Mexican soldiers arrested for alleged drug ties

Reuter | Mar 6, 2009

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – A dozen Mexican soldiers were arrested on suspicion of working with the violent Gulf Cartel, the Mexican army said on Thursday, a blow to President Felipe Calderon’s military-backed campaign against drug gangs.

The troops are accused of collaborating with four municipal policemen in the central state of Aguascalientes who provided protection for Gulf cartel capos, the army said in a statement.

The arrests come as Calderon sent thousands more troops to the violent border city of Ciudad Juarez in an attempt to curb spiraling drug violence that killed more than 6,000 people last year.

Calderon deployed the army to fight organized crime since taking office in 2006 partly because soldiers have traditionally been seen as less corrupt than police.

But several recent high-profile arrests — including a presidential guardsmen who allegedly received $100,000 a month to track Calderon for drug traffickers — reveal infiltration in the highest levels of Mexico’s security forces.

The Gulf cartel is fighting a turf war for control of smuggling routes with its main rival the Sinaloa federation, led by Mexico’s most wanted man Joaquin “Shorty” Guzman.

The Gulf cartel’s feared hitmen known as the Zetas, infamous for torturing and beheading their enemies, were founded by a group of military deserters.

(Reporting by Mica Rosenberg; Editing by Bill Trott)

Mexico vows more troops for drug war on U.S. border

Reuters | Feb 25, 2009

By Julian Cardona

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico (Reuters) – Mexico promised on Wednesday to pour more troops into a northern border city at the heart of the country’s drug war, where a meeting of federal officials was rattled by bomb scares earlier in the day.

Ciudad Juarez, across from El Paso, Texas, has become Mexico’s most violent city as security forces take on drug cartels warring for control of smuggling routes into the United States.

“We aren’t going to give up an inch of the city and we will expel them from Juarez,” Interior Minister Fernando Gomez Mont told reporters after a security cabinet meeting in Ciudad Juarez, which was heavily guarded by federal police.

“There will be a substantial increase in military and federal police presence in the coming weeks.”

Threats against public officials have been rising in the region. Last week suspected drug hitmen killed two city councilmen near Ciudad Juarez.

Gangs also have threatened to kill the mayor and last week forced out the police chief after killing his deputy and promising murders of police officers every 48 hours.

“They want to sow terror and the municipal and state police are totally overwhelmed,” Chihuahua state lawmaker Victor Quintana told Reuters.

A former soldier attacked a convoy carrying Chihuahua state Governor Jose Reyes late on Sunday in what Mexican media speculated was linked to the drug war.

During Gomez Mont’s visit to Ciudad Juarez, authorities received bomb threats and found traces of explosives in a vehicle parked at the airport, which was evacuated by soldiers and federal police but reopened by late afternoon.

“Anonymous calls to the police and army alerted us to the threats but they turned out to be false,” army spokesman Enrique Torres said.

Frightened travelers waited outside the airport and flights were diverted to the state capital, Chihuahua.

President Felipe Calderon has sent out about 45,000 troops across the country but clashes between rival gangs and security forces killed some 6,000 people last year.

Even with about 2,500 troops and federal police in Ciudad Juarez and surrounding areas, more than 250 people have died in drug violence this month in the city.

Drug trade experts say Mexico’s most-wanted man, Joaquin “Shorty” Guzman, who leads a cartel from the Pacific state of Sinaloa, is vying to take Ciudad Juarez’s lucrative smuggling route from local cartel leader Vicente Carrillo Fuentes.

Law and order in the city has collapsed as Guzman’s hitmen seek to destroy the Juarez’s cartel’s entire operation, said Tony Payan of the University of Texas in El Paso.

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Youth mental illness costs U.S. billions

Reuters | Feb 13, 2009

By Will Dunham

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Mental illness, substance abuse and behavioral problems among children and young adults, costs the United States $247 billion a year in treatment and lost productivity alone, an expert panel said on Friday.

The panel set up by the National Research Council and Institute of Medicine which advise U.S. policymakers urged the White House to set prevention goals and coordinate government action to attack the problem.

The panel looked at the financial toll from mental illnesses including depression, anxiety disorders and schizophrenia, as well as drug and alcohol abuse and behavioral problems by people up to age 24.

It concluded that treatment and lost productivity costs alone reached an estimated $247 billion annually. That figure excluded criminal justice and education, workplace disruption and social welfare spending which would certainly add many billions more to the price tag.

“It’s a lot of money,” said Kenneth Warner, dean of the University of Michigan School of Public Health, who headed the panel.

The estimate came as the Obama administration and many lawmakers look for ways to improve U.S. healthcare, which is the world’s most expensive but lags many other countries in some quality measures.

Some school-based and other programs have effectively reduced mental health, substance abuse and behavioral problems but federal leadership has been lacking, the panel said.

“We really can prevent a lot of mental, emotional and behavioral disorders,” Warner said.

Obama’s surge and the Afghan heroin trade

Bharath is Truth | Feb 9, 2009

By Johann Samuhanand

Bangalore, India, February 09 — As America surges in Afghanistan, it has created its own stirring in the heroin trade, which has come back to life after NATO forces took over the country from the Taliban. The Taliban, who enforced not only Sharia law but other stringent Islamic conditions on the people as well, ensured that poppy was not cultivated at all. Though this infuriated ordinary Afghans, the Taliban enforced it ruthlessly. This also ensured the vanquishing of the drug mafia run by drug lords like General Dostum, Ishmeil Khan, etc.

When the International Security Assistance Force took over, it opened the floodgates of freedom of the media and personal liberty, and also the freedom to grow poppy. Initially, it ensured that ordinary Afghans were happy with the money that came from this trade. This time, the Taliban did not abolish this trade, but cleverly used it to subvert the central rule of Karzai as desired by Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). The United States winked at this as long it was supporting the Pakistani army and ISI and didn’t affect its global interest in the painkiller market in Europe. ISI thinks that subverting the Indian economy through heroin and other poppy-derived drugs is as effective as a terrorist attack against India. As the global prices for heroin crash in the European market, the CIA is waking up to face the challenge of protecting its market in Europe and the United States.

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The connection between ISI and the CIA through drug money is not much known, since ISI is intricately linked to jihadi terrorism, which gets more media space. ISI cannot survive as an institution with this “oxygen” from the drug trade.

Again, the hawala system in Afghanistan is controlled by poppy-generated illegal money. One finds that the hawala centers and drug routes are the same. Ninety-three percent of the world’s illegal opium is grown in Afghanistan. The world’s intelligence agencies and drug lords have their meeting point in the small but prosperous town of Baramcha in Helmand, which grows 70% of Afghanistan’s poppy. The GDP of Afghanistan is US$7.8 billion, while the illegal opium trade is worth more than US$5 billion!!! Now one can understand how important drug trade is to Afghanistan, to the jihadis, to ISI and to the United States, where the illegal street trade is worth US$200 billion! The Taliban are able to completely ignore or reduce taxes on non-opium trade in the areas they control, as long as one pays 10% tax on the opium produced, thereby winning the hearts and minds of ordinary Afghan farmers.

Then what is the game plan of the Obama administration in inviting the following people for his inauguration: Gul Agha Sherzai, Dr. Ashraff Ghani Ahmedzai, Ali Ahmed Jalali, and Abudullah Abdullah? Why is he trying to replace Karzai with one of these warlords? These guys are not angels. The reason is drug money, which made even Zilmay Khalizad salivate for the job.

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Henchman of Mexican drug lord ‘dissolved 300 bodies in acid’

Three hundred bodies were allegedly dissolved in acid by a man accused of working for a Mexican drug kingpin.

Telegraph | Jan 24, 2009

By Nick Meo

Santiago Meza Lopez confessed to disposing of the victims of Mexico’s grisly drugs wars over a decade by dumping them in graves and pouring acid on them to let them dissolve underground, said police. He has been arrested in the border city of Tijuana.

The victims are believed to be rivals of Teodoro Garcia Simental, an alleged former lieutenant of the Tijuana-based Arellano Felix drug cartel, authorities said.

Soldiers and police paraded Meza, 45, before reporters at a cement-block shack on the outskirts of the city where he allegedly disposed of the bodies. Two grave-sized holes had been dug near the walls.

The security officers made Meza tell reporters how he allegedly disposed of the bodies, prodding him to speak up whenever he mumbled.

Meza, who has not yet been charged, was arrested along with three others on Thursday at a Tijuana hotel. He told reporters on Friday that he was paid $600 (£440) a week for his work.

Earlier this month, the United States Drug Enforcement Administration identified Garcia as one of ten men it believed to have been battling for drug trafficking routes through the border city. The DEA said Garcia was the chief rival of alleged Arellano Felix cartel leader Fernando Sanchez Arrellano.

Mexican officials have blamed the power struggle for a surge in violence in Tijuana, the birthplace of the Arellano Felix cartel. The two men split in April after a shootout between their followers left at least 14 people dead, Mexican and US officials say.

Drugs violence claimed more than 5.300 lives in Mexico last year.

Mexico seizes almost 3 tons of meth ingredient from Korean ship

Mexican traffickers are the main methamphetamine suppliers to the United States.

SMH| Jan 23, 2009

Mexican authorities say they have seized nearly three tonnes of pseudoephedrine from a ship that arrived from South Korea.

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Soldiers and federal agents have found eight million pseudoephedrine tablets weighing 2.8 tonnes in 60 boxes aboard a ship in the Pacific port of Manzanillo.

Pseudoephedrine is the main ingredient used to make methamphetamine.

The bust occurred on Monday and was announced on Thursday in a joint statement from the attorney-general’s Office, the navy and departments of defence and public safety.

Mexico has banned all imports of pseudoephedrine to try to thwart methamphetamine production. The US Justice Department says Mexican traffickers are the main methamphetamine suppliers to the United States.

US military may be “forced to intervene” if Mexico collapses into civil war

Mexico drugs bust: Mexico lies astride the crucial smuggling routes linking the US with the drug-growing areas of South America Photo: AP

America may be forced to intervene in Mexico to prevent the country’s “rapid and sudden collapse” at the hands of organised crime and drug cartels, according to the US army.

Telegraph | Jan 16, 2009

Mexico in danger of collapse, says US army

By David Blair, Diplomatic Editor

A report on the “Joint Operating Environment”, compiled by the army’s high command, places Mexico alongside Pakistan as a possible failed state of the future. America, which shares a 2,000 mile border with Mexico, would be the obvious destination for massive refugee flows if its neighbour descended into civil war.

President Felipe Calderon has deployed Mexico’s army in a new offensive against organised crime. This battle against four major drug cartels, along with a myriad of local syndicates, claimed the lives of 5,367 members of the security forces or suspected criminals last year alone.

“Two large and important states bear consideration for rapid and sudden collapse: Pakistan and Mexico,” reads the US army’s report.

“The Mexican possibility may seem less likely, but the government, its politicians, police and judicial infrastructure are all under sustained assault and pressure by criminal gangs and drug cartels. How that internal conflict turns out over the next several years will have a major impact on the stability of the Mexican state.”

Mexico, with a population of 110 million, provides America with more migrants than any other country. It also lies astride the crucial smuggling routes linking the US with the drug-growing areas of South America, notably Colombia, which remains the world’s biggest source of cocaine.

If Mexico became a failed state, millions would flee across the northern border and organised crime gangs would have a secure base from which to penetrate America. This could leave Washington with little choice but to intervene, possibly by military means.

“Any descent by Mexico into chaos would demand an American response based on the serious implications for homeland security alone,” says the report.

Mexico’s crime gangs have retaliated for Mr Calderon’s offensive by targeting members of the security forces for murder. Dozens of soldiers have been beheaded. Many ordinary police officers and security officials accept bribes from the drug rings. This corruption, which may reach into the highest levels of the government itself, is a crucial factor obstructing Mr Calderon’s campaign. Ultimately, it may also have the effect of destroying the state itself.

The US army’s report stresses that countries can collapse very quickly, pointing to the example of Yugoslavia which broke up during the civil wars of 1991 – 95. “The collapse of Yugoslavia into a chaotic tangle of warring nationalities suggests how suddenly and catastrophically state collapse can happen – in this case a state which had hosted the 1984 Winter Olympics at Sarajevo, and which then quickly became the epicentre of the ensuing civil war.”

Mr Calderon won Mexico’s presidency by a tiny margin of less than one per cent during a controversial election held in July 2006. Despite this slender mandate, he has made the fight against organised crime the central goal of his leadership.

15 dirty cops snared in drug conspiracy sting

FBI agents stage sting to snare corrupt Ill. Cops

AP | Dec 2, 2008

By MIKE ROBINSON

CHICAGO (AP) — Duffel bags stuffed with cocaine were delivered by plane to an out-of-the-way suburban airport while two sheriff’s officers provided security. A police officer stood by to guard the cash and keep out the riffraff at a poker game where $100,000 changed hands. And a drug dealer was told squad cars marked “sheriff” and “sheriff’s police” might be available on a “freelance” basis to provide protection for his deliveries.

Such tales of law enforcement gone awry emerged in court papers Tuesday as federal prosecutors unveiled a series of elaborate sting operations aimed at officers who hired out to ride shotgun for drug deals and other criminal activities.

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Fifteen officers and two other men who had pretended to be law enforcement officers were charged with conspiracy to possess and distribute cocaine or heroin or both.

But the most spectacular pretending was done by the federal agents themselves.

The pilots of the airplane were not drug runners but undercover agents. So were the gamblers who busily played hand after hand of high-stakes poker — all for show.

The drug broker who squired the officers to the airport to pick up the duffel bags was an agent. So was the drug dealer who stuffed the bags into his Mercedes-Benz.

U.S. Attorney Patrick J. Fitzgerald said he was dismayed to find that so many law enforcement officers had “sold out their badge.”

“When drug dealers deal drugs, they ought to be afraid of the police — not turn to them for help,” Fitzgerald said at a news conference.

Officials paid homage to an unnamed FBI agent who moved into a business in Harvey more than a year ago and set up shop as a drug broker. He soon attracted the attention of police and the corruption grew, authorities said.

They said the agent was sent in undercover because there had been reports of police corruption over the last several years in southern Cook County, including the Harvey police department. An investigation into allegations of robbery, extortion, narcotics offenses and weapons distribution is ongoing, officials said.

Those charged include 10 Cook County sheriff’s correctional officers, four Harvey police officers and one Chicago police officer.

Of the 17 defendants, 14 were arrested or surrendered Tuesday and were being immediately brought before U.S. Magistrate Judge Michael Mason. Two sheriff’s officers are on active duty with Army National Guard units in Afghanistan, and warrants were issued for their arrest.

If convicted of conspiracy to possess and distribute more than five kilograms of cocaine or one kilogram of heroin, the defendants would face a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years and a maximum of life. The maximum fine would be $4 million.

Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart called the alleged behavior “absolutely reprehensible.”

“The responsibility of watching over jail inmates is an important one and it’s a shame these men didn’t take that responsibility more seriously,” he said in a statement.

Each of those charged has been suspended with pay pending a hearing next week, Dart said. “That step will then lead to a request for termination,” he said.

Mexico death industry thrives on drug war killings

Firefighters, wearing chemical protective suits, remove barrels containing cut up bodies in acid in the border city of Tijuana September 30, 2008. Drug cartel hitmen have massacred some 70 people in the past eight days in Tijuana on the U.S.-Mexico border, once a freewheeling city serving Americans tequila, cheap medicines and sex that is being devastated by the war. Picture taken September 30, 2008. REUTERS/Jorge Duenes (MEXICO)

Reuters | Nov 1, 2008

By Lizbeth Diaz Lizbeth Diaz

TIJUANA, Mexico (Reuters) – Mexico’s drug wars are fueling a boom in the funeral industry near the U.S. border as undertakers capitalize on soaring murder rates and gruesome killings.

As Mexicans gather in cemeteries Sunday to place marigolds, candy skulls and candles on tombs for the Day of the Dead festival, a spike in drug violence means more bodies are bound for funeral parlors.

“We’ve seen a big increase in the number of clients because of the drug war, especially since September. It’s gone from a few (bodies) a week to one or two every day,” said Fernando, a funeral home owner in Tijuana across the border from San Diego, California. He declined to give his last name.

About 4,000 people have been killed in Mexico this year as gangs vie for control of the cocaine trade amid a crackdown that has thousands of army troops battling drug cartels on their home turf.

Drug cartel hit men have killed some 160 people in the past month in Tijuana, once a party town serving Americans tequila and sex that is being devastated by the war.

Gun battles and gangland mutilations are also boosting demand for facial reconstructions. Funeral parlors can charge more than $1,000 to make the dead presentable for their wakes.

And because of the rise in decapitations in the city, undertakers offer to hold the body and wait for the head to be found before proceeding with the funeral.

“No questions asked,” said Fernando, standing by three caskets on display for potential clients.

The trade carries risks, however. A funeral director was shot dead in front of his house in Ciudad Juarez across from El Paso, Texas, in late October and several mortuaries have been sprayed with bullets.

Although the motives for the mortuary killing in Ciudad Juarez were unclear, funeral home owners say they face extortion from drug gangs and have been threatened after organizing funerals for some drug war victims.

Undertakers from central and southern Mexico are opening branches in drug-violence hot spots near the border, and some are offering special deals to attract more clients.

“We’ll do the make-up on the body for free,” said one mortuary employee as he handed out promotional flyers outside a rival funeral home in Tijuana.

Some families want a quick burial for fear of attacks by rival drug gangs. They can pay the minimum of about $1,000 and buy a thin, unvarnished plywood coffin for a spot in a municipal graveyard.

Others want the engraved bronze and gold caskets with silver handles and red satin interiors that cost $25,000.

Some families buy funeral packages that include huge, gaudy flower bouquets, banquets for guests, Mariachi musicians and stone mausoleums in private plots.

5 Mexican military members linked to drug cartel

AP | Oct 31, 2008

By E. EDUARDO CASTILLO

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Four Mexican military officers and one soldier are under investigation for alleged links to one of the country’s most powerful drug cartels, Mexico’s Defense Department said Friday.

The investigation capped a week of corruption scandals that have arisen from the January arrest of Alfredo Beltran Leyva, a reputed top lieutenant in the Sinaloa drug cartel believed to have penetrated many of Mexico’s security agencies.

The Defense Department said in the statement that Beltran Leyva’s arrest led authorities to investigate the five military members. They were all turned over to prosecutors on Jan. 29, but their cases weren’t made public until Friday.

Officials would give no more details on their cases.

On Monday, officials in the federal Attorney General’s office said five authorities in the organized crime unit had been arrested for informing the Beltran Leyva cartel and a spy inside the U.S. Embassy may have been handing over details of DEA operations.

On Thursday, Reforma newspaper reported that, with Beltran Leyva’s arrest, officials had found a list of military members who were allegedly being paid to work for the drug lord.

Mexican authorities refused to comment on that report, or say it if was related to Friday’s revelation.

The corruption scandals are the most serious known infiltration of anti-crime agencies since the 1997 arrest of Gen. Jesus Gutierrez Rebollo, then head of Mexico’s anti-drug agency. Gutierrez Rebollo was later convicted of aiding drug lord Amado Carrillo Fuentes.

President Felipe Calderon has long acknowledged that corruption is a problem among the federal police and soldiers charged with leading Mexico’s anti-drug campaign, but this week’s announcements were nonetheless a major blow to his nationwide campaign to take back territory controlled by cartels.