Life Imitates "Art" (Updated)

There's a moderately funny movie called "Born in East L.A". It's based on a single by Cheech Marin (of Cheech and Chong) that's a parody of Springsteen's "Born in the U.S.A." The record tells the story of a Hispanic guy who gets accidentally deported to Mexico because he can't produce a Green Card...and the reason he can't produce a Green Card is that he's American.

Turns out when it really happens, there ain't a goddamn thing funny about it.

The family of an American citizen who disappeared after apparently being mistakenly deported to Tijuana a month ago has filed suit asking the U.S. government to help find him.

Pedro Guzman, 29, a Lancaster construction worker, is developmentally disabled and penniless, and he hasn't been heard from since May 11, said his family at a news conference in Los Angeles on Monday.

His mother, Maria Carbajal, said she spent the last month in Tijuana living out of her car while searching in vain for her son. She said neither the U.S. nor the Mexican government has helped in her search for him.

Guzman was born in Los Angeles, his family said. He is light-skinned and 6 feet 5. He speaks English and Spanish, made it through the 10th grade and has a driver's license.

But his family said he cannot read or write, gets lost easily and, although he does not appear mentally impaired, can be taciturn and suspicious of strangers.

The situation began when Los Angeles County Sheriff's deputies arrested Guzman for trespassing at an airplane junkyard in Lancaster.

His mother said he was sentenced in April to 120 days in jail, but that about a month later, he called to say he had been deported to Tijuana and didn't know why.