Body found found in oil drum in Chula Vista bay
There is a slight chill, a hesitant breeze, as San Diego eases into fall, particularly along the bay, even as the sun hits it's brightest points of the day. There are dozens of small boats, yachts among them anchored along the marina, off J Street and Marina Parkway, the park looks out onto the bay, a tranquil landscape amidst the gloom and steel of the industrial area surrounding it.
A 55 gallon oil drum, weighted down with cement blocks, and a metal chain, was pulled out of the Bay, late yesterday afternoon. Investigators on the scene say it may contain human remains, due to the smell emerging from the drum. Family members of a recent missing person arrived on the scene, hoping for relief or closure, one way or another. Authorities confirmed nothing else, as of today.
For some who know, who read, who saw, who remember, there are shades of other bodies found in strange ways across San Diego, especially Chula Vista, Bonita, Eastlake. They were found on golf courses, in parking lots, strangled and beaten in vans, with messages painted on the side. They were found sometimes in plastic drums, acid singed remains of humans, carne asada roasted outside to cover the scent. They were found with toothpicks, hundreds of them, around the body and face of the victim.
They were calling cards of Los Palillos, a former cell of CAF, in the era of Benjamin and Ramon, who fell out with Javier Francisco Arellano Felix, and his top lieutenant Jorge Briceno, "El Cholo", they moved into San Diego, and began operations. They trafficked meth and marijuana to the mid west, and primarily kidnapped, tortured, and collected ransom for Arellano Felix members, affiliates and their families.
Don Balas son, Balitas was kidnapped, among others, including Eduardo Tostado, "El Mandil", who was rescued by the FBI. Sometimes they released their victims, many times not. They were driven by not just profits, but revenge, for the death of Palillo, Victor Rojas, the brother of Jorge, who led Los Palillos.
They terrorized those hidden communities in the enclaves of the family members of Tijuana/Sinaloa connected families, and the San Diego police department, opening fire with automatic weapons during a high speed cheese and leaving two officers with severe injuries. Eventually between 2007 and 2009 they were indicted, arrested, and in long lasting trials, all but a few given life sentences.
Yet, some remember. Perhaps this is not like that, a personal dispute, a crime of passion, an affair gone wrong, or a fight gone too far. Someone, for some reason placed limbs and body parts in a drum, and tried to conceal it forever beneath the dark green/blue waters of the Pacific.
A bloody frenzy of killing devours many in Tijuana, as CJNG and CTNG dispute the plaza. Bodies are found in drums, in suitcases, thrown from bridges, in the trunks of cars, feet bound, mouth gagged, handcuffed in the lonely fields of San Quentin, bodies decaying in the heat.
And in San Diego, one almost vanished into the murky depths of the ocean, who never talks, never reveals, conceals forever, a body, stuffed in a 55 gallon drum, sinking, slowly to the bottom, drowning it's secrets.