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Fishing Tournament in Memory of Slain ICE Officer Held on South Padre Island
- Updated: September 27, 2019
Mary Zapata, second from left to right, the mother of the slain ICE agent Jaime J. Zapata, stands with the overall winning fishing team. Photo: Tony Vindell/LFN
by Tony Vindell/LFN
A fishing tournament to honor a slain U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent took place on South Padre Island.
Twenty five boats registered in the third annual Jaime Zapata Memorial Fishing Tournament having Louie’s Backyard as the tourney’s headquarters.
A team of anglers from Harlingen and McAllen took the grand champion spot as they caught the heaviest stringer.
Known as a grand slam, the trio’s red fish, trout and flounder weighed 17.6 pounds.
Their monster-sized trout weighed 6.65 pounds, the red fish 8.34 pounds and the flounder 2.6 pounds.
Jerry Juarez owns a business in McAllen called Blue Note Capital which was also the name of the team led by guide Rudy Romero of SPI.
The proceeds from the tournament go into a scholarship fund.
Ten $500 scholarships were given to 12 students from the Rio Grande Valley to Laredo who are attending a college or university.
The tournament is named after Zapata, an ICE special agent killed on Feb. 15, 2011 outside Mexico City in an ambush.
His parents, Amador and Mary Zapata, set up the Jaime Jorge Zapata Foundation and organized the first fishing tournament three years ago.