Cartel siege in Sonora largely hidden

[Angelhair]

ALTAR, Mexico - The police chiefs met in the dusty plaza with a federal official clutching a black bag filled with pesos: $40,000 in government pensions for the senior citizens living in the pueblos of the nearby foothills.

A convoy of seven vehicles rumbled into the plaza, the trucks squeezing between taco and T-shirt vendors who gawked at the 60 or so federal and state police officers toting assault rifles.

The crack squad had captured drug-cartel kingpins and battled gangs from Baja California to Michoacan. On this day they slipped on their ski masks to escort the police chiefs on a mission of mercy to a lost corner of Mexico.

They would be heading deep into the scrublands of the Sonoran Desert, where hundreds of cartel gunmen controlled the pueblos and ambushed intruders on hillside roads that have become blood-spattered shooting galleries.

The convoy was outmanned, outgunned and probably didn't even have the element of surprise. Cartel lookouts - they could be anybody: taxi drivers, store owners, fellow cops - had no doubt already tipped off the organized-crime groups. Cell-phone conversations were routinely intercepted.

"I'm talking here and the mafia is listening," said one commander who, like many police, residents and officials, spoke on condition of anonymity out of security concerns. "They already know we're coming."

The convoy turned past the small church and the local newspaper office, its windows blasted out, and ran every red light and stop sign leaving town.

This is Mexico's hidden drug war.

Ciudad Juarez and other violence-torn urban areas may rack up large body counts and capture headlines and presidential visits. But here in the northern part of the state of Sonora, two of Mexico's strongest drug cartels are waging a battle for scores of human and drug trafficking routes into Arizona that may be just as sinister.Cartel siege in Sonora largely hidden

 

[waltky]

'El Chuy Raúl' brought to the U.S....

Mexico extradites Sinaloa Cartel member 'El Chuy Raúl' to U.S.
Jan. 26, 2017 -- Mexico's attorney general on Thursday said Jesús "El Chuy Raúl" Beltrán León, a Sinaloa Cartel member accused of working as the former bodyguard of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzmán's son, has been extradited to the United States.

Beltrán León is facing charges related to drug trafficking, including money laundering, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. "The event was held at the International Airport of Mexico City, where elements of the Federal Ministerial Police handed over the defendant to U.S. Marshals agents," the attorney general's office said in a statement. Beltrán León is also accused of serving as a bodyguard and lieutenant for Jesús Alfredo Guzmán Salazar, one of Guzman's sons.

Guzman, leader of the Sinaloa Cartel, recently pleaded not guilty to numerous criminal charges in New York over his role in establishing drug trafficking's most power cartel. He was extradited from Mexico to the United States last Thursday to the surprise of some law enforcement agencies, despite Mexican National Security Commissioner Renato Sales in October saying Mexico hoped to extradite the drug lord "in January or February."

Beltrán León was "investigated for his probable responsibility in the introduction, from Mexican territory, of large quantities of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine and marijuana to several cities of the United States of America, as well as to organize, direct, administer and monitor the drug trafficking and money laundering activities of a criminal group operating in our country," the attorney general's statement added.

Mexico extradites Sinaloa Cartel member 'El Chuy Raúl' to U.S.

 

[MikeK]

After all this annual police melodrama is over and a bunch of drug producers and traffickers are either arrested or killed -- every one of them will be instantly replaced by subordinates waiting in the wings.

"Attempting to solve a problem by doing the same thing over and over and over and expecting a different result is one definition of insanity." (Albert Einstein)

But in this example insanity is not the motivating force for this counterproductive nonsense -- this repetitious theatrical bullshit that serves absolutely no constructive purpose. The use and availability of any drug one wishes to buy and use will remain available as per usual -- if not on the same corner then on the next corner, or the next.

Consider who benefits from the drug war: The pharmaceutical industry. The liquor and beer industries. The drug-testing industry. The legal profession. The police occupation, the prison industry. Every corrupt politician who receives "contributions" from those legal entities -- as well as those who are bribed by the major traffickers who remain in business because of the drug war.

This bullshit has been going on without interruption ever since Nixon initiated the War on Drugs and Reagan escalated it and it stands as clear evidence of the gullibility and stupidity of the majority of American voters. They simply refuse to acknowledge that the War on Drugs is a fiasco which is working against the interests of the American People.

 

[waltky]

Mexican drug war corespondent gunned down in Sinaloa...

Journalist who covered Mexican drug wars gunned down in Sinaloa
May 16, 2017 -- Mexican journalist Javier Valdez Cárdenas, renowned for dogged reporting on drug trafficking and corruption, was gunned down Monday in Sinaloa, officials said. He is the fifth journalist to be killed in Mexico this year.

Valdez, 50, reportedly was pulled from his car by a gunman and shot multiple times near his newspaper office in Sinaloa. Riodoce, the weekly publication Valdez founded, reported his death. Speaking at the crime scene, Sinaloa state prosecutor Juan José Ríos Estavillo vowed to provide more protection for journalists. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, 40 journalists have been killed in Mexico since 1992.

A gunman pulled Javier Valdez Cárdenas from his vehicle and fatally shot him near the journalist's newspaper office Monday.​

Valdez received the CPJ's International Press Freedom Award in 2011 for his reporting on organized crime and corruption in the face of repeated death threats. "To die," he said in an interview with CPJ, "would be to stop writing." Valdez was remembered as a "brave and beloved" Mexican journalist. Mexico President Enrique Peña Nieto called the killing an "outrageous crime" and expressed his condolences to Valdez's family and friends. "I reiterate our commitment to freedom of expression and the press, which are fundamental to our democracy," Nieto said on Twitter.

Valdez also was a correspondent for the national newspaper La Jornada and worked with the news agency Agency France-Presse. "We lament this tragedy and send all condolences to Javier's family and those close to him," Michèle Léridon, AFP's Global news director, said in a statement. "We call on the Mexican authorities to shed all possible light on this cowardly murder."

Journalist who covered Mexican drug wars gunned down in Sinaloa

See also:

Award-winning Crime Reporter Killed in Mexico
May 15, 2017 - Award-winning reporter Javier Valdez has been shot dead in the north-western state of Sinaloa.

Valdez, who specialized in covering drug trafficking and organized crime, was killed Monday when unidentified attackers opened fire on his car in the city of Culiacan where he was working. Valdez, 50, received the International Press Freedom Award by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) in 2011 for his coverage of drug trafficking. He was a correspondent for a national newspaper, La Jornada, and also co-founded the respected Riodoce publication and authored several books delving into narcotrafficking and organized crime. Valdez is at least the sixth journalist to be murdered in Mexico since early March.

Evidence identifiers are placed next to the body of journalist Javier Valdez at a crime scene in Culiacan, Mexico​

President Enrique Pena Nieto condemned what he called an "outrageous crime." "I reiterate our commitment to freedom of expression and the press, fundamental for our democracy," he tweeted. Journalists targeted in Mexico are most often local reporters in places where the rule of law is tenuous, but there have also been killings of journalists with national profiles such as Valdez and Regina Martinez Perez, who was slain in 2012. The recent spate of slayings includes Miroslava Breach, correspondent for La Jornada in the northern state of Chihuahua, who was gunned down in March. On Saturday, seven journalists were assaulted and robbed by a mob of about 100 armed men on a highway in the troubled southern state of Guerrero.

Sinaloa has long been a drug-trafficking hotbed and is home to the Sinaloa Cartel headed by notorious kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, who is in a New York prison awaiting trial on multiple charges. Experts say Guzman's arrest last year and extradition in January have led to upheaval in the area as rival factions war for control of the gang. "Drug trafficking there is a way of life," Valdez said in an October interview with Rompeviento TV. "You have to assume the task that falls to you as a journalist — either that or you play dumb. I don't want to be asked, 'What were you doing in the face of so much death ... why didn't you say what was going on?'"

Award-winning Crime Reporter Killed in Mexico

 

[waltky]

Cartel Hitmen Torture ‘Confessions’ From Victims Before ISIS-Style Beheading them...

Cartel Hitmen Force ‘Confessions’ From Victims Before ISIS-Style Beheadings In Mexico
12.03.17 - One of at least three decapitations last week was caught on camera as cartel violence continues to soar.

Members of the Viagras cartel videotaped a rival hitman confessing to “sins” in the western Mexican state of Michoacán last Thursday, then bent his neck backward over a block of wood and sawed off his head with a carving knife. The beheading video was posted to social media, along with a warning to the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG). In the clip, the decapitated victim also claims to be the brother of Juan Carlos Márquez Pérez, a.k.a. “El Duende” (The Goblin), a CJNG operative arrested back in 2015. In a separate incident on Tuesday of last week, two more severed heads were found in a cooler at a television station in the nearby city of Guadalajara. The heads were accompanied by a note signed by the CJNG and addressed to a high-ranking police officer. Another cartel cooler was left at the federal courthouse building that same day, but officials refused to disclose the contents.

Mexican mafiosos appear to have borrowed the practice of beheading their enemies from Middle Eastern terrorists such as Al Qaeda and the Islamic State (ISIS). Decapitations in Mexico have risen dramatically over the last several years due to their perceived shock factor. Head cutting has become the signature move for crime groups looking to intimidate opposing factions, pressure law enforcement, and cow local citizens. There have been dozens of beheadings by the cartels in 2017, which is on pace to be the bloodiest year in the country’s decade-long Drug War. (October, the latest month for which there are statistics, saw the homicide rate rise to an average of almost 90 murders per day.) One recent, high-profile decapitation case involved the discovery of two heads—and fourteen additional dead bodies—in the popular resort area of Los Cabos, Baja California Sur, last June. In another incident, the freshly removed cabezas of two men and a woman were found inside decorative sombreros during the run-up to the nation’s Independence Day in Veracruz state.

Heads for Tales

Last week’s brutal decollation video was filmed in the scorching valley called Tierra Caliente (The Hot Lands). Located smack in the middle of the troubled state of Michoacán, the Hot Lands are claimed by both the home-grown Viagras cartel and the invading CJNG from neighboring Jalisco state. The valley and surrounding mountains are home to large-scale drug production and shipping zones, and the local timber and mining industries provide lucrative sources for extortion, making Tierra Caliente a prize worth fighting over for both crime syndicates. In a 2016 interview Viagras leader Nicolás “El Gordo” (The Fat One) Sierra admitted his outfit was “fighting a crusade” against the CJNG, which is now reported to be Mexico’s largest cartel. According to experts, the recent video segment could indicate the gang from Jalisco might have Sierra and his sicarios (hitmen) on the ropes.

“This execution video is definitely out of character for the Viagras and appears to be an escalation in their use of violence [against] the CJNG cartel,” said security analyst Robert Bunker, who teaches at the U.S. Army War College, in an interview. “A safe guess would be that their fight with CJNG may not be going well and they see the need to ‘ramp up the terror’ against that group in order to better protect their territories and illicit interests,” Bunker said. Gustavo Fondevila, a professor who specializes in organized crime at Mexico City’s Center for Economic Research and Teaching, said such “trophy killings” are often aimed at controlling the black-market economy. “Beheading captured members of a rival cartel has a direct effect on the [black] market,” said Fondevila, who went on to call decapitation a “technique of conquest” aimed at a given geographic region.

“The rationale of the beheadings, abuse, and torture [ . . .] is to persuade the other [cartel] to leave a place, give up, or surrender without using weapons. It’s a relatively inexpensive way to win and take the market.” The method used to decollate the CJNG footsoldier in the Viagras’ video post, and the way it was filmed, combine to tell a menacing tale about the motive and mindset of those involved. “Beheadings where the victim is kneeling or thrown on the ground with the head lifted up to expose the neck and then beheaded beginning with a throat cut are a visceral and bloody type of execution,” said Bunker, author of the book Narcoterrorism and Impunity in the Americas. “They really portray a sense of the victim’s heightened terror to the viewing audience as the terrorist or cartel enforcer begins working on them with a large knife,” Bunker said. “A shooting or stabbing execution just doesn’t have the same horror.”

Officers Implicated?