, also known as the "imgainary line" between San Ysidro and Tijuana, Mexico. I discuss it in this memoir.

Education and political activism would become a large influence in my life but only after it was almost too late. But luck was on my side and I somehow was able to escape the fate of many like me who either ended up incarcerated or dead. This is my story.