Seven-year-old Marcus Lassiter had just begun to live, but his young life was snuffed out by a drunk-driving illegal alien with several prior DUI arrests. The boy was walking along the road with a friend when Hipolito Hernandez struck him down and sped off.

Marcus was a first-grader at Cooper Elementary School, in Clayton, North Carolina. His teacher Kate Mundt described him as a friendly boy who played with everyone. "He walked in every morning with a huge smile on his face," she said.

This article from WRAL.com connects the dots of crimes committed by illegal foreigners in a way that most media reports don't: Illegal Immigrants Charged in DWI Cases Test Judicial System (April 18, 2008).

Seven-year-old Marcus Lassiter won't see his eighth birthday. George Smith was on his morning commute to Duke University but never made it to work. Betty Coates might struggle with daily tasks for the rest of her life.

Johnston County Sheriff Steve Bizzell sees a pattern among the cases of these victims of drunken driving: Each accused driver was in the United States illegally.

Bizzell pointed to Hipolito Hernandez, an illegal immigrant who faces second-degree murder charges in the hit-and-run that killed Marcus last Sunday.

"This case here is a prime example of the justice system letting the people down," Bizzell said.

Nearly 300 illegal immigrants were convicted on driving-while-impaired charges and placed in North Carolina prisons in 2007.

Hispanics also account for 18 percent of drunken-driving arrests, while making up less than 7 percent of the state’s population, according to a study from the University of North Carolina Highway Safety Research Center aired in WRAL's documentary "Focal Point: Crossing the Line."

The study also showed that Hispanics involved in car crashes were 2.5 times more likely to be drunk than white drivers and three times more likely to be drunk than black drivers.

The accused killer was speeding when he struck the little boy and had a blood-alcohol level of .21, more than twice the legal limit of .08.

Bizzell said the tragedy is that deaths such as Marcus' and debilitating injuries such as Coates' are preventable.

"This isn't about race. This isn't about Mexico versus the United States," Bizzell said. "It's about a drunk Mexican that's illegal, driving drunk, no operator's license, stolen vehicle, killing a little 7-year-old boy."

Sheriff Bizzell is mostly right, but the carnage is all about Mexico versus America.

Presidente Calderon demands completely open borders so that millions more Mexicans will remit billions more dollars to keep his overgrown taco stand in business. Some dead Americans along the way are no problema to him.