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Consulate issues warning amid Matamoros grenade attacks

June 4, 2012, 8:40 pm
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By Sergio Chapa
KGBT

The American Consulate in Matamoros has issued a warning following a string of grenade attacks, including two of them against schools.
Residents have been using the #Matamoros hashtag of Twitter to report the attack over the past few days.
The Reforma News Agency reported that morning a high school and a college were both attacked on Monday morning.
No injuries were reported but residents said there were only property damages.
Nobody has claimed responsibility for the attacks but Tamaulipas remains a battleground state between former allies the Gulf Cartel and the Zetas.
Consulate officials issued a warning for American citizens south of the border on Monday afternoon.
According to the warning, there have been a series of attacks using explosive devices since Thursday.
The majority of the attacks have been in or near the Fraccionamiento Victoria on the city's southside but have not been limited to the area.
The consulate is asking its employees to exercise appropriate caution.
Security Message for U.S. Citizens: Explosive Device Attacks in Matamoros, Tamaulipas (June 4, 2012)
Since May 31, multiple explosive devices have been reported in Matamoros, several of which have detonated.  The majority of these devices were located in Matamoros near Fraccionamiento Victoria Seccion Fiesta, but are not limited to that area.  U.S. Consulate General employees are being advised to exercise appropriate caution in their movements.
For the latest security information, U.S. citizens traveling abroad should regularly monitor the Department's internet web site at http://travel.state.gov/ where the current Worldwide Caution, Travel Warnings, and Travel Alerts can be found.  Up-to-date information on security can also be obtained by calling 1-888-407-4747 toll free in the United States and Canada, or, for callers from Mexico, a regular toll line at 001-202-501-4444.  These numbers are available from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday through Friday (except U.S. federal holidays).
Please review the Department of State’s Travel Warning concerning travel within Mexico and the state of Tamaulipas, available athttp://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/tw/tw_5665.html. The Department continues to advise U.S. citizens to defer non-essential travel to the state of Tamaulipas. We also encourage U.S. citizens living or traveling abroad to register with the nearest U.S. Embassy or Consulate through the State Department's travel registration web site at https://travelregistration.state.gov/ibrs/ui/ so that they can obtain updated information on travel and security. Americans without internet access may register in person or by phone with the nearest U.S. Embassy or Consulate. By registering, American citizens make it easier for the Embassy or Consulate to contact them in case of emergency.
For any emergencies involving American citizens in the Matamoros consular district, please call or visit the American Citizens Services (ACS) Unit at the U.S. Consulate General on Avenida Primera 2002, Col. Jardin, Matamoros, Tamaulipas; telephone (011)(52)(868) 812-4402;http://matamoros.usconsulate.gov/.
Sincerely,
American Citizen Services
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Mexican Marines rescue 12, bust 10 in Nuevo Laredo

June 4, 2012, 9:00 pm
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By Chris Covert
Rantburg.com

A Mexican Naval Infantry unit raided a location in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas Monday rescuing 12 unidentified individuals and detaining 10 others, according to a news release by the Mexican Secretaria  de Marina (SEMAR) or Mexican Navy posted on the official website.

The marine unit had been dispatched to the location based on an anonymous complaint, had been patrolling the general area and found a residence where 11 men and one women were being held hostage.  The victims has been kidnapped from various areas in Nuevo Laredo.

The 10 detainees are reportedly members of the Gulf Cartel criminal group.


At the location marines also seized a large cache of munitions including  two grenade launchers, 17 AK-47 rifles, one machine gun, six handguns, five explosive charges, 18 40mm grenades, 25 hand grenades, 241 weapons magazines, 16,500 rounds of ammunition, two vehicles and communications gear.

Nuevo Laredo is in the grip of a bloody battle between the Gulf Cartel and Sinaloa alliance, and Los Zetas.  Nuevo Laredo is considered to be Los Zetas' home territory, but their rivals have been conducting a competition which include kidnapping innocent victims, butchering them and displaying them as rival gang members.

Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com

© Copyright 2012 by Chris Covert
You must obtain permission to reprint this article.
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California Faces Threat at Sea From Chapo’s Latest Drug Smuggling Technique

June 4, 2012, 10:03 pm
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Chivis Martinez for BORDERLAND BEAT

On May 21, 2012 I posted an article reporting on 4 tons of mota floating in the waters off Dana Point, a city in SoCal near Huntington Beach.  Newport Beach, Huntington Beach, Dana Point, Malibu are among the wealthiest cities in the US and are popular spots used by water sports enthusiasts, such as boating and surfing, but also hot spots for vacationers to visit. 

The beaches draw a crowd year round and filled during the summer months.  These are not  desolate areas. The beach cities also have "Oil Islands" unused since off shore drilling halted.  They hug the coastline and would be a convenient stagging area for a short duration.  Paz, Chivis

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Used to smuggle drugs from Mexico, this panga boat was captured near
Huntington Beach, in Southern California

On a starry night in the hills overlooking the Pacific Ocean north of Los Angeles, a two-man California National Guard special forces surveillance team sets up a sophisticated night scope. Their mission is to search the horizon and the waters below for an increasing number of Mexican drug traffickers offloading multi-ton loads of marijuana--and sometimes illegal immigrants--on remote U.S. beaches.

"These service members are the eyes and ears of federal law enforcement here," said Lt. Kara Siepmann, of the Guard's National Drug program. When asked about what specifically they are looking for, one of the surveillance team members said, "We're looking for blacked out vessels and any suspicious activity we can find, any unusual boats coming through the area."


The soldiers work quietly and in the dark, aware that the Mexican traffickers have their own spotters here watching out for U.S. law enforcement personnel. "They don't want to land where the National Guard or the Border Patrol are looking for them," said Siepmann.


TURNING FISHING BOATS INTO DRUG BOATS (PANGAS)

Inthe last few years, law enforcement officials said they have seen a considerable spike in smugglers loading drugs or immigrants onto boats in Mexico's northern Baja

Federal agents said this is the latest smuggling technique employed by Mexico's notorious Sinaloa drug cartel, headed by that country's most-wanted criminal, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman. The boats are small, open-hulled commercial fishing boats called pangas, which are commonly found in the inshore waters of Mexico and Central America.
With their low profiles, the pangas are hard to spot in open water, but they can carry a large payload. Sometimes these 30- to 40-foot boats will have as many as four outboard engines, allowing them to outrun most vessels used by the authorities.

"The trend is pretty much going straight up," said Lt. Stewart Sibert, the captain of the US Coast Guard Cutter Halibut, which patrols in search of Mexican smugglers near the California coast.
"The past few months have been very busy for us," he said. "We caught more drugs in these past two months than in the past two years."
Used to smuggle drugs from Mexico, this panga boat was found in California's Ventura County in January 2012.


According to arrest statistics reported by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, or ICE, there were 183 known "events" in fiscal year 2011 along the California coast involving the maritime smuggling of drugs or immigrants, up considerably from the previous three years. During the first seven months of this fiscal year, there have already been 113 such events as the numbers climb even faster than last year.


"We're seeing four and five tons of drugs come in per run and we're seeing dozens of runs. It's almost one or two per week at this point," said Sibert.
A DANGEROUS TRADE HEADING NORTH
Law enforcement officials have argued the rise in maritime smuggling is a direct result of their crackdown on smuggling operations along the U.S. land border with Mexico. As they first interdicted smuggling boats headed for beaches in southernmost California, near San Diego, they began to see the traffickers moving farther north to drop off their loads, which are then distributed across the country.

"As we stop them in one area, they’re trying to go around us. We're sort of leapfrogging up the coastline," said Sibert. Recently, an abandoned panga and a hidden marijuana stash were found near San Simeon, Calif., more than 300 miles from the Mexican border.
"They go far out to sea to try to evade interdiction efforts along the border," said Claude Adams, the special agent in charge for ICE Homeland Security Investigations. "They typically go 100 miles out or farther due west, and then they come north," to reach the U.S. coastline.
While the panga boats are considered relatively stable when used for fishing in calm inshore waters, officials said, they can be quite dangerous in rougher waters offshore, especially if they are overloaded with drugs or illegal immigrants. The boats rarely have adequate safety equipment and authorities speculate that many may have been lost at sea, along with their passengers.

"It's a direct indication of these criminal smuggling organizations' complete disregard for human life. They are driven by profit and nothing else," said Troy Matthews, of the U.S. Border Patrol in San Diego. "You'll have somebody driving the ship who is not necessarily highly-trained. You'll have poorly maintained vehicles that will break down and subsequently they are loitering out at sea for days."

Used to smuggle drugs from Mexico, this panga boat was found on California's Leo Carrillo Beach in August 2011
BORDER SECURITY THREAT
As they find more boats on the beaches and make more arrests, U.S. authorities are learning more about how the smuggling operation work, and the degree to which they are coordinated with land-based trafficking operations.

"We've seen some pangas that run directly up onto the beach and upload their cargo," said Sibert. "And then we've seen some that will come in and transfer their load to recreational boats that look less suspicious and try to run them directly into the marinas and yacht clubs."

Many times the panga boat operators will land at night on remote beaches near roads or a highway where they met by other members of the smuggling group. "There's usually an offloading team that will have a rental boxcar, U-Haul, or something of that nature to take the payload and transport it to a stash house where an organization begins the distribution process," said Adams.

[Video: California National Guard members work on secret nighttime surveillance operations to locate smugglers on the seas, attempting to reach the California coast. They use night vision goggles and infrared technology that allows them to see for miles out to sea. ]
A particular concern voiced by many U.S. authorities is the potential national security threat these boats and smugglers represent.  "They're just as willing to smuggle perhaps a weapon of mass destruction as they are a load of narcotics," warned Adams.  "And they're just as willing to smuggle a terrorist as people coming here to work." 

To coordinate their interdiction efforts, federal, state and local law enforcement officials have formed a coastal-area task force. "As they adapt, we will adapt, and they'll continually try to find new ways to get contraband and people into the country, and we're going to be right there nipping at their heels," said Adams.

Authorities conceded, however, that so far they are seeing no let-up in the Mexican maritime smuggling trade, and, in fact, are actually seeing bigger drug loads on boats now than in recent years.

"It's a huge challenge," said Matthews, from the U.S. Border Patrol. "It's an immense geographical area that we have to cover. There is not only single agency that can cover it by itself."

Source: NBC

Read Ovemex'  related post HERE
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Arizona Sheriff Jumped The Gun Burned Bodies in SUV May Have Been Murder Suicide

June 6, 2012, 9:40 am
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.By Molly Hennessy-Fiske and Richard A. Serrano, Los Angeles Times

Arizona authorities now believe five bodies recovered from a torched SUV dumped in the desert 35 miles south of Phoenix over the weekend were not victims of Mexican cartel violence, but rather a family killed in a murder-suicide.

The white Ford Expedition was seen fleeing from a U.S. Border Patrol agent early Saturday on Interstate 8 in the Vekol Valley area, a known smuggling corridor between Phoenix and Tucson.

About four hours later, Border Patrol agents found the SUV several miles north of the highway in the desert, charred, with four bodies in the cargo area and a fifth in the back seat.

Police in the Phoenix suburb of Tempe announced Tuesday that the SUV was registered to a local family, James and Yafit Butwin.

The couple and their three children were reported missing Monday by an acquaintance who received a note from them, and after police called to the Butwin home found "suspicious and concerning evidence," authorities began investigating the disappearance as a murder-suicide, according to a statement Tuesday.

"We do not believe there are any outstanding suspects involved in this case," Tempe police said.

James Butwin, 47, was a licensed real estate broker married to Yafit Butwin, 40, an interior designer who listed herself on Facebook as "separated."

"They had some marital issues. ... They were going through the process of getting a divorce," Tempe Police Sgt. Jeff Glover said, although he said the couple had been living together.

Glover said finances "might have played a role" in the suspected murder-suicide.

"There were some kind of financial issues going on with the business," he said of James Butwin's real estate work, adding, "They were under some financial duress."

Last Friday, Yafit Butwin, who described herself as Israeli, posted a photograph of herself on Facebook with her husband and three children, Malissa, Daniel and Matthew.

"Happy Birthday Jim," she wrote. "I am so proud of my three children:) and they know why."

The bodies recovered from the SUV were autopsied by the Pima County medical examiner's office Monday, but investigators were unable to identify them or to determine their genders because of burn damage, according to a statement by Pinal County sheriff's investigators.

Federal law enforcement officials, as well as local authorities, had theorized that the deaths were connected to the drug trade and possibly another example of violence spreading from Mexico across the Southwest border into the United States.

Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu initially said on Facebook that the deaths might be linked to a "violent drug cartel," adding a barb directed at former Arizona governor-turned-Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano: "The border is NOT more secure than ever, Ms. Napolitano!"

But after the SUV was traced to the missing family Tuesday, Babeu's office backpedaled.

In a statement, they noted that federal officials had also speculated the SUV may have been torched by the Zetas criminal gang but that "the Pinal County Sheriff's Office is not able to confirm this information as our investigation is still ongoing."

"The investigation is definitely not drug-related," Glover said.

Rad Havana's post on Borderland Beat Forum HERE
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Tamaulipas: Kidnapped Former Official Pleads For Rescue by Corrupt PRI Politicians

June 6, 2012, 7:24 pm
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Chivis Martinez for Borderland Beat

Pedro Arguelles Ramirez, former General Director of the Tamaulipas State Government, called for assistance of Governor Egidio Torre Cantu and his predecessor, Eugenio Hernandez, to help with his release from being held  by members of organized crime

In a video released by Milenio television, is the former official who disappeared in Ciudad Victoria.  The former Tamaulipas official calls on his PRI Party associates for help while being clear about the corruption of PRI  and its collusion with organized crime groups.

Below is his dialog from the video:
"I am Pedro Ramirez Arguelles, belong to the PRI, I ask Egidio Torre, Eugenio Hernández, Ramon Ochoa and Morelos Canseco, because you are the only people who can help me out of this problem.

Eugene:  you know me well,  that I interacted with organized crime for you and for my party (PRI), as we wanted a quiet state, a state where there was so much violence and  thus their political purpose would benefit. 
We know that you wanted to be president of the PRI.
Egidio Torre: you also want a tranquil state and thus lead the next election for Raul Gonzales for Governor.  So I ask you to help me, I'm here with this problem, for my party
Alfonso Sanchez Garza: help me, just as I helped you  in the election for president.  (mayor)


Ramon Ochoa, Morelos Canseco, you also benefited, help me, please, for my children, I do not want to be here. "


The video began circulating on 30 May in social networks.  Both Eugenio Hernandez, Tomas Yarrington, former governors are being investigated for ties with the drug trafficking organizations”

See Havana's Borderland Beat Forum Post HERE

sources used : Milenio, SIPSE
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Former Mexican Governor Calls Allegations Politically Motivated

June 10, 2012, 4:23 pm
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A former Mexican state governor accused of ties to drug cartels denied the allegations and said they were aimed at discrediting his party ahead of the July 1 presidential election.
The administration of lame-duck President Felipe Calderon is “trying to stigmatize the PRI as a party of criminals,” Tomas Yarrington told MVS radio.

The PRI’s candidate for president, Enrique Peña Nieto, enjoys a wide lead in the polls.

Yarrington, who governed the northern state of Tamaulipas from 1999-2004, said Calderon’s government is pressuring the judiciary to issue a warrant for his arrest on the eve of next month’s balloting.

U.S. federal prosecutors on May 22 filed forfeiture cases involving two properties in Texas – which borders Tamaulipas – they say Yarrington purchased via front men using bribes from drug cartels.

The U.S. Justice Department subsequently requested information from Mexico about Yarrington’s net worth.

“In my persecution they are not seeking justice, there is deception,” Yarrington said. “I don’t have any relationship with organized crime, I haven’t received bribes, have not provided protection to any criminal nor have I carried out money laundering activities.”

The former governor also reiterated earlier affirmations by his U.S. lawyer that he does not own the Texas properties targeted in the forfeiture cases.

The Mexican Attorney General’s Office has had Yarrington’s bank accounts frozen and is aggressively investigating both him and his successor in Tamaulipas, Eugenio Hernandez.

“Maliciously, they have been leaking that the assets and firms of Tamaulipas businessmen belong to me, with the intent of leaving the impression that I have immense net worth, which is absolutely false,” Yarrington told MVS.

“In their desperation to boost (ruling party) candidate (Josefina Vazquez Mota), they slander and hurt people and firms in the state of Tamaulipas,” he said.

The Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI, governed Mexico without interruption from 1929-2000 and is expected to regain the presidency in next month’s vote, ending 12 years of rule by the rightist National Action Party.

Last October, Calderon suggested in an interview with The New York Times that some PRI members would be susceptible to making deals with organized crime if the party returned to power.

It is generally accepted that PRI administrations brokered agreements among rival drug cartels to prevent bloody turf battles of the kind that have become routine in Mexico over the last five years.

Peña Nieto’s frontrunner status in the presidential race is due in part to Mexicans’ frustration over persistently high levels of drug-related violence throughout Calderon’s term.

Calderon militarized the struggle against Mexico’s heavily armed, well-funded drug mobs shortly after taking office in December 2006, deploying tens of thousands of troops across the country.

The strategy has led to headline-grabbing captures of cartel kingpins, but the accompanying violence has claimed more than 50,000 lives.

Source: EFE



Rest of the interview on Youtube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSFH3GB2U6Y

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6W4VwgRq6A
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Mexico Arrests Drug Boss for Slaying of Activist’s Son

June 10, 2012, 4:34 pm
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The suspect was the reputed boss of the Beltran Leyva cartel’s operations in Morelos state, where the son of anti-violence activist Javier Sicilia was slain, the Mexican defense department said.
Army troops apprehended a drug kingpin in connection with last year’s murder of the son of anti-violence activist Javier Sicilia, the Mexican defense department said Friday.

Raul Diaz Roman was captured Thursday in Tecamac, a town in the central state of Mexico, the department said in a statement.

The suspect was the reputed boss of the Beltran Leyva cartel’s operations in Morelos state, where Sicilia’s son was slain, and it was people under Diaz’s command who carried out the murder, the department said.

Diaz worked for the cartel while still an active-duty member of the Morelos police, overseeing drug trafficking in the cities of Cuernavaca, Xochitepec and Jiutepec, according to the statement.
It was March 2011 when Juan Francisco Sicilia and six other men were found dead inside a vehicle in Temixco, Morelos.

His son’s death prompted Javier Sicilia, a prominent poet and commentator, to abandon literature and create the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity to press for an end to the Mexican government’s militarized approach to crime-fighting.

A multi-front conflict pitting rival drug cartels against each other and the security forces has claimed more than 50,000 lives in Mexico since December 2006, when newly inaugurated President Felipe Calderon gave the armed forces the leading role in the struggle with organized crime.

Source: EFE

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Mexican Activist Gets U.S. Support for Planned Peace Caravan

June 10, 2012, 4:48 pm
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Mexican poet-turned-activist Javier Sicilia has received the U.S. government’s backing for his planned month-long peace caravan in that country aimed at drawing attention to drug-related violence and communicating his anti-drug war message.

Sicilia, who heads the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity, or MPJD, was received here Friday by U.S. Ambassador to Mexico Earl Anthony Wayne and spoke to him about his plans for the caravan, which is scheduled to begin on Aug. 12 in San Diego and cover several southern U.S. states before making its way to Chicago and New York and ending in Washington in mid-September.

The United States has a long history of supporting freedom of expression, including peaceful expressions of protest and dissent, Wayne said in a U.S. Embassy press release.

He added that he appreciated the “courtesy” of MPJD leaders in sharing their points of view and plans.

The statement said the goal of the caravan will be to create awareness about drug violence, weapons trafficking and trans-border issues such as migration and money laundering.

U.S. activists, including representatives of the San Francisco-based human rights advocacy group Global Exchange, will take part in the peace caravan.

The 56-year-old Sicilia, who formed his movement after his son was murdered last year by suspected drug-gang members, says the United States shares the blame for the tens of thousands of drug-related deaths in Mexico over the past five-and-a-half years, citing the high demand for illegal drugs there and the north-to-south flow of weapons to Mexican drug cartels.

He wants the United States to stop providing aid to Mexico under the Merida Initiative, a U.S.-funded regional plan to battle drug cartels and other transnational criminal networks.

The activist also supports legalizing narcotics and insists that drugs should be treated as a public-health problem not as a national security issue, a stance that President Barack Obama does not share.

This summer’s caravan will be the first outside Mexico and the third since MPJD was founded last year.

The most recent one took place last September in southern Mexico and was aimed at raising awareness of the pain suffered by victims of violence, including large numbers of Central American migrants who are preyed upon by drug traffickers and corrupt officials.

Sicilia’s group, made up of relatives of victims of violence, also is demanding an end to Mexican President Felipe Calderon’s strategy of deploying tens of thousands of army soldiers and federal police to drug-war flashpoints, saying it has only made the country less safe.

Since Calderon took office in late 2006, organized crime-related violence in Mexico has left more than 50,000 dead, 10,000 missing and 120,000 displaced from their homes.

Source: Associated Press
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Zeta Cartel Strikes in Sinaloa: Seven Dismembered Bodies Found

June 10, 2012, 4:56 pm
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Mexican police have found seven dismembered bodies in a Pacific Coast state where the country’s most-wanted man is battling its most aggressive drug cartel.

The attorney general’s office says the bodies were found early Tuesday in Sinaloa along with a message accusing authorities of cooperating with drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman.

Guzman is head of the Sinaloa cartel, and the letter’s wording suggests that it may have been written by the Zetas cartel.

The bodies were found stuffed into 13 black garbage bags and dumped in a residential area, authorities said. The victims were dressed in police uniforms but authorities confirmed none of the people killed were actually officers.

The Zetas have launched tit-for-tat attacks on Sinaloa strongholds since Sinaloa cartel gunmen and their allies moved in on Zetas turf.

Last week, suspected Zetas took the unusual step of using an airplane to drop thousands of leaflets accusing Sinaloa’s governor of taking orders from Guzman.

It is the most gruesome instance of drug cartel violence since the decapitated, mutilated bodies of 49 people were found strewn across a Mexican highway earlier this month.

The victims had their hands, feet and heads cut off. The Zetas cartel is also thought to be responsible for those murders, living up to their title as one of Mexico’s most deadly cartels. Police eventually arrested Daniel Jesus Elizondo Ramirez, also known as “El Loco” or “The Crazy One,” in connection with the killings.

It is becoming seemingly impossible to keep track of the death toll in Mexico’s drug war, which is now around 55,000 since December 2006. Roughly 50,000 additional people have disappeared.

Source: The Blaze/AP

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60 People Killed so far in June

June 11, 2012, 9:55 pm
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Periodico Noroeste. 6-11-12

60 People Killed so far in June

In the first 10 days in June there have been 60 homicides in 11 municipalities in the state.

CULIACAN (Sinaloa) . Last month there were an average of 4.9 homicides every day; but in June the number rose to 5.8 murders a day.

With the homicides committed this month, there have been 709 murders committed so far this year, and 2,617 from the day Governor Mario Lopez Valdez began his administration.

In the first few days of this month they killed the coordinator with the Federal Ministerial Police, a State Ministerial Police officer and a Culiacan Municipal Police officer.

Federal Ministerial Police commander Saul Carrasco Villa was abducted on Thursday, May 31, and was found a day later murdered and burned in Guamuchil.

On Tuesday, June 5, Officer Raul Castelo Salomon of the State Ministerial Police was murdered while he drank alcoholic beverages in Valle del Carrizo, in Ahome.

On Friday, June 8, in Culiacan, officer Cesar Geovany Ochoa Acosta with the municipal police was murdered as he arrived at his home in the Colonia 10 de Mayo neighborhood.

This year, 17 law enforcement officers have been murdered, of whom 11 were municipal police officers, 5 were members of the State Ministerial Police, one was a member of the State Preventive Police and one was with the Federal Ministerial Police. [Note: The story specifies 17 homicides, but the numbers given add up to 18.]

Last Saturday, in the Badiraguato municipality on the border between Sinaloa and Durango, three minors and four adults were ambushed. The young men were attacked by gunfire while they were on an unpaved road in a pickup truck.

Of the 60 homicides committed this month, 24 were perpetrated in Culiacan, 11 in Ahome, 7 in Badiraguato, 5 in Mazatlan, 3 in Guasave, 2 in Salvador Alvarado and Juan Jose Rios, 2 in El Fuerte, and one each in the towns of Navolato, Sinaloa, Choix and Mocorito. [Note: Again, the story specifies 60 homicides but the numbers given add up to 58. One likely explanation is that there were two homicides each in Salvador Alvarado and JJR. This interpretation is consistent with other reports from these areas.]  
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There were more than 47,000 deaths from violence related to drug trafficking:

June 12, 2012, 4:44 pm
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There were more than 47,000 deaths from violence related to drug trafficking: PGR.

During the first 5 years of the Calderon administration, 47,515 individuals were killed in disputes between organized crime groups, according to a report issued by the PGR. With respect to those cities with the greatest number of murders related to organized crime, Ciudad Juarez is in the lead, having reported 1,206 crimes [in 2011].   


El Universal. 06-12-12
Marcos Muedano

The number of homicides from the dispute between organized crime groups in the 32 federated  entities in the country reached 47,515 murders in the first five years of the Felipe Calderon presidency.

The deaths reported by the federal government indicate that there were 62 homicides in December 2006;  2, 826 in 2007;  6,838 in 2008;  9614 in 2009;  15,273 in all of 2010, and 12,903 deaths from January to September from presumed criminal rivalry.

When the first three trimesters in 2011 are compared with the same period in 2010, there is an 11% increase in the number of murders. In the first instance (2011), there were 12,903, while in the second instance (2010) they reach 11,583, according to the PGR (Procuraduria General de la Republica--analogous to the U.S. DOJ).

Notwithstanding, the monthly trends oscillated between 1,300 and 1,600 deaths last year, while in 2010, the average was 1,500 a month.

"The public has the ability to review updates of facts available up to September 30, 2011, with respect to homicides that, because of their characteristics, could have taken place in the context of rivalry between criminal organizations," stated the PGR.

Likewise, the PGR reported that murders related to the dispute between organized crime groups and Mexican drug cartels indicate that 70% of the deaths took place in 8 states: Chihuahua, Nuevo Leon, Durango, Sinaloa, Tamaulipas, Coahuila, Guerrero and Veracruz: "Homicides remain clearly concentrated in some states. 70% of the deaths that, given their characteristics, could have occurred in the context of rivalries betwen criminal organizations took place in eight states," asserted the PGR.

Chihuahua, the most vulnerable state

Analysis of the homicides in the 32 federated entities indicates that Chihuahua is the state that reports the greatest incidence, with 2,289 homicides, followed by Guerrero: 1,538, Nuevo Leon: 1,133, Tamaulipas: 1,108, Durango: 709, Jalisco: 622, Edomex: 579 and Coahuila, 572.

With respect to the cities with the highest number of homicides related to organized crime, Ciudad Juarez continues in the lead as the most violent city in the country, with 1,206 crimes. Juarez is followed by Acapulco, 795; Torreon,476;  Monterrey, 399; Culiacan, 365; Durango, 309; San Fernando, 292; Guasave, 191; Tijuana, 183; Veracruz, 155;  Nuevo Laredo, 144;  Gomez Palacio, 116;  Zapopan, 109;  Ecatepec, 107; Boca del Rio, 94;  Morelia, 91, and Iztapalapa, 31. 2010 was the most violent year of the sexennial with 15,273 murders linked to organized crime, 58% more than the 9,614 reported in 2009.

From December 2006 until the end of 2010, there were 34,612 murders reported, of which 30,913 were listed as "executions;" 3,153 listed as "confrontations," and 544 are listed in a separate category labeled "homicides-aggressions."

It was revealed that up to 2010, 8 out of every 10 murders linked to organized crime took place in 162 municipalities. Currently, there are 2,441 municipalities in Mexico, which means that 80% of this type of crimes took place in barely 6.5% of the listed areas.

  

 

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VERACRUZ: 14 Dismembered Bodies Discovered in Truck

June 12, 2012, 6:01 pm
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Borderland Beat

The General Attorney of Justice of the Mexican state of Veracruz  confirmed the discovery of 14 dismembered bodies found in plastic bags and abandoned in the town of Alamo Temapache, Veracruz, located north of the state, in the region known as “huasteca veracruzana”.

The bodies were abandoned in a Nissan white truck bearing the  license plate WJ-09836 of the state of Tamaulipas. Of the 14 victims two are reported to be women, one in her 40s.
It is suspected the exectuions were the act of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG and Matazetas) CJNG is the group that were responsible for executing and dumping  35 persons in Boca del Rio, Veracruz, in September 2011. 

 In their narco banners left at the scene, the declared the dead to be Zetas, it was later found that none had a history of narco crimes and none were found to have links to any organize criminal groups.
The discovery occurred at  dawn today, according to radio stations of  the northern part of the state that borders the state of Tamaulipas.

The newspaper Notiver published in his edition of this Tuesday that the discovery was of 17 bodies; however the PGJE identified 14 bodies.

The discovery of the bodies occurred on the federal road on the stretch knows as Alamo-Potrero del Llano.

A citizen’s call  activated the police, Army and Marines with an intense mobilization in the town of Alamo Temapache.

The job of the Director of Expert Services started daybreak of Tuesday and concluded before noon today, after determining that the human remains belonged to 14 people.

Just last Monday, Governor Javier Duarte (at left) had requested hotel entrepreneurs and the public opinion to stop seeing Veracruz as a violent state. He referred that this description made him “sad” but at the same time claimed it to be election tactics due to the proximity of Election Day.

“Let’s talk good about Veracruz. I view  with sadness the black campaigns that have much to do with a political calendar. They are trying to make it looks as a violent state, but we have to achieve that Veracruz be a good news”, expressed the head chief after initiating a touristic impulse program at the zone of the high mountains in the city of Cordoba.

 Source: ElTiempo, Proceso

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What the numbers say about crime

June 12, 2012, 6:03 pm
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El Universal

Editorial,

What the numbers say about crime

El Universal. 06-12-12.  In what we've seen of the [Calderon] six year term, up to September 2011, there have been 47,515 persons murdered "in the context of the rivalry among criminal organizations," according to the PGR. Although it is always positive to disclose a number of such transcendence, it would be ideal if the fact came with an explanation of the methodology used to derive it, including plans to reverse a situation that nobody is satisfied with.

The first doubt that the PGR's report raises is, just what is understood by "in the context of rivalry among criminal organizations"?  Does this include confrontations with law enforcement agencies, or the number of civilian victims of abductions or robberies?

The PGR states that the number is derived by counting the homicides-- in the context of (criminal) rivalry-- that were reported to the federal government by the state attorneys general and prosecutors. One hopes that the states would at least have been asked to use uniform criteria for consideration.

In order to be able to address a problem eficiently, one must first rely on rigorous diagnosis. With respect to the situation of unrest in this country,  it is essential to know the precise reasons underlying the homicides in order to provide a tailored response.

But one must also keep in mind that human life is intrinsically valuable. Under no circumstances should the categorization of dead presumed criminals be used to brag about some progress in the battle against crime. As President Calderon has said, what legitimizes use of the power of the state is that its exercise is based on lawfulness and morality. The deaths of persons whoever they may be, can never be good news.

There are still more than ten months left in this president's six year term. Much can still be done to adjust its strategy-- do whatever is needed-- so that violence is reduced without surrendering in the task of fighting crime.

There are still things to be done in the area of preventing drug addiction, recovering public spaces, jobs for young people in vulnerable situations, among other measures, to prevent homicides from being committed in the first place.                   

 

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Brother of Z40 Takes a Fall For Money Laundering

June 12, 2012, 6:25 pm
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Borderland Beat
In the video there is footage of  Trevino's horse in a race and an interview with Trevino after the race..... below is photo of Trevino's Horse "Tempting Dash"  further down is another video of a horse they named "Corona Cartel" and another "Carters Cartel"..Vimeo has it on their site. The indictment link is at bottom..  ..Paz, Chivis Martinez

Jose Trevino’s Tempting Dash, kept his perfect mark intact in winning the $1,105,397 Texas Classic Futurity(G1) while breaking his own 400 yard track record. Lone Star Park Photo

Authorities stopped an impressive operation of José Treviño Morales, brother of Miguel Angel Trevino Morales (Z40) , second in command of the Los Zetas, who led a race horse farm in Oklahoma, through which " laundered "millions of dollars,  reports The New York Times.

According to the Daily News, on Monday 11 U.S. Department of Justice conducted a raid at the ranch in Oklahoma involving helicopters and hundreds of agents, making the capture of Jose Trevino, brother of Miguel Angel Trevino, the Z -40, and several of his collaborators.

Both brothers originated the business in the United States, resulting in  a successful breeding business of  quarter hourses called Tremor Enterprise, it allowed them to launder money from drug trafficking, according to reports of police officers cited by the NYT.

Jose bought the ranch in Oklahoma and 300 stallions with  money from  Z-40. In just three years, they were victorious in three of the most important horse races in America that netted them profits by $ 2.5 million in prizes.

U.S. officials noted that this network of Los Zetas spent about a million dollars a month on the purchase of race horses in America.
Receiving detailed information about the cartel in January 2010. One source reported that Los Zetas are paid in a day more than a million dollars using two mares for breeding.

According to the newspaper, the business of the Trevino brothers had the support of a "friendly" partner identified as Ramiro Villarreal who helped them find the best horses to compete in races.

After receiving information from the purchase of mares in 2010, the DEA arrested Villareal and he agreed to cooperate with the authorities as an undercover informer. But five months later his charred body was found in a vehicle on the outskirts of Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas.

Police sources commented that one of the favorite pastimes of Miguel Angel Trevino is just the horse races and, although he is always in constant motion, he manages to organize races "parejeras" on farms and racetracks in Mexico and Guatemala.
FBI agents overlook a horse ranch under investigation Tuesday, June 12, 2012 in Lexington, Okla. Federal agents raided the Oklahoma ranch and a prominent quarter horse track in New Mexico on Tuesday, alleging the brother of a high-ranking official in a Mexican drug cartel used a horse-breeding operation to launder money. (AP Photo/Brett Deering)

Corona Cartel
(the following is the text that accompanies the video "Corona Cartel")

We were recently hired by management of the Quarter Horse stallion Corona Cartel to produce a promotional video and DVD on the horse. A pleasure and honor to work on this as Corona Cartel is number two on the list of all-time leading living sires of racing Quarter Horses. On the racetrack, his sons and daughters have earned more than $26 Million. A multiple grade one stakes winner, Corona Cartel had a stellar career on the track as well. He now stands at Lazy E Ranch in Guthrie, Oklahoma.

Production assistance from Remington Park Television

Thanks Los Alamitos, Zia Park, Sam Houston Racepark, Remington Park, Lone Star Park.

Indictment Link Here

 it is full screen but can be adjusted


An intriguing article from New York Times:

Newcomers rarely make it into the winner’s circle at the All American Futurity, considered the Kentucky Derby of quarter horse racing.

Yet in September 2010, a beaming band of men waving Mexican flags and miniature piñatas swept into Ruidoso, N.M., to claim the million-dollar prize with a long-shot colt named Mr. Piloto.

Leading the revelry at the track was Mr. Piloto’s owner, José Treviño Morales, 45, a self-described brick mason who had grown up poor in Mexico. Across the border, Ramiro Villarreal, an affable associate who had helped acquire the winning colt, celebrated at a bar with friends.

As for the man who made the whole day possible, Miguel Ángel Treviño Morales, he was living on the run, one of the most wanted drug traffickers in the world.

Mr. Treviño, a younger brother of José Treviño, is second in command of Mexico’s Zetas drug trafficking organization. Thin with a furrowed brow, he has become the organization’s lead enforcer — infamous for dismembering his victims while they are still alive.

The race was one of many victories for the Treviño brothers, who managed to establish a prominent horse breeding operation in the United States, Tremor Enterprises, that allowed them to launder millions of dollars in drug money, according to current and former federal law enforcement officials. The operation amounted to a foothold in the United States for one of Mexico’s most dangerous criminal networks, the officials said.

Using Miguel Ángel Treviño’s cash, José Treviño’s legal residency and Mr. Villarreal’s eye for a good horse, Tremor bought a sprawling ranch in Oklahoma and an estimated 300 stallions and mares. The Treviño brothers might have kept their operation quiet, given the criminal connection, but their passion for horses and winning apparently proved too tempting. In the short span of three years, Tremor won three of the industry’s biggest races, with prizes totaling some $2.5 million.

The business was “so far out there it’s hard to believe,” said Morris Panner, a former prosecutor who handled drug cases. “Maybe they were using some kind of perverse logic that told them they could hide in plain sight, precisely because people wouldn’t believe it or question it.”

The Justice Department moved against Tremor on Tuesday morning, sending several helicopters and hundreds of law enforcement agents to the company’s stables in Ruidoso and its ranch in Oklahoma. José Treviño and several associates were taken into custody and were charged later in the day, the authorities said.

Miguel Ángel Treviño and another brother, Omar, were also charged. The two remain at large in Mexico. Omar Treviño is also a high-ranking member of the Zetas, and an F.B.I. affidavit filed in United States District Court describes him as participating in the money laundering.

The affidavit said the Zetas funneled about $1 million a month into buying quarter horses in the United States. The authorities were tipped off to Tremor’s activities in January 2010, when the Zetas paid more than $1 million in a single day for two broodmares, the affidavit said.

The New York Times became aware of Tremor’s activities in December 2011 while reporting on the Zetas. The Times learned of the government’s investigation last month and agreed to hold this article until Tuesday morning’s arrests.

The brothers’ activities on either side of the border made for a stark contrast. One week in May began with the authorities pointing fingers at Miguel Ángel Treviño for dumping the bodies of 49 people — without heads, hands or feet — in garbage bags along a busy highway in northern Mexico. The week concluded with José Treviño fielding four Tremor horses in a prestigious race at Los Alamitos Race Course, near Los Angeles.

 By then, Mr. Villarreal’s story had come to a fatal, fiery end. Not long after the 2010 victory at Ruidoso, he was detained by the Drug Enforcement Administration and reluctantly agreed to work as an informant. Five months later, his charred remains were found in a burnt-out car on the highway outside Nuevo Laredo.

The buzz around Tremor’s winnings and acquisitions began three years ago, when José Treviño bought an estimated $3 million in quarter horses, including one named Number One Cartel.

Since then he has worked with breeders, trainers and brokers considered pillars of the business. Tremor Enterprises did not always put its name on the horses it owned or the races they ran, presumably to avoid the attention of tax collectors and law enforcement authorities, according to federal agents.

But people inside the financially struggling industry do not need written records to tell them who is doing business with whom. And some of those insiders acknowledged that the subject of José Treviño’s identity, and where he got his money, was treated like so many taboos: people did not ask many questions, either because they did not care, or did not want to know.

“Everyone knows who José Treviño is,” one trainer said. “But all they cared about was whether his checks would clear.”




A Drug Organization Ascends

Made up of rogue members of the Mexican military and police, the Zetas were a protection force for the powerful Gulf Cartel before they set out on their own in 2010. Their ascendancy ignited a spate of massacres and assassinations of elected officials, police chiefs, journalists and others, which turned organized crime from a law enforcement problem to the No. 1 national security threat for Mexico’s fragile democracy. Miguel Ángel Treviño, known as Zeta-40, or just 40, was never in the military. But he became useful to the Zetas for his experience moving contraband across the border.

Law enforcement authorities said the Zetas have been able to rapidly expand their reach beyond Mexico’s borders with the United States and Guatemala. And while other Mexican drug organizations prefer to keep themselves and their money close to home, the Zetas have established outposts as far as South America and West Africa.

“The Zetas are particularly adroit at spreading their tentacles across borders,” said Michael S. Vigil, a former senior official with the Drug Enforcement Administration. He added that the gang’s extensive intelligence and operational capabilities allow it to take control of new territory so quickly that it is difficult for law enforcement to keep up.

Their primary stronghold is Nuevo Laredo, one of North America’s busiest border-crossings and Mr. Trevino’s hometown.

He had grown up there in a large family with six brothers, including José, and six sisters, American authorities said. Like most local residents, the Treviño family treated the border as a kind of imaginary line.
Law enforcement authorities knowledgeable about the family said the siblings learned the tricks of moving easily between the United States and Mexico, using temporary visas and border-crossing cards to start families, buy properties and do business in both countries.

Court records lay out the nature of the brothers’ turn to crime, which dates back at least two decades. In 1995, an older brother, Juan Francisco Treviño, was sentenced on charges of conspiring to smuggle hundreds of pounds of marijuana into the United States.

On the witness stand, Juan Francisco described himself as a struggling entrepreneur who had tried to make a go of a small construction company, Treviño Masonry, but later went into trucking.

Prosecutors argued that those businesses were fronts for the Treviños’ smuggling activities, citing a raft of lapsed business licenses, false identification documents and suspicious wire transfers.

The defendant was sentenced to 22 years in prison, and remains incarcerated. José and Miguel Ángel Treviño were implicated in the case, but were never prosecuted for lack of evidence, said authorities involved in the investigation.

It is unclear whether the two brothers parted ways at that point or continued collaborating. Miguel Ángel Treviño’s rise through the ranks of the Zetas is well known. Jere Miles, an expert on the Zetas at the Department of Homeland Security, said that among the Mexican underworld, Mr. Treviño had gained the notoriety of a cult figure, one who has escaped unscathed from several gun battles against the law, makes deals with no one and seems unafraid to die. Dismembered bodies, dumped by the dozens, have become his calling card.

He also manages the organization’s money, according to George Grayson, a professor at the College of William and Mary who has written a book about the Zetas.

The trail of public information on José Treviño goes cold until 2009, when he began buying expensive racehorses.

“From all appearances, he looked like anyone else interested in quarter horses,” said one person in the industry who knows José Treviño. “But he had a massive amount of money, with no good explanation where it came from. And he had a family name that made a lot of people wonder.”

New Player at the Track

As much as Tremor was a money-laundering operation, the Treviño brothers’ quarter horse venture allowed them to mix business with pleasure. Horses have long been considered a status symbol in Latin America and drug traffickers have been among the region’s most avid collectors.

Law enforcement officials said quarter horse racing was one of Miguel Ángel Treviño’s favorite pastimes, and even while living on the run, he has managed to keep control of several ranches and racetracks in Mexico and Guatemala where he holds match races, known as parejeras.

But Mexican horse racing — like so much else in that country — has been battered by the violence of the drug war. Many Mexican breeders have moved their operations to the United States, where they could buy horses with better bloodlines and compete for bigger prizes, without fearing for their lives.

“Much of the growth in American quarter horse racing is due to those guys,” said one industry expert, referring to the influx of breeders and buyers from Mexico. “They have spent a lot of money. And it’s made a big, big difference.”

The quarter horse industry, centered in the Southwest, features races that are shorter and faster than thoroughbred contests.

To get in on the action at American tracks, Miguel Ángel Treviño needed someone he could trust to pick a winner. For that, he turned to Mr. Villarreal.

Mr. Villarreal was an unlikely horseman, the socially awkward son of a bookkeeper and teacher known for his build and bottomless appetite as “El Gordo,” or “Fatso.” He began attending auctions as a child, and developed an uncanny ability to spot horses that may not have come from the best lineage, but whose stride or attitude suggested an exceptional capacity for speed.

Mr. Villarreal’s parents said he started buying horses as a teenager, mostly borrowing from relatives and friends. Still, he never seemed to have enough to purchase the kinds of horses that could compete for major prizes. Nor did the strikingly effeminate man ever develop the social skills needed to fit into the macho world of breeders and trainers.

In some ways, said one friend, he stopped trying. For awhile, he named his horses after runway models — like Campbell, as in Naomi, and Elle, as in Macpherson — because he was captivated by women’s fashion.

Mr. Villarreal got his big break in 2006, when he cobbled together $10,500 to buy a colt at an auction at Los Alamitos, records show. He took the horse to Mexico, named it “El Sicario” — which means “The Assassin” — and entered it in the parejera circuit, where it began to beat younger, better-rated competitors.

“That horse got 40’s attention,” said one of Mr. Villarreal’s friends. “He told Ramiro, ‘I want you to buy horses for me.’ ”

He did not hesitate, the friend said. “This was his chance to live his dream.”

Mr. Villarreal’s father, who is also named Ramiro, saw it slightly differently.

“If someone like that asks you to do something,” the elder Mr. Villarreal said, “Are you going to tell him no?”

Soon, the younger Mr. Villarreal’s name began appearing on the lists of the top buyers at auctions in California, Texas, New Mexico and Oklahoma. His first champion was Tempting Dash, which won more than $600,000 in 2009, set a track record during the Texas Classic Futurity and gave Tremor its first victory in a million-dollar race.

No matter how successful, Mr. Villarreal always showed deference to his boss, calling him “Papi.” When Miguel Ángel Treviño wanted to see Tempting Dash for himself, Mr. Villarreal drove the horse, along with dozens of others, to Mexico.

Getting back was more complicated. To avoid inspections, quarantines and other procedures required for bringing livestock into the United States, Mr. Villarreal had trainers sneak the horses back across the border, herding them just after dawn through the Rio Grande.

“My son used to tell me that his biggest blessing was also his curse,” said Mr. Villarreal’s father. “He would tell me, ‘My problem is that I am good at what I do, so a lot of people ask me to help them. Some of those people are good. Some of those people are bad.”

‘A Great Moment’

As much as Miguel Ángel Treviño relied on Mr. Villarreal, he needed his brother, José, to be the face of his fledgling American horse business.

José Treviño, the clean-cut father of three, with a small tattooed Tremor logo on his hand, almost always attended races with his family at his side. He often credited his success to a combination of divine intervention and dumb luck.

“After a win, he always says that he’s been blessed with an ability to pick the right horses and run them in the right races,” said one person who met him. “He’s always humble. He’s the kind of guy who knows what he doesn’t know, who seems eager to learn, and who isn’t shy about asking for advice.”

At the start, José Treviño seemed reticent in the spotlight, avoiding reporters by pretending he did not speak good English. But the more races he won, the more comfortable he seemed with cameras and microphones. People who knew him said he never sought out the media, but never refused to talk when they called.

And they called often.

“That was awesome, that was awesome,” José Treviño said, beaming before reporters in November 2009, after Tempting Dash won the Texas Classic Futurity. “We were expecting him to run big, but we weren’t expecting something like this, to break the track record like this.”

The following year, when the colt named Mr. Piloto won the All American Futurity in Ruidoso, N.M., racing writers called it the “biggest upset in All-American history,” and marveled at how Mr. Treviño, with a “green-as-grass” horse, could beat competitors with better qualifying times and world-class jockeys.

Then last year, a sorrel filly named Separate Fire swept the Ed Burke Futurity at Los Alamitos, Calif., delivering José Treviño his third race where the top prizes were worth $1 million — a record.

“We’re down-to-the-ground people,” he humbly told Track Magazine after the race last July. “This is a great moment, one we are going to enjoy for a long time. But I think you have to take it as it comes and don’t let it change your life.”

Still, his life did change. Tremor’s winning streak allowed him to hire the most respected jockeys, trainers and sales associates in the business. Last year, said people who know him, José Treviño moved his family from a modest suburban house in Mesquite, Tex., where he said he worked in the construction industry, to a large ranch outside Lexington, Okla.

The 70-acre ranch, Zule Farms, is named after his wife, Zulema, a former secretary who told people that she kept the books for Tremor. A person familiar with the ranch said that Mr. Treviño had converted a manure-filled cattle barn on the property into a breeding facility, with state-of-the-art labs and special stalls where mares are implanted with embryos.

Across the quarter horse industry, people started to whisper about where he was getting his money.

“There’s no way all the money he’s putting into that ranch came from being a brick mason. It’s just not logical,” said a person familiar with Zule Farms.

Nor were José Treviño’s operations always transparent. Records show that on at least a couple occasions, he had other people sign for the company’s major purchases. One deal was signed by a teenager who looked like he was not yet old enough to drive. The other was handled by the scion of a prominent quarter horse family, Tyler Graham, who stunned a packed auction house in Oklahoma by agreeing to pay a record $875,000 for a broodmare named Dashin Follies.

At the time of the sale, Mr. Graham said he was buying the horse on behalf of a client he would only identify as “a Mexico resident.” Shortly afterward, records show, he turned the horse over to Tremor. Mr. Graham has not been accused of any wrongdoing.

An industry expert who attended the auction said the sale prompted more rumors. But he said sketchy deals are not uncommon in an industry where payments are made in cash and records are notoriously — even deliberately — unreliable.

“If someone walks into an auction with hundreds of thousands of dollars, and refuses to give his name, no one is going turn him away,” the industry expert said. “What they’ll tell him is, ‘We’ll register the horse in any name you want.’ ”

A Mysterious Death

As José Treviño’s prominence grew in the quarter horse community, so did Miguel Ángel Treviño’s place in the drug trade. By the end of 2010, he had helped lead a brutal expansion so deep into Mexico that the Zetas became not only a priority for Mexico’s security forces, but also an enemy that inspired other drug organizations to join forces and fight.

Miguel Ángel Treviño’s control over drug warehouses and hit squads across the border also compelled United States authorities to offer a $5 million reward for information leading to his arrest.

At the same time, Mr. Villarreal was falling out of favor with Tremor. He was in debt because the Treviño brothers barely paid him enough to cover travel costs, friends said. Mr. Villarreal began padding his expenses, prompting Miguel Ángel Treviño to suspect him of skimming money from Tremor, the friends said.

In September 2010, Mr. Villarreal was traveling to a horse auction in Oklahoma when he was detained by D.E.A. agents during a layover at a Houston airport. A spokesman for the agency refused to comment on its relationship with Mr. Villarreal.

But several law enforcement officials familiar with the case said agents held him for up to six hours, questioning him about his ties to Miguel Ángel Treviño. Before releasing him, the agents confiscated Mr. Villarreal’s cellphone and computer, and ordered him to meet with them a few days later.

When Mr. Villarreal returned, the agents said he could either work for them as an informant or face being prosecuted himself, according to the officials. The D.E.A. wanted Mr. Villarreal to help track Miguel Ángel Treviño’s whereabouts and then lure him into the United States.

Mr. Villarreal pleaded that he was too nervous to pull off the ruse, adding that Miguel Ángel Treviño would never trust him enough to follow him across the border.

But the D.E.A. insisted and a beleaguered Mr. Villarreal relented, the officials said.

At least once, Mr. Villarreal tipped off his handlers when Miguel Ángel Treviño went to a racetrack in Nuevo Laredo.

“Mexican authorities took pictures of 40, but they didn’t try to arrest him,” said one of Mr. Villarreal’s friends. “They told Ramiro that they were afraid too many people might get killed. Ramiro told them if they waited any longer, he was going to get killed.”

Sometime around the end of that year, Miguel Ángel Treviño summoned Mr. Villarreal to a meeting. Mr. Villarreal’s friends recounted the following incident as he had described it to them.

A pickup point was arranged in Laredo, where Mr. Villarreal was blindfolded and then driven into the Mexican desert by gang members.

Minutes dragged as Mr. Villarreal waited for Miguel Ángel Treviño to arrive. He saw two vats filled with a liquid he presumed to be acid, one of the trafficker’s preferred methods for disposing of bodies.

“Where’s Papi?” he asked the men.

“Don’t worry,” they answered. “He’s coming.”

Miguel Ángel Treviño arrived about an hour later in a car with more lieutenants and an unknown man, who was also wearing a blindfold.

The trafficker hugged Mr. Villarreal and asked, “You’re not screwing me, are you, Gordo?”

“No, of course not, Papi,” Mr. Villarreal answered.

Saying he would be back “in a minute,” Miguel Ángel Treviño walked over to the unknown man, took off his blindfold, shot him in the head and ordered his men to dump the body in one of the vats of acid.

Mr. Villarreal passed out. He told his friends he did not know how long he was unconscious, but when he awoke Miguel Ángel Treviño was slapping him in the face and laughing.

“What’s wrong, Gordo?” he joked. “You can’t handle seeing me kill someone? Next time, I’m going to have you do it.”

“No Papi,” Mr. Villarreal said. “I don’t want there to be a next time.”

The drug trafficker got back into his car and drove away. Mr. Villarreal was taken back to Laredo and immediately got in touch with the D.E.A., imploring the agents to release him from their agreement.

“When I met him he was a complete mess; profusely sweating, gangrene in one leg, and barely able to walk,” said a former law enforcement official. “He was in between a rock and a hard place: either stay in the United States and risk going to prison, or go back to Mexico and risk getting killed.”

In the end, Mr. Villarreal, 38, continued informing for the D.E.A. and in March, Miguel Ángel Treviño summoned him to another meeting.

On March 10, 2011, Mr. Villarreal’s car was found incinerated outside Nuevo Laredo. There was so little left of him that authorities took DNA samples from the ashes to identify his remains.

One federal law enforcement official said some agents believed his death was an accident, but acknowledged that no investigation was conducted.

Mr. Villarreal’s father said he had little hope of ever finding the truth. Asked who he thought was behind Mr. Villarreal’s death, the round, balding man looked over at his wife, tears streaming down her cheeks, and echoed a refrain heard from so many Mexican crime victims. “If we ask questions, we could be the next ones to die, so for us, this is a closed chapter.”

Whispers of a “mob hit” spread across the quarter horse industry. In March, law enforcement agents even raided Tremor’s stables at Los Alamitos racetrack. But none of it seemed to slow down Tremor’s business.

Last weekend, at Los Alamitos, a Tremor colt named Mr. Ease Cartel ran the second-fastest qualifying time for a million-dollar race scheduled for June 24. When Jose Trevino’s daughter was married recently, guests included well-known figures in the industry and Track magazine covered the “big event” on its Web site.

“If he had been some thug, or the stereotypical person you’d expect to be in a drug cartel, then maybe people wouldn’t have accepted him and done business with him,” a former trainer said of José Treviño. “But he’s a really nice guy, so none of us wanted to believe he could have anything to do with the killing going on in Mexico.” 

 Sources: Proceso, NYT

Thanks to: Milo of Borderland Beat Forum his posting of the NYT article is HERE  and to 777 of Borderland Beat Forum for the video find 


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Death in Durango: 4 die

June 13, 2012, 9:00 pm
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To read background reports in the Durango mass graves, click here and here

By Chris Covert
Rantburg.com

A new grave has been found in Durango city in Durango state Wednesday, according to Mexican news reports.

According to a post on the website of El Siglo de Durango news daily, an army unit with the Mexican 10th Military Zone was dispatched to a location on Cristobal Colon in the capital at around 1100 hrs on a report of a mass grave, based on an anonymous citizen's complaint

Exhumation has already begun, and soldiers have already found one human arm.  The article hints more remains are expected.  

The last of the Durango state mass graves was declared last March by Durango Fiscalia General de Estado (FGE) or Durango state attorney general, Sonia Yadira de la Garza Fragos, ending eight months of finds and exhumations that ended in January totalling 331 dead.  The graves, scattered throughout the state with most of them concentrated in Durango city, in toto are the largest mass grave find in the Mexican Drug War.
Fiscalia Sonia Yadira de la Garza Fragoso


Cristobal Colon is the location where the last 50 remains were found.
So far, it is unclear if this new find will be added to the 331 death toll.

Many of the dead in the Durango mass graves date back years, as far as 2007.  Most of the dead from those finds, 287 of 331, had been strangled to death.  From the several news reports, it appears the victims were killed in the normal course of organized crime business in Durango state.

Far from a backwater in the Mexican Drug War, Durango state and its capital sits on Mexico Federal Highway 40, the northernmost continuous east west route, which stretches from the Sinaloa port of Mazatlan to Reynosa, Tamaulipas. 

Durango is also one of two state capitals, the other being Saltillo, Coahuila also located on the highway.  Mexico Federal Highway 40 also goes through the La Laguna region of Mexico with one of the heaviest concentrations of Mexican security troops in the north.

Three other dead were found in Durango state since last Tuesday, according to web reports posted on El Context de Durango news daily.
  • An unidentified man in his 20s was found strangled to death in Durango municipality near the village of Metates Tuesday.  The victim was wrapped in a blanket and left on Mexico Federal Highway 40 at about the 27 kilometer marker between Durango and Mazatlan
  • Two unidentified individuals in an advanced state of decomposition were found in Gomez Palacio municipality Tuesday.  The victims were found on a road connecting Jimenez ejido with Huitron ejido by a resident of the La Laguna region of Mexico, which includes Torreon, Coahuila as well as Gomez Palacio.
In an unrelated development, a Mexican Army unit seized drugs and guns near a village in Pueblo Nuevo in Durango, according to a post on El Sol de Mexico news daily website.

The raid took place two kilometers from the village of Cebollas where soldiers seized 417.8 kilograms of marijuana packaged in 44 units.  A total of 195 kilograms of marijuana seed in 13 sacks, and three sacks with a total of 44.9 kilograms of poppy seeds were seized as well.

Weapons taken in the raid included two rifles, one grenade launcher, 29 weapons magazines and 120 rounds of ammunition.

No detentions were reported in the raid.

Pueblo Nuevo municipality was the location last month where six unidentified suspected drug members died in an intergang shootout.  That shootout took place near the village of La Hierbabuena near the border with Sinaloa state.

Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com

© Copyright 2012 by Chris Covert
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Mayhem in Zacatecas: 7 die

June 13, 2012, 9:00 pm
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By Chris Covert
Rantburg.com

Areas around Fresnillo, Villanueva and Sombrerete municipalities in Zacatecas state heated up since last Sunday as rival armed gangs engaged in firefights killing at least three.  Also in Sombrerete municipality, a small aircraft crashed in a remote area of the municipality killing three according to Mexican news accounts.

According to a news item posted on the website of El Sol de Zacatecas news daily, a small aircraft crashed near the village of Charco Blanco en Sombrerete municipality. Four unidentified individuals were killed.  The report added the authorities at the time of the news posting did not know if the aircraft was a government or private bird.

Meanwhile, armed groups presumably associated with the drug cartel fought each other in several engagements in Sombrerete, Villanueva and Fresnillo municipalities since Sunday.

Two individuals were found Tuesday in two separate vehicles abandoned after a Sunday shootout between armed groups in Fresnillo municipality.  The first unidentified victim was found in a stolen abandoned Volkswagen Jetta sedan near the village of Purisima del Maguey.  Inside the vehicle was found one AK-47 rifle, 1,000 rounds of ammunition and at least 24 packages of marijuana.

Near the village of Enrique Estrada, also in Fresnillo municipality, a second shooting victim was found dead aboard a Volkswagen Bora sedan, and was identified as Fernando Dueñas Acevedo.  The news report said the second victim may have also been involved in Sunday's shootout in Villanueva municipality, which took the life in a police agent.

Also in Fresnillo municipality, police agents raided a safe house in El Triunfo seizing undisclosed quantities of drugs and weapons.  No detainees were reported in that raid

A separate El Sol de Zacatecas report said that numerous gunfights have taken place since Tuesday between armed groups in the hills between Valparaiso and Sombrerete municipalities.  The report did not mention any casualties.

In Valparaiso last March five unidentified individuals were killed by elements of the Mexican 52 Infantry Battalion.  A second relief element dispatched from a base in Fresnillo to reinforce the fight  was attacked.  No one was reported wounded or detained in that second shootout.

Chris Covert writes Mexican Drug War and national political news for Rantburg.com

©  Copyright 2012 by Chris Covert
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Travel Warning for Mexico: Possible Violent 'Retaliation' Against Americans

June 14, 2012, 11:48 am
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CBS NEWS REPORT

American travelers to Mexico should beware of possible violent retaliation for this week's arrest of alleged Zetas drug cartel associates and family members inside the U.S., the U.S. State Department has warned.
Though the warning does not specify which "Transnational Criminal Organization" might engage in "anti-American" violence, on Tuesday federal authorities arrested seven alleged associates of the powerful Zetas drug cartel in New Mexico and Oklahoma for allegedly laundering millions in drug profits through breeding and racing quarterhorses in the U.S. Those arrested included Jose Trevino Morales, the brother of Zetas leaders Miguel Angel and Oscar Omar Trevino Morales, who were also indicted but remain at large in Mexico.
According to the indictment, the Zetas cartel steered drug money to Jose Trevino Morales and his wife to purchase, train and race quarterhorses. Horses owned by the Zetas' alleged front companies competed at Ruidoso Downs in New Mexico and won lucrative races, including the $1 million All American Futurity in 2010. Some of the horses, like Morning Cartel and Coronita Cartel, had the word "cartel" in their names.
The travel warning issued Tuesday, the day of the arrests and the unsealing of the indictment, urges U.S. citizens in Mexico to be on guard. "Given the history and resources of this violent TCO, the U.S. Embassy urges U.S. citizens to maintain a low profile and a heightened sense of awareness."
Miguel Angel Trevino Morales and his brother Oscar Omar, who go by the names 40 and 42, which refer to their alleged rank within the Zetas at the time of the cartel's creation several years ago, are now allegedly top leaders of an organization that controls drug trafficking in the east and south of Mexico.

The Zetas began in 1999 when former members of the Mexican military signed on to work as security for the Gulf drug cartel. The Zetas went into business for themselves and are now at war with the Gulf Cartel.
The Zetas are based in Nuevo Laredo, in Tamaulipas state just across the border from Laredo, Texas. The U.S. State Department issued a Travel Warning about Tamaulipas in February, and on Tuesday noted that it "continues to advise U.S. citizens to defer non-essential travel to the state of Tamaulipas."
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Sicarios Storm a Wake Killing a Woman and Burning Kids in Juarez

June 14, 2012, 3:50 pm
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Posted on Borderland Beat Forum by Havana

A group of heavily armed gunmen stormed the funeral chapel of St. Martin in the neighborhood of El Garnjero Monday.

A young gunman murdered (executed) with a coup de grace the wife of the deceased (who the service was for), then used Molotov cocktails to burn three adults and six minors who are frail in delicate health.

According to data provided by the state prosecutor, northern zone, the woman, identified as Gabriela Manriquez, 25, was shot in the forehead and also burned by fifty percent of his body.

In the raid,  three adults were injured  as well as five children, plus a baby of seven months, apparently the daughter of the unfortunate woman, all suffering burns consideration in much of their bodies .

The person who was veiled in the local funeral home, was a young man who was shot dead last Friday after taking 6 gunshots in the streets of Zacatecas and Parral in Colinas de Juarez.

Yesterday morning, several people were in the funeral services at San Martin Funeral Home, including the woman who just had been married to the veiled, several adults and children of all ages. The funeral home is located on Granjero and Mora streets in the neighborhood of Granjero.

So far  various types heavily armed men entered, without any consideration, approached the woman and shot her in the forehead, then emptying several containers of gasoline, to proceed to set fire to the building.

Following, the individuals fled in an unknown direction, leaving total chaos and confusion among the participants, several adults and children suffered burns on their bodies after the attack.


Three ambulances arrived from the Red Cross who provided first aid to the injured, while others were brought in trucks and cars to nearby private clinics.

The cries of pain, despair and helplessness are not left waiting, children and adults wept and begged for medical attention. Others sought their parents, the youngest crying so desperately, plainly demanding the arms of their parents.

They were treated on the sidewalk, into the seats of cars , on the floor. They tended to burns on their hands, their bodies , others had to be literally stripped bare in order to attend to their injuries.

Personal firefighters, rescuers, Civil Protection and others, among whom were municipal and ministerial police, ran in all directions, trying to collaborate on something to prevent more tragedies.

The official indicated that the only fatality was identified as Gabriela Manriquez, 25 years old.

The female was shot by a firearm of undetermined caliber in the front, note that the experts found no shell casings at the crime scene.

The woman's body was found inside the business, at the wake, face down, shot in her forehead with 50 percent of her body burned.

The other eight people, including the girl about seven months old, are hospitalized in local where the health of the wounded was registered.

The door of the room, made of wrought iron, was destroyed after the attack, while the coffin in which she watched the young man recently killed, was intact after the event, because it was placed in the bottom of the building, and several pieces of furniture such as chairs and part of the chapel, wer apparently were affected.

Of the suspects nothing is known, despite the movement of dispatched patrols in the vicinity with the intention to establish the perpetrators whereabouts.

Source: http://www.lapoliciaca.com/nota-roja/sicarios-queman-a-ninos/
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Another Elusive "El Azul" Apprehension Operation Failure. Officials Aren't Saying Much

June 14, 2012, 4:00 pm
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Posted in Borderland Beat Forum by Havana
Forces were deployed in a federal operation thi weekend to a party in the northern part of the state capital of Colima, and yesterday it was official revealed that allegedly were looking for the drug trafficker Juan Jose Esparragoza Moreno, alias "El Azul".

According to sources, at approximately 23:30 pm on Friday, elements of the federal forces arrived at a ranch in the Residential area of Victoria, where there was a "quincianera" party.

Later, around 01:00 pm on Saturday, were more effective in strengthening their operation, which was coordinated from Mexico City. In the actions implemented in the area of building units were used exclusively to land two Black Hawk helicopters.

The action lasted until 03:00 pm that day. The elements of the federal forces entered the party, separated the men and women, while children were thrown out. Adults were checked IDs, but after realizing that the boss had fled, were removed, according to sources and available information, totaled about 120 items and that they were after Esparragoza Moreno, member of the "Pacific Cartel" (CDS), for whom the Attorney General of the Republic offers, a reward of 30 million pesos, Forces deployed a federal operating the weekend at a party in the northern part of the state capital, and yesterday it was revealed that allegedly went to apprehend the drug trafficker Juan Jose Esparragoza Moreno, alias "El Azul".

According to sources, at approximately 23:30 pm on Friday, elements of the federal forces arrived at a ranch in the fractionation Residential Victoria, where there was a party of 15.

Later, around 01:00 pm on Saturday, were more effective in strengthening the operation, which was coordinated from Mexico City. In the actions implemented in the area of building units were used exclusively and two Black Hawk helicopters landed.

The action lasted until 03:00 pm that day. The elements of the federal forces entered the party, separated the men and women, while children were thrown out.

Adults were checked by ID, but after realizing that the boss had fled, were removed, according to sources. According to available information, totaled about 120 items.

Juan José Esparragoza Moreno, member of the Cartel del Sinaloa, for whom the Attorney General of the Republic offers, since 2009, have been offering a reward of 30 million pesos, according to the agreement A/123/09.

Officials are saying a whole lot of nada about the operation
Questioning the Attorney of Justice of Colima, Yolanda Guzman Verduzco, about the operation, she mentioned that she was not informed of the measure and asked to support with expert services and public prosecutor, in case you'd need to attest any evidence or any indication.

"The Secretary of the Navy had very precise information about some event in the field of drug trafficking that was going to be taking precisely in that location, particularly at a party. I knew that it would happen, but not with whom," said the official.

No consolidated information indicated that they had (federal authorities) had made ​​any arrests. Only data available when asked was about some probable people working for organized crime, "he said. Federal authorities didn't say if they were looking for Juan José Esparragoza Moreno.

"That information I have not, we can not verify the reported informtion until the investigation is consolidated and the apprehension of these people is processed" she said.

In one of the statements, Sergio Villarreal Barragan, alias "El Grande" -witness-collaborator of the attorney noted that in July 2008, the General of Division, Thomas Dauahare Angeles, met in a residence of Jardines del Pedregal, where " El Azul "was presented to the lord Arturo Beltran Leyva, alias "El Barbas". according to the agreement A/123/09.

Source: http://wiki69.net/2012/06/colima-operativo-para-atrapar-a-el-azul-se-les-pelo/
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Mexican Police Caught Kidnapping Victims

June 14, 2012, 4:09 pm
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Got it from Borderland Beat Forum by johnnyozone22

Source: Universal


There it was on video: Five heavily armed policemen barge into a hotel in western Mexico before dawn and march out with three handcuffed men in underwear.

But police weren't making an arrest. Prosecutors say they apparently were taking orders from criminals. Just hours after the three were seized, they were found asphyxiated and beaten to death.

Mexicans have become inured to lurid tales of police collaboration with narcotics gangs during 5 1/2 years of a drug war that has cost more than 47,500 lives. But seldom can they actually see it occur, and the video broadcast on national television was a shocker.

"One assumes that in some cities ... the municipal police work for the drug cartels," said Jorge Chabat an expert on security and drug trafficking at the Center for Economic Research and Teaching. "But what is different here is that there is a video. It's not the same thing to imagine that this going on, and to see it."

The Jan. 20 video released by prosecutors late Wednesday shows a police truck pulling up to the hotel in the city of Lagos de Moreno, quickly followed by a pickup carrying four armed men in civilian clothing. A city policeman carrying an assault rifle runs over to their truck and is given what appears to be a list. Then he and his fellow officers trot into the hotel and present the list at the reception desk, apparently asking what rooms the men are staying in.

In the next segment of the video, the victims are trotted out of the hotel in their underwear with their hands cuffed behind their backs. One is being hustled along by a man in civilian dress, who stuffs him into a patrol car. The gunmen – police are investigating whether they belong to the Jalisco New Generation drug gang – appear to be calling the shots throughout, with the police officers serving as gofers.

The police then watch and wait in front of the hotel while the men's luggage and vehicle are stolen. Finally, the police truck carrying the victims follows the gunmen as they drive away in the own pickup and the stolen vehicle.

While the kidnapping and murder occurred in January, and the faces of several officers were clearly seen on the videos, the officers were not detained until June 6, when soldiers and state police raided a local police station. And they still have not been formally charged with any crime.

"It took time to obtain the video tapes, to do the investigation, and to get the arrest warrants," said Jalisco state prosecutor's spokesman Lino Gonzalez said Thursday. "We didn't have the information."

In any case, the release of the dramatic images comes less than three weeks before national and state elections in which security is a major issue. Critics accuse President Felipe Calderon of setting off a bloodbath with his strategy against gangs, while his party's presidential candidate, Josefina Vazquez, has suggested her opponents are ready to compromise with the cartels.

Jalisco is governed by Calderon's party. The man who was mayor of Lagos de Moreno when the video was shot is now a rival party's candidate for the state legislature.

Gonzalez said that so far, seven policemen and officials of the municipal police force of Lagos de Moreno have been detained pending charges. And state Attorney General Tomas Coronado said the four men in civilian clothing also have been detained separately in other cases. He declined to say what gang they might belong to.

There are still mysteries surrounding the case, including whether the gunmen thought the victims were members of a rival drug cartel. The victims were from the northern state of Coahuila, where the hyperviolent Zetas cartel has been battling the Sinaloa cartel, allies of the local Jalisco Nueva Generacion gang.

Gonzalez said the victims, before checking into the hotel, had been briefly detained by police at the local jail for a minor infraction. They paid a fine and were released. But while in custody, "They said something indiscrete," Gonzalez said. "Apparently they said something like `We're from Coahuila, and we're part of the mafia.'"

It's not unusual in Mexico for detainees to boast about their connections, hoping to press corrupt police to release them.

This time, however, it backfired.

"Apparently, somebody at the jail heard the comment, and reported it to the real criminals," Gonzalez said.

Coronado told local media the men had claimed to be Zetas.

Gonzalez said it has never been proved the kidnapped men were gang members. They may have just been in Lagos de Moreno collecting the rent on a ranch, and they are being treated simply as victims.

Chabat noted that corruption has reached so deep that in 2010 in the northern state of Nuevo Leon, seven local police officers in the town of Santiago were arrested on allegations they were working for the Zetas drug gang and that they kidnapped and killed the town's Mayor, Edelmiro Cavazos, in retaliation for his attempts to cut corruption.

"There are police officers who kill the mayors they are supposed to protect," Chabat said. But this week's video "is cause for despair," he said. "It gives rise to the feeling that this is not going to be solved in the short term."



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