Mexico - It Is Cool To Be Corrupt Again

The new administration of president Enrique Pena Nieto recently announced that there will be changes in open access arrangements (also called direct access relationships) between Mexican and U.S. security agencies. The government contends that the new rules will consolidate security operations, centralize communications between Mexican and U.S. security agencies and eliminate overlap among Mexican law enforcement agencies. Yet there is a turn-about-is-fair-play element in the administration’s new rules. U.S. security agencies will have to be vetted by Mexico’s Interior Ministry. Since Pena’s election U.S. security agencies have expressed concern that his government would restrict or curtail what is called the vetted unit program. The new rules may make reliable lateral communications between U.S. security personnel and their Mexican counter-parts more difficult.

 

May 9, 2013: Security officials announced that three Interpol policemen and one federal investigator have been reported missing. The four men are Mexican citizens and were engaged in a special investigation in Chihuahua state (northern Mexico, U.S. border). They were last seen in a vehicle on the road between Chihuahua City and Ciudad Juarez.

 

May 8, 2013: The U.S. Treasury Department has designated eight senior Sinaloa drug cartel leaders as Specially Designated Narcotics Traffickers.  The men are Sinaloa sub-commanders (deputies of Sinaloa drug lord Joaquin Guzman).  In drug smuggling jargon, they are plaza bosses. Each plaza boss is tasked with operating a specific trafficking corridor between the U.S. and Mexico. The Treasury designation freezes all assets the individuals may have in the U.S. and bans U.S. citizens from doing business with the cartel members. Three of the men receiving the designation are already in jail in Mexico.

 

 May 5, 2013:  Eleven people died in three firefights between drug cartel gunmen and security forces in Tamaulipas state (northeastern Mexico, Texas border). One of the people killed was a soldier.  The state prosecutor’s office reported two gunmen were killed in the town of Gustavo Diaz Ordaz. Six were killed in a shootout in Matamoros (across the border from Brownsville, Texas).  The soldier was killed in a gun battle in Guemez. Two gunmen were killed in that incident.

 

May 4, 2013: Suspected cartel gunmen in Chihuahua City (Chihuahua state) murdered the sons of two leading Mexican journalists. The young men were the sons of a financial writer and television commentator (father) and the editor of a major newspaper (mother). The cartels have targeted critical journalists and their families in order to silence them.

 

April 30, 2013: The rumors that Mexican cartels were buying operations from Colombian drug gangs apparently had a basis in fact. U.S. security agencies have noted an increase in cocaine trafficking traceable to Mexican cartels. EUROPOL has also reported that the Mexican cartels are now smuggling more Colombian cocaine.  Colombian narcotics traffickers have not disappeared. However, the Colombian government has succeeded in reducing the power of the guerrilla groups and paramilitary gangs that became key players in the Colombian cocaine operation.  The government has done this by either defeating the groups militarily or convincing their leaders (in some case aging leaders) that making a political deal was preferable to defeat and arrest. Many of these gangs began with political agendas, but over time they began providing security for coca growers and cocaine cartelistas. 

 

April 29, 2013: The government announced that it is revising the terms of its open access policies with U.S. security agencies. The change will affect how Mexico-U.S. security agencies share intelligence and operational information. It also affects the way Mexican and U.S. security agencies will conduct joint and cooperative operations.  To what degree will cooperation change? That is unknown. The effects on anti-crime and anti-terror efforts could be very significant, though the Pena government insists that it just wants to consolidate and centralize communications and security operations between Mexico and the U.S.. U.S. security and intelligence officers, however, are worried that the new Mexican administration is fundamentally changing the operating procedures of the Mexican security personnel with which they work most closely.  These Mexican personnel work in what U.S. security agencies generically call vetted units. The more official sounding Vetted Investigative Unit (VIU) also crops up. Vetted units are special elements (units) composed of screened personnel who work for the U.S. security agencies, foreign counterpart agencies or institutions.   Personnel serving in vetted units have been thoroughly investigated and have been found to be highly reliable and trustworthy professionals. To put it simply, these people are not corrupt. The U.S. agencies want to avoid penetration by criminal organizations.  The U.S. agencies do not want U.S. personnel compromised and U.S. methods compromised. They do not want sensitive U.S. intelligence disseminated to unauthorized individuals – like drug cartels.  U.S. agencies like the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) have used the vetted unit process with several foreign countries. The DEA has worked with several in Colombia, which is no surprise. An unclassified 2007 DEA inspector general report said that many DEA agents had told the inspector general that vetted units were critical to accomplishing DEA foreign operations. That same report listed examples of several operations where DEA worked with vetted units: “conducting investigative operations, surveillance, and wiretaps; checking on investigative leads; destroying drug production laboratories; and interdicting drug shipments.”  Sometimes vetted units operate from offices which are completely separate from those of their specific agency or government institution. For example, a vetted Mexican intelligence unit might operate from a U.S. intelligence facility in Mexico. The U.S. 

and Mexico began using vetted units to share sensitive intelligence and operational data in the 1990s (1997 according to one source). Why would the new administration change the relationship? The new administration is run by the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). The PRI has always cast itself as the party which defends Mexican sovereignty against the colossus of the north.  Though the U.S.-Mexico vetted unit program began during a PRI presidency, it expanded enormously after December 2006 when the Calderon administration went to war with the drug cartels.  Mexican and U.S. military commands were exchanging real-time intelligence. Vetted personnel worked in the U.S. NORTHCOM headquarters in Colorado Springs and at a smuggling interdiction and surveillance task force headquarters in Key West, Florida. U.S. intelligence also flows to vetted personnel in the Mexican intelligence command center in Mexico City (so called Platform Mexico). Though no U.S. political leader or security official has said it in public, Pena’s decision sure looks like a signal that the bad old days PRI corruption have returned. (Austin Bay)

 

April 24, 2013: The government has closed a criminal case against two associates of the former Coahuila state governor Humberto Moreira Valdez. Moreira was at one time the head of the PRI.  He was governor of Coahuila from 2005 to 2011. The two accused associates faced corruption charges. 

Over $3 billion dollars in public money disappeared when Moreira served as governor (one source said the money consisted of bank loans).   One of the accused served as state treasurer under Moreira. Federal prosecutors in the Attorney General’s Office (PGR) concluded that they did not have jurisdiction and turned the case over to state prosecutors. Critics accused the government of dropping the federal case because the new president, Enrique Pena Nieto, is a member of the PRI and the entire scandal demonstrates that the PRI remains corrupt. The current governor of Coahuila is Humberto Moreira’s brother.

 

April 23, 2013: U.S. security officials believe the Zetas have expanded their contacts with U.S. drug gangs. The Zetas have a significant presence in Atlanta, Chicago and Houston. 

 

April 17, 2013: Mexican media are alleging that the decline in drug-related murders in Ciudad Juarez is not due to better policing. Rather, the Sinaloa cartel has defeated its rivals. Residents have told reporters that they are glad the violence has subsided, whatever the reason.

 

April 15, 2013: EUROPOL released a report which claimed that Mexican drug cartels are now involved in many illegal drug trafficking rings in Europe. Los Zetas cartel has increased its operations in Europe. EUROPOL said that the Mexican cartels help coordinate operations, particularly cocaine sales and some synthetic drugs (amphetamines).

Superjet-100 to prowl Latin American skies

The Russian Sukhoi Superjet-100project is making up for the image-building losses the airliner has suffered due to a number of accidents. The aircraft maker has upgraded nodes and components to allow claims in a move that’s largely boosted the airliner’s external competitiveness. The Mexican Airline Interjet says it will have bought 20 Superjet-100 airliners by the end of 2014.

According to the Mexican Airline’s CEO Jose Alvarez, the air-carrier will invest more than one billion dollars in its purchases, using loans from Italian, French and Russian banks. The first supplies are due as early as in May this year. The last aircraft of those purchased is to be delivered in December next year.

The acquisition of 20 Russian-made Superjet-100 planes will enable Interjetto fly to as many as 80 new destinations, both at home and abroad, specifically to the United States and Colombia.

The Chief Analyst with the Russian AVIAPORT agency, Oleg Panteleev, feels that the deal to be wrapped up is very interesting and important both to the Russian aircraft-makers and the Mexican air-carrier. Here’s more from Oleg Panteleev.

"Interjet has been quickly growing, so it will need just this kind of an effective regional 100-seater, Oleg Panteleev says. The Russian aircraft performance does meet the Mexican airline’s requirements, but Interjet wants all the aircraft to be delivered on time, and it will expect the Russian plane’s reliability and time on the wing to be in conformity with what the aircraft-maker says they are".

The Superjet-100 airliner will replace the A-320 Airbuses that Russia bought from Europe years ago and that are overage now. Besides, Superjet-100 consumes 15% less fuel. Mexicans will continue purchasing Airbuses, but Superjet-100 airliners seem to perform more efficiently at high-level airports.

Just how efficient the Russian airliner will prove in Mexico will obviously determine the future of the aircraft on the international market. The airliner has suffered a spate of crashes in recent years, which caused potential buyers to think better of their plans to purchase it. Anyway, experts are certain that Superjet-100 will cope with its so-called “childhood diseases” that are typical of all new aircraft, and will eventually prove attractive to many partners. The experts’ opinion is shared by Victor Pryadka, Director-General of the Alliance Company of Avintelaviation technology.

If Russia adheres to the time of delivery, and the operation of the aircraft in Mexico proves successful, more Latin American countries will seek to buy the plane. Although the aircraft market is saturated, Superjet-100 has actually few rivals. South East Asian nations have taken interest in the Russian airliner. But the Sukhoi Company must pursue a correct marketing strategy to turn that interest into actual acquisition contracts. Meanwhile, the company engineers are doing their best to ensure that the contract will be carried out.

Mexico - Off With The Heads

It is not quite equivalent to killing Osama Bin Laden, but for Mexicans who have suffered in the Cartel War, it comes close. The death of the leader of Los Zetas, Heriberto Lazcano, continues to be major news. Lazcano (El Lazca) was killed in a firefight with Mexican Marines on October 14. The firefight took place in the northern state of Coahuila. Marines also killed one of Lazcano’s bodyguards. So far, so good. However, Zetas gunmen attacked the funeral home where his body was held and stole it. That’s another reason the story continues to be big news. Is he really dead? Authorities have DNA evidence and police took fingerprints of the corpse, but legend makers will say he isn’t no matter the evidence. There are other indicators. Police and media report that a new leader (Miguel Angel Trevino) has taken control of the cartel.

October 17, 2012: The government charged seven security officials with collaborating with drug gangs. Three of the individuals work for the nation’s central organized-crime unit.

October 16, 2012: Police raided three teachers' colleges in Michoacan state (western Mexico). The campuses had been under siege for over a week as demonstrators protested curriculum changes that required students to take computer science and English courses. Over 120 protestors were arrested at the three schools. Ten police officers were injured in the raids.

October 15, 2012: The government asserted that its program of putting constant pressure on the leaders of the drug cartels is paying off. The arrests and deaths of senior cartel commanders have weakened the organizational structure of the cartels. The homicide rate in Mexico is down seven percent this year, when compared to 2011.

October 13, 2012: Soldiers killed Manuel Torres Feliz (El Ondeado) in a firefight near the town of Oso Viejo (Sinaloa state). Torres Felix is a senior commander in the Sinaloa drug cartel. The soldiers also seized weapons, ammunition, and other military equipment. Troops were sent to guard the site of the firefight and the morgue where Torres Felix’s body was sent. The government is obviously taking steps to avoid a repeat of the theft of Los Zetas’ commander’s Heriberto Lazcano’s body.

October 12, 2012: The U.S. government designated El Salvador’s MS-13 gang (also called Mara Salvatrucha) as a transnational criminal organization. MS-13 was formed in the Los Angeles, California area but now has connections throughout the world. It has extensive connections with Mexican drug gangs. The gang may have as many as 30,000 members and associates world-wide. Two years ago investigators suggested that MS-13 might be a conduit for shifting some Mexican cartel operations to El Salvador. The designation makes it illegal for Americans and U.S. financial institutions to do engage in any business with the gang or gang members.

October 9, 2012: Marines killed Heriberto Lazcano Lazcano, head of Los Zetas drug cartel in a firefight in near the town of Progreso (Coahuila state). Fingerprints taken by marines confirmed the body was Lazcano’s, who vied with the Sinaloa cartel’s Joaquin Guzman for the title of the most wanted gangster in Mexico. He was a former army special forces soldier and he built Los Zetas along military lines. The government announced his death but also had to admit it did not have his body. Zetas gunmen attacked the funeral home where his body was being kept and stole the corpse.

October 8, 2012: Naval personnel arrested Los Zetas regional commander Salvador Afonso Martinez on October 6. He was believed to be the Zetas leader who organized the mass murder of 72 Central American migrants in 2010 in Tamaulipas state (northern Mexico). Martinez is believed to be in charge of Los Zetas operations in the states of Coahuila, Tamaulipas, and Nuevo Leon.

October 5, 2012: A U.S. Border Patrol agent who was killed on a patrol on October 2 may have been killed by an inadvertent shot fired by another border security agent. The incident took place near Naco, Arizona.

October 3, 2012: The U.S. believes that three Mexican drug cartels are active in the U.S. city of Chicago, Illinois. Apparently the cartels supply the majority of the illegal drugs available in the city.

October 2, 2012: U.S. Border Patrol agent Nicholas Ivie was slain in an incident near the Arizona-Mexico border. The agent was shot in a remote area between the towns of Naco and Bisbee. The agent’s death is under investigation.

The U.S. government officials is indicating that investigators have found circumstantial evidence that the Mexican Federal police who wounded two U.S. CIA officers in an incident on August 24 were working for a criminal gang. The Mexican government provided the name of the cartel under suspicion: Beltran Leyva. The Mexican government acknowledged that it is looking into whether or not the Beltran Leyva cartel may have co-opted (bribed) the police detachment involved. The U.S. initially called the incident an ambush and since then some government security personnel have called it an assassination attempt. The two CIA officers were in a U.S. embassy vehicle (armored SUV) and were chased and shot at by Mexican Federal police on a road near Cuernavaca. A senior Mexican Navy officer was also in the vehicle.

October 1, 2012: The government said that the Attorney General's Office is continuing to study the U.S. Department of Justice report on Operation Fast and Furious. Fast and Furious was a badly botched U.S. sting operation that smuggled around 2,000 weapons into Mexico, with the alleged intent of fingering sources of illegal firearms entering Mexico and identifying drug cartel weapons buyers.

September 26, 2012: The theft of crude oil and refined petroleum products continues to plague Mexico’s national oil company, PEMEX. A recent investigation of pipelines in Mexico discovered numerous breaks in the lines where criminal gangs were siphoning off oil. Oil and oil distillate theft has become a big business. One investigator estimated that criminal gangs are stealing over one billion dollars a year in crude oil and refined products. Some of the products are smuggled into the United States.

September 24, 2012: Cartel gunmen attacked a burial ceremony in Torreon, Coahuila and murdered seven people and wounded 17. The ceremony was for a man murdered by a drug cartel Some of the people at the ceremony were carrying weapons and fired back.

Mexican Politicians Love The C-130J

Mexico is buying two C-130J transports from the United States. Mexico already operates four older C-130s (E and L models). Including support, training, and spare parts (including two engines) the C-130J deal will cost $412 million. These two new transports will primarily be used for "presidential support." That apparently means helping politicians to move around, with a secondary role of helping with the war against the drug cartels, if there is a serious emergency.

The C-130 continues to thrive after over half a century because they are a reliable and inexpensive way to move cargo and personnel to improvised airfields. The C-130J transport proved to be more than just another model in the fifty year old C-130 design. This is mainly because it's cheaper and easier to use. Like most new commercial transports, the C-130J emphasizes saving money. The new engines generate 29 percent more thrust while using 15 percent less fuel. Increased automation reduced crew size from four to three. The rear ramp door can now be opened in flight when the aircraft is going as fast as 450 kilometers an hour, versus the current 270 kilometers an hour.

The C-130J is more reliable and easier to maintain. So far, C-130Js have cost nearly twenty percent less per hour than previous models. The current 70 ton MC-130H (there are several MC-130 models) has a crew of seven, a cruise speed of 480 kilometers an hour, and unrefueled range of 4,300 kilometers. This version can carry 77 passengers, or 52 paratroopers, or 57 litter patients and 18 tons of cargo or specialized containers outfitted with business jet amenities.

The most common version of the C-130 still in service is the C-130H. It has a range of 8,368 kilometers, a top speed of 601 kilometers per hour, and can carry up to 18 tons of cargo, 92 troops, or 64 paratroopers. The latest version, the C-130J, has a top speed of 644 kilometers, 40 percent more range than the C-130H, and can carry 20 tons of cargo. The stretched C-130J-30 can carry more bulky cargo and goes for about $100 million each. The C-130 has flown for over 50 countries since the late 1950s.

Mexico - The Scope Of The War

The defense ministry (SEDENA, Secretaria de la Defensa Nacional) estimated that the illegal drug business employs around 500,000 people in Mexico. This data was revealed in a closed session last month devoted to the defense ministry’s efforts to fight drug trafficking. The comments are now public record. Since they first appeared in print, the estimates have been showing up in other sources and have fired numerous discussions about how successful a drug war can ever be when a half million citizens are involved in the drug business. It was estimated that around 300,000 people are involved in planting drug-producing plants. Around 160,000 people are involved in drug distribution (wholesale and retail), transporting the drugs to distributors, or providing information to the cartel leaders (ie, work as informants). Included in this group are what the defense secretary called small-scale drug dealers (small fry according to one translation). Approximately 40,000 people can be called cartel members. This means they hold command or operational positions of some sort in a criminal gang. Lawmakers who heard the defense secretary’s report told media that the defense ministry has concluded that efforts by various security agencies to attack cartel finances have worked, which is the reason so many cartels have moved into extortion rackets and kidnapping operations. The lawmakers face constant (and understandable) complaints from constituents about the plague of kidnappings. Mexico’s Secretary of the Navy, Admiral Mariano Francisco Saynez Mendoza, also spoke to the representatives. He told the deputies that the Mexican Navy (which includes Mexico’s Marine Corps) will continue to fight against organized crime organizations “until the civil authorities have sufficient capability to undertake this mission.” The statement attributed to the admiral indicates that he believes civil security authorities are not yet up to the task. This report came from Mexico’s top military leaders. They are secretaries but they are not civilians. Mexico does not have a joint military command structure like the United States. 

SEDENA controls the Mexican Army (which includes the Mexican Air Force). The Navy operates as an independent branch under the Secretary of the Navy’s command. The Cartel War has enhanced the Mexican military's reputation with the Mexican citizenry. The military already ranked high in terms of public esteem. The public regards the military as more honest and more reliable than other government institutions. --- Al Nofi and Austin Bay

September 22, 2012: The government will continue to review the U.S. investigation of Operation Fast and Furious, a failed U.S. government operation that its proponents claimed would help identify how and to whom weapons from the U.S. were smuggled weapons to Mexican drug cartels. The U.S. Justice Department conducted the investigation and recommended that 15 Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco Firearms and Explosives (BATFE) employees be disciplined. The operation involved somewhere between 1700 and 2000 weapons, many of them assault rifles. BATFE began the operation in 2009. Two Fast and Furious weapons were used in a December 2010 shootout in Arizona. A U.S. Border Patrol agent was slain in that incident. Other Fast and Furious weapons were used in numerous murders in Mexico.

Seven dead, dismembered and burned bodies were discovered in Michoacan state (western Mexico). Several cartels are fighting a turf battle in the state, including the Jalisco New Generation, La Familia (also knowsn as La Familia Michoacana), the Knights Templar faction, and the increasingly powerful Los Zetas.

September 21, 2012: Officials in Coahuila state reported that 131 prisoners escaped from the Piedra Negras jail on September 17. So far three of the inmates have been recaptured. There is evidence that Los Zetas cartel was behind the mass jail break. The cartel had bribed or intimidated prison guards and the guards let the prisoners escape. The warden, the prison’s chief of security, and several guards were arrested on September 19. The government indicated that Los Zetas may be trying to replenish their ranks of gunmen – and note that these are trained and experienced gunmen. A Mexican media source claimed that over 500 members of Los Zetas have either escaped from jail or been released since 2008.

September 20, 2012: The army has deployed soldiers to combat drug gang violence in the town of Nezahualcoyotl, an eastern suburb of Mexico City. The soldiers are part of a 1,000 man task force which includes federal police agents and local police. Both Los Zetas and the La Familia cartel are believed to be behind the violence in the town.

September 18, 2012: The U.S. and Mexico are discussing ways to improve Mexico’s legal system. The U.S. State Department has a program that includes training prison wardens and improving prison security. The Mexican government has emphasized improving the judiciary (ie, better trained and more ethical judges) and ending corruption in the police forces. Mexico is also altering the way it conducts criminal trials and is introducing court room procedures similar to those followed in the U.S.. The U.S. has provided a training program for Mexican judges in U.S. court procedures. According to official figures, around 7,500 Mexican federal judicial personnel (judges, clerks, etc.) have had training in U.S. court procedures.

September 17, 2012: A major jail break occurred in the city of Piedras Negras (Coahuila state, northern Mexico, across the border from Eagle Pass, Texas). Approximately 130 prisoners escaped from the jail.

Police identified 17 bodies discovered near the town of Tizapan El Alto (Jalisco state) on September 16. The dead were individuals missing from nearby villages. Officials speculated that the murders were a revenge slaying by a drug cartel. Revenge for what? Los Zetas and a faction of the Sinaloa cartel are fighting for control of the region and that means controlling the population through either fear or payoffs. The bodies (of men and boys) were found mutilated and in chains.

September 14, 2012: An San Antonio, Texas woman pled guilty to trying to buy three AK-47 assault rifles which she intended to sell to a Mexican drug cartel. She was caught in a sting operation in Austin, Texas by police. She believed she was buying three fully automatic AK-47s.

September 13, 2012: Mexican Marines arrested Jorge Eduardo Costilla Sanchez, a senior commander in the Gulf cartel. He was arrested in Tampico, Tamaulipas state. At one time Costilla was a municipal police officer in Matamoros (across the border from Brownsville, Texas).

September 12, 2012: Police arrested the senior commander and founder of a splinter faction of the Milenio drug cartel. Ramiro Pozoz Gonzalez was head of La Resistancia. La Resistancia operates in Jalisco state.

September 10, 2012: The Democratic Revolutionary Party’s (PRD) perpetual candidate, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (aka AMLO) announced that he is leaving the party. He said he intends to lead what he called a campaign of peaceful resistance to the Mexican government.

Mexican security authorities arrested Rafic Mohammad Labboun Allaboun, a U.S. citizen allegedly tied to the militant Islamist group Hezbollah, in the city of Merida (Yucatan state). He has been turned over to U.S. authorities.

September 9, 2012: Mexican security officials believe that the splits in Los Zetas cartel are very real. The military has taken the view that the internal battles are the result of the continuous pressure placed on the cartel. The Zetas have lost a lot of gunmen in battles with the Mexican Army and Mexican Navy marines. A lot of their assets have been seized. Moreover, a number of senior leaders and their lieutenants have been arrested and killed. That means the lines of control have blurred, for conducting operations and distributing cartel profits. Police and prosecutors have reported that arrested Zetas confirm that a lot of the infighting is over how the cartel’s money is split. That said, the Zetas are still active and still ruthless. So far the Zeta against Zeta battle has been ugly, but an all-out Zeta internal war would be worse.

September 8, 2012: Federal police arrested Jesus Leonel Sanchez Meza in an operation in Sonora state. Sanchez was allegedly involved in the December 2010 murder of a U.S. Border Patrol agent. The agent was killed with a weapon smuggled into Mexico through Operation Fast and Furious.

Mexico - Fracked At The Border

A recent U.S. government study concluded that using the Mexican military in the Cartel War as a substitute for inadequate or incapable police forces has been a limited success. The report also said that Mexico has made headway in its attack on the leadership of organized criminal syndicates. The report asserted that the reliance of military forces, however, led to more atrocities. While a majority of Mexican citizens back government efforts to combat crime, a majority also doubts that drug violence can be quelled. The people, and the U.S. report, also believe that corruption plagues the Mexican police forces and judiciary. All this leads back to square one. Corruption in police forces and ineffectiveness were the primary reasons President Felipe Calderon’s government decided to use the military when it launched the Cartel War in December 2006.

July 25, 2012: The U.S. International Boundary and Water Commission recommend that the U.S. build border fences in a flood plain area along the Rio Grande River. The project could involve 14 miles worth of fencing. Mexico opposes the recommendation. The flood plain area is near the Texas towns of Rio Grande City and Roma.

July 24, 2012: Eight people were murdered in drug gang violence the city of Monterrey (Nuevo Leon state). Seven of the victims were taxi drivers. Police reported cartel gunmen in vehicles attacked the drivers using large-caliber weapons.

Gunmen murdered three men in a hotel in the town of Cocula (Jalisco state). Investigators believe the attack was drug cartel related.

July 22, 2012: Some 50 gunmen attacked the mayor’s office and the police station in the town of Vista Hermosa (Michoacan state). The town has a population of around 10,000. The gunmen killed five people, including three policemen and the town’s director of public security. The gunmen arrived in trucks, sealed off the town, then attacked. The government said the cartel gunmen wanted to show how strong they are in the area. The local police were completely out-manned and out-gunned. The Mexican Army has now moved troops to the town.

July 16, 2012: Fracking techniques and other enhanced recovery methods have opened up new oil and gas resources in the United States. They have also, indirectly, opened up new smuggling routes for Mexican drug cartels. U.S. security officials and Texas police forces have reported that drug smugglers are making use of a new network of roads built to service natural gas drilling rigs in South Texas. U.S. oil and gas companies are drilling in the Eagle Ford shale formation, near the Texas-Mexico border. The new service roads are for the most part dirt roads, but they are in areas that were previously brush country, cut by jeep trails and little else. For years the U.S. Border Patrol has used a chokepoint strategy for siting checkpoints on highways or rural farm roads that heavy vehicles had to use if they were carrying goods (or contraband) north. Side roads would run in and out of ranches but eventually these side roads returned to the north-south paved road network. The new roads, however, can be used to by-pass the chokepoints. The drilling boom has created other opportunities for cartel subterfuge. Though there is no official report (yet) that they have done so, law enforcement agencies know that the drug cartels can disguise their vehicles to look like oil and gas drilling vehicles or service vehicles. The cartels can also steal and use legitimate oil and gas company vehicles. All of this makes the inspection and enforcement job of the Border Patrol and other police forces that much harder. A law enforcement group in Texas also reported that its members are concerned that drug traffickers might try to bribe oil and gas service workers. Here is one scenario. The cartels bring drugs across the border, stash the drugs in a hiding place in the brush country (near a drilling site), and then the crooked truck drivers would pick up and deliver the drugs to cities in Texas, the southwest, or the Midwest (essentially the Interstate 35 corridor route). (Austin Bay)

July 16, 2012: Police arrested one man who is suspected of being involved in the July 13 attack on a Christian group camping near Mexico City. The attackers raped several women.

July 15, 2012: Mexican security officers arrested one of the corrupt police officers involved in the June 25, murder of senior federal police officers. The rogue officer was hiding in an apartment in Mexico City.

July 13, 2012: A dozen heavily armed men attacked a Christian youth camp-out in a park located near Mexico City. Seven young women were raped by the attackers. The attackers robbed the camp, assaulted several other campers, and then stole two vehicles. Officials said the attack went on for several hours.

Mexican investigators reported that they raided a warehouse and discovered sacks of food, farm goods, and implements that are allegedly part of a vote-buying scheme linked to the July 1, presidential election. The food included sacks of oats and beans. The food was allegedly traded for votes by local government officials, The Democratic Revolutionary Party (PRD) alleges that the winning party, the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), violated election laws and bought the election.

July 13, 2012: Police in Cancun arrested one of America’s most-wanted fugitives. Vincent Legrend Walters had been in hiding for 24 years. He was wanted on murder and kidnapping charges. Apparently he was working at the Cancun airport. Walters will be extradited to the U.S. July 12, 2012. A newspaper in Nuevo Laredo (Tamaulipas state, across the border from Laredo, Texas) said that it will no longer report on violent disputes between drug gangs. The newspaper, El Manana, has suffered two grenade attacks on its offices. Media in Texas have noted that several Mexican newspapers have curtailed their reporting on drug violence because the cartels have physically threatened their employees. Nuevo Laredo has been the scene of an on-going war between Los Zetas cartel and the Gulf cartel. The gangsters do not want media reporting on their crimes.

July 11, 2012: The Mexican Army reported that murders by crime gangs in Ciudad Juarez fell by 42 percent in the first six months of 2012. While 952 gang-related murders occurred in the first six months of 2012, 1,642 occurred in the first six months of 2011. Authorities attribute the decline to military and police efforts to weaken the Juarez cartel and the Gente Nueva criminal organization. The Sinaloa cartel is allied with the Gente Nueva gang.

July 9, 2012: The U.S. is investigating an incident where a U.S. Border Patrol agent reportedly fired at a gunman on the Rio Grande River. A Mexican boy may have been hit by the Border Patrol agent’s bullet. The incident occurred July 7, near a border crossing between Matamoros and Brownsville, Texas.

Mexican election authorities reported that the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) will likely have 62 seats in Mexico’s Senate. Mexico has 128 senators, so that is three seats short of a majority.

Seven police officers and four gunmen were killed in a firefight in Sinaloa state. The firefight occurred near the town of Choix. Sinaloa’s governor had announced earlier this month that Mexican federal police were assuming security duties in Choix. Choix’s local police chief was murdered June 29. The Mexican Army fought a battle with members of the Beltran Leyva cartel in Choix in May.

July 7, 2012: President-elect Enrique Pena said that he will revive Mexico’s oil industry. The incoming president said that modernizing Mexico’s national oil company, PEMEX, was a priority issue.

July 6, 2012: A retired Colombian police commander, General Oscar Naranjo, will be advising in-coming president Enrique Pena on counter-crime issues. Naranjo advocates creating elite police strike units to target senior cartel leaders and lower-level gunmen (cartel enforcers). Attacking the gunmen provides more immediate protection for citizens. Local gangs would also be targeted. Naranjo contends this worked in Colombia and will also work in Mexico.