MEXICO CITY (Reuters) -- Mexico City police forced a Norwegian
                  tourist into a patrol car, robbed him at gunpoint, and locked him in the trunk
                  of a vehicle they then dumped on a freeway overnight, the Norwegian
                  Embassy said on Friday.

                  Jorn Espolin Johnson, an engineer on vacation with his mother, was stopped
                  by police outside his downtown hotel at 7.30 p.m. on Wednesday. They
                  stole $150 in cash and forced him to give them his personal identification
                  number to a credit card account containing $5,000.

                  "He left his hotel to look for a taxi to visit a friend. The police came before
                  the taxi, the patrol car pulled up and they asked to see his immigration
                  documents," Norwegian Embassy official John Opdahl told Reuters.

                  At least four policemen then blindfolded Johnson, forced him to drink tequila
                  and locked him in the trunk of another car, which was found abandoned on
                  one of the city's major traffic arteries around 4.30 a.m. on Thursday.

                  Mexico City's police have frequently shocked even this crime-weary city for
                  their corruption and human rights abuses, and the U.S. State Department has
                  repeatedly warned tourists about violence in Mexico.

                  The capital's police force has been running an informal campaign to boost its
                  image in recent weeks. Officials were not immediately available for
                  comment.

                  In July police in the Tlahuac district kidnapped three teenage girls and
                  repeatedly raped them while holding them in stables. They managed to
                  escape four days later.

                  In October 1997, 19 police were arrested for killing three youths whose
                  mutilated bodies were found dumped in a ravine hours after they were
                  arrested.

                  Officials speaking on condition of anonymity said there were signs a gang of
                  police in Mexico City's historic downtown area were assaulting tourists, who
                  are unaware that ordinary police have no remit to check immigration
                  documents.

                  They added that police sometimes stop tourists on the pretext they are
                  looking for illegal drugs.

                  Crime has spiraled in Mexico since a disastrous peso devaluation in
                  December 1994 submerged the country in its worst recession in decades.

                  Mexico City mayor Cuautehmoc Cardenas was elected in 1997 in the first
                  direct polls for the post in modern times, winning on a campaign platform of
                  fighting crime and stamping out corruption.

                  The Cardenas administration claims to be making some headway in tackling
                  crime. But the Mexico City-based National Chamber of Commerce says its
                  surveys show violent crime is rising and that most victims have so little faith in
                  the police that most do not even bother reporting assaults.

                  most do not even bother reporting assaults.

                  Copyright 1998 Reuters Limited.