“I was that level!” Gutierrez told The Catholic Register. “My superior was the attorney general and the governor (of the State of Chihuahua).”

The IRB also suggested Gutierrez could have moved to another part of Mexico if gangs were threatening his life. But assuming a fake identity and staying under the radar of powerful drug cartels would be difficult for Gutierrez, given that his face was printed on 10-metre-tall billboards proclaiming the new, post-corruption era in Mexico’s criminal justice system.

Gutierrez is appealing the IRB’s decision to send him back to Mexico.

“I’m not a liar,” he said.

After 18 months in Canada, telling his story over and over and working as a security guard, the former criminal profiler, detective and head of a state police department who worked on hundreds of murder cases involving female victims is still hoping for a hearing that looks at the facts of his case. So far, Gutierrez feels he walked into his IRB hearing with at least two strikes against him due simply to his nationality.

“I feel like I was treated like, ‘Oh, you’re Mexican. You can go back,’ ” he said.

The IRB denies that it prejudges anybody based on where they came from.

“Refugee claims are decided solely on the evidence and argumentation presented at the hearing and each claim is decided on its individual merits,” said an IRB spokesman in an e-mail.

But the evidence and argumentation in IRB hearings always includes the “National Documentation Package,” which summarizes the human rights and security situation of the country in question.

A quick glance over the package raises a few red flags for Judith Teichman, University of Toronto political science professor and specialist in Latin America. She says government statements or even Mexican legislation are not a reliable reflection of Mexican reality.

“Nobody puts much stock in what the Mexican government says it is doing,” said the author of three books on Mexico. “In actual fact, there’s always a huge gap between what the law says and what actually happens.”

If the IRB wants to know what actually happens, Jesuit Father Luis Arriaga stands ready to paint a grim picture. The director of the internationally recognized Miguel Agustin Pro Juarez Human Rights Centre has been appointed to the Mexican supreme court’s advisory board for planned reforms of the criminal justice system.

“The police are not a reliable source of protection against organized crime or other threats,” he said. “Sometimes the police are the ones committing abuses.”

The Jesuit lawyer is very careful about not telling Canada or the IRB what to do — “Policy choices are a decision for the Canadian people and their government,” he said. But counting on Mexican police or other agents of the Mexican state to protect vulnerable people based on what you read in government publications ignores the facts on the ground, he said.

If the IRB thinks the police can protect the 18,000 migrants who are kidnapped every year in Mexico, or the police can do anything about a murder rate of more than 42 per 100,000 in the state of Chihuahua (compared to a rate of about 1.8 per 100,000 in Canada), they should think again.

“Over 90 per cent, 98 per cent of crimes, remain unpunished in Mexico. Police don’t do an effective job investigating crimes or threats,” he said.

As for escaping drug cartels by moving to another part of Mexico, it’s an unrealistic notion, said Arriaga. The drug cartels are rich, powerful, organized and active in every state in Mexico.

“They have national reach,” he said. “It is incorrect to think that certain towns or states are safe, or that only local authorities are corrupt.”

If the IRB is already rejecting more than 90 per cent of Mexican claimants, things could get a lot worse under Bill C-11 that proposes refugee system reforms, according to the Canadian Council for Refugees.

Bill C-11 would let the government designate some countries of origin that would be automatically ineligible for a refugee appeal — “safe countries of origin.”

“Treating claimants differently based on country of origin is discriminatory. Refugee determination requires individual assessment of each case,” says the Canadian Council for Refugees.

Assumptions about Mexico are dangerous, according to the council. It points to the case of Grise, a young woman who sought refugee status in Canada because drug traffickers were threatening her and her family. After Canada returned her to Mexico, her body was found with a bullet in her head. There will be more Grises if Bill C-11 is passed, says the CCR.

If there is anything the IRB can assume about Mexican refugee claimants, it’s that they didn’t find it easy to abandon their homes and country, said Arriaga.

“Mexicans who flee their country under threats of death or violence do not leave due to lack of love for their homes,” he told an overflow audience at Regis College May 10. “Uprooting oneself from one’s country, leaving behind friends, family and memories is always difficult and frequently painful.”

Mexico has declared war on drugs and sent 50,000 soldiers into the streets.

“War is always irrational,” said Arriaga.

Meanwhile Mexico’s signature is on every international human rights treaty ever written.

“In Mexico, these rights remain articles of paper, not reality,” said Arriaga.

As a Jesuit, Arriaga believes Christians have to look carefully at the big picture of crime in Mexico through the eyes of Christ — looking at the poor and vulnerable first.

“It is very important to say that we believe in love and love impels us,” he said. “This thing about social justice and faith in justice is very important — especially in Latin America. Especially in a lot of countries where there are a lot of inequalities.”