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Mexico orders release of U.S. Marine held on weapons charges

Posted at 8:34 PM, Oct 31, 2014
and last updated 2014-11-01 11:24:35-04

(CNN) — A Mexico court has ordered the release of U.S. Marine reservist Andrew Paul Tahmooressi, held in a Mexican prison since March on a weapons charge, a Mexican federal government press release said Friday.

Tahmooressi was arrested March 31 at a Tijuana, Mexico, checkpoint after Mexican customs agents found three firearms in his truck, including a .45-caliber pistol, a pump shotgun and an AR-15 rifle.

Mexico’s strict federal gun laws prohibit anyone illegally bringing weapons into the country.

Since his arrest, Tahmooressi has maintained that he took a wrong turn on the California side of the border into Tijuana. His mother told CNN in May that Tahmooressi, who served with the Marines in Afghanistan, had moved to the San Ysidro, California, area to get treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder.

“He has unresolved, or untreated PTSD, and he cannot get the cognitive therapy behavior that veterans of America receive … in a Mexico jail, where there is no such thing,” his mother told CNN earlier this year. “He’s highly discouraged there is no light at the end of the tunnel.”