BISD RIFE WITH RUMORS AFTER CAPISTRAN'S DEMISE

By Juan Montoya
By all accounts, Brownsville Independent School District Food and Nutrition Services administrator Silverio Capistran Jr. was a very worried man ever since he had been placed on administrative leave January 25 and the district announced it had launched an investigation into his department.
His suspension followed as district public service announcement that the district had retrieved a spoiled shipment of barbacoa meat processed in Mexico last November that had been detected and removed from all district cafeterias.
Coming on the heels of his divorce from his first wife over alleged infidelities with a fellow district employee, he was under pressure to support two families with his paycheck, including the three children with his first wife and a new one on the way with his new mate.
Last week, he took one of his older sons with him to purchase a handgun from the Academy store on the Frontage Road. Although police have not confirmed it one way or the other, initial reports indicate that he may have taken his life by his own hand at the young age of 42.
There was plenty to worry about.
Reports indicate that he had invited close relatives to invest in the importation of barbacoa (shredded processed beef) processed in Mexico which he had told them was a lucrative business that could make them a lot of money.
Over time, some of his relatives said that he was raking in the money but they did not give any details of how the barbacoa business contributed to his income.
Some did say, however, that Brownsville Police Department and Cameron County District Attorney's Office investigators had visited both homes to search for unspecified evidence.
Last Monday, Justice of the Peace Linda Salazar said she was called to the scene at 10:15 at night after he was found in his driveway inside his truck dead with a single gunshot to the right side of the head.
The problems with the barbacoa that were detected last November stemmed from the processing plant in Gomez Palacios, Durango which was processed and shipped here by Empacadora Frape, S.A. de C.V. through its contract with Valco Foods, a U.S. division of a Mexican company with offices in McAllen. The company is said to have been doing a land-rush business with the BISD totaling close to $500,000, an estimate that now risen to close to $900,000, sources say. It also counted La Joya ISD among its frequent purchasers.
Since the federal government pays the bill for school lunches, it has also piqued the interest of its investigators.
And despite the assertion by the BISD administration that Valco Foods purchased all the meat on the U.S. side and then sent it to be processed in Gomez Palacios, Durango, that version has come into question.
According to one source, not all the meat packages that arrived at the BISD on tucks bearing Mexican license plates carried the USDA inspection seal. Some sources say that although Valco may have sent some of the 20,000 pounds monthly under its contract with Region 1, not all the meat was raised in the United States and the difference may have been made up by the processor with a lower-priced Mexican product.
Valco Foods was approved to provide Region 1 member school districts with a contract from July 1, 2015 through June 30, 2017 with 1 two‐year extension option. It is unknown how many pounds that Valco Foods delivered under the Region 1 contract have been bought by the BISD, although one BISD source says the district has spent a little over $800,000-plus on the product.
If fulfilled, the company stood to make $3,019,200 over the 24 month period of deliveries to Region 1 member school districts. No one has said whether the Region 1 directors knew that Valco has been using a Mexican processor to supply its member district schools with barbacoa.
Part of the award letter states that " Food and beverage items must meet the USDA Healthy Hunger Free Kids Act (HHFKA) of 2010 requirements and/or the USDA Smart Snacks in Schools Standards, as well as any additional requirements mandated by the Texas Department of Agriculture."
After Capistran's death, USDA, Food Safety and Inspection Service investigators have appeared in the Brownsville area seeking clues to the BISD's purchase and payment of the suspect meat.
"There are other people involved in this," said a BISD staffer who commented on condition of anonymity. "The office staffer who signed the invoices has also been suspended and no one knows how many others are involved."