Juan Luis Lagunas Rosales was born in the Mexican state of Sinaloa, a mecca for cartels and the land of notorious drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman. Lagunas grew up never knowing his father. His mother left him with his grandmother as a child.

Lagunas left his hometown at the age of 15 without finishing high school, moving to the nearby municipality of Culiacan and washing cars to make a living, he said in an interview in July. It was in this adopted town that he took on the nickname that would later become known across cyberspace: "El Pirata de Culiacan," or "The Pirate of Culiacan."

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Drug war bloodshed in Mexico has spiked to record levels, with more homicides recorded in June than in any month in at least two decades.

Prosecutors opened 2,234 homicide investigations last month, according to government statistics released Friday. That's an increase of 40% over June of last year and 80% over June of 2014.

Rising demand for heroin in the United States and a bloody power struggle inside one of Mexico's most powerful drug cartels have put the country on track to record more killings in 2017 than in any year since the government began releasing crime data in 1997.

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Mexican police guard a crime scene near the beach resort of Mazatlan, where 19 suspected drug cartel members died in clashes with police on July 1. On Wednesday, cartel violence claimed 26 more lives in neighboring Chihuahua state.

Mexican police guard a crime scene near the beach resort of Mazatlan, where 19 suspected drug cartel members died in clashes with police on July 1. On Wednesday, cartel violence claimed 26 more lives in neighboring Chihuahua state. (Mario Rivera Alvarado / Associated Press)

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Families of People WHO 'Disappeared' Amid Mexico's Violent Drug Wars Are Forced to Continue the Search for Truth and Justice on Their Own, As Authorities Often Refuse to Help

QUERETARO, MEXICO - Socorro Arias unlocks the door to her son's bedroom. A faintly musty smell wafts out. Other than a layer of dust, everything is just as Raymundo Isaac Rico Arias left it on Feb. 12, 2012, the day the 27-year-old teacher disappeared.

A stack of Valentine's Day hearts - cut from red construction paper - lies on Rico's bed, intended as gifts for his students. Clothes are piled in the corner, along with shoes and leather belts. Marilyn Monroe smiles seductively from one wall, while a Virgin Mary statue sits on the bureau, gazing pensively in front of the mirror.

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MEXICO CITY - The drug that killed Prince has become a favorite of Mexican cartels because it is extremely potent, popular in the United States - and immensely profitable, American officials say.

Law enforcement and border authorities in the United States warn that Mexican cartels are using their own labs to produce the drug, fentanyl, as well as receiving shipments from China. Then the cartels distribute the substance through their vast smuggling networks to meet rising American demand for opiates and pharmaceuticals.

"It is really the next migration of the cartels in terms of making profit," said Jack Riley, acting deputy administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration. "This goes to the heart of the marketing genius of the cartels. They saw this coming."

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MEXICO CITY - Two days after Jorge Antonio Parral Rabadan was kidnapped by a criminal gang, the Mexican Army raided the remote ranch where he was a prisoner and killed him. As he instinctively raised his hands in defense, the soldiers fired over and over at point-blank range.

A brief army communique about the event asserted that soldiers had returned fire and killed three hit men at the El Puerto ranch on April 26, 2010.

But Mr. Parral had fired no weapon.

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MEXICO CITY - In the history of modern war, fighters are much more likely to injure their enemies than kill them.

But in Mexico, the opposite is true.

According to the government's own figures, Mexico's armed forces are exceptionally efficient killers - stacking up bodies at extraordinary rates.

The Mexican authorities say the nation's soldiers are simply better trained and more skilled than the cartels they battle.

But experts who study the issue say Mexico's kill rate is practically unheard-of, arguing that the numbers reveal something more ominous.

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MEXICO CITY - In the history of modern war, fighters are much more likely to injure their enemies than kill them. But in Mexico, the opposite is true.

According to the government's own figures, Mexico's armed forces are exceptionally efficient killers - stacking up bodies at extraordinary rates.

Mexican authorities say the nation's soldiers are simply better trained and more skilled than the cartels they battle. But experts who study the issue say Mexico's kill rate is practically unheard-of, arguing that the numbers reveal something more ominous.

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Fed up with drug-related violence, a growing number of Mexican politicians see one potential cure: Legalizing the cultivation of opium poppies for the production of medicine. The debate has emerged in recent weeks after President Enrique Pena Nieto proposed legislation in April to loosen marijuana laws by legalizing medical cannabis and easing restrictions on its recreational use. Since then, governors and congressional lawmakers have voiced their support for regulating opium poppies, which are often grown by farmers in poor areas of the country and sold to cartels as the raw material for heroin.

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Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is so disgusted by the dirt in his new prison cell that he has asked for chlorine to clean it himself, his lawyer said.

Guzman, 59, was abruptly transferred from his maximum-security prison near Mexico City to a jail in Ciudad Juarez, at the US border, on Saturday. His lawyer, Jose Refugio Rodriguez, told AFP that he has since filed two motions to have Guzman returned to the Altiplano lockup, some 90 kilometers (55 miles) west of the capital.

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Shift to Legalization

Big Change in Area That Includes Big Producers of Marijuana, Opium

MEXICO CITY - With a swipe of his pen last week, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto proposed that Mexican citizens could legally possess up to an ounce of pot.

The day before, Canada's health minister stood at a United Nations podium and said her country would introduce new federal legislation to make cannabis legal by next year.

Already, people are free to smoke marijuana in four U.S. states, including Washington, and the District of Columbia, and medical marijuana is allowed in almost half the country. Uruguay has fully legalized weed for sale. And a large chunk of South and Central America, including Brazil, Peru, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Costa Rica, has made marijuana more available in varying ways, whether it is for medicinal or recreational use.

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MEXICO CITY - With a swipe of his pen last week, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto proposed that Mexican citizens could legally possess up to an ounce of marijuana.

The day before, Canada's health minister stood at a United Nations podium and announced that her country would introduce new federal legislation to make cannabis legal by next year.

Already, people are free to smoke marijuana in four US states and the District of Columbia, and medical marijuana is allowed in almost half the country. Uruguay has fully legalized weed for sale. And a large chunk of South and Central America, including Brazil, Peru, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, and Costa Rica, has made marijuana more available in varying ways, whether it is for medicinal or recreational use.

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Mexico City - With a swipe of his pent his week, Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto proposed that Mexican citizens could legally possess up to an ounce of pot.

The day before, Canada's health minister stood on a United Nations podium and announced that her country would introduce new federal legislation to make cannabis legal by next year.

Already, people are free to smoke marijuana in four U.S. states and the District of Columbia, and medical marijuana is allowed in almost half the country. Uruguay has fully legalized weed for sale. And a large chunk of South and Central America, including Brazil, Peru, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Costa Rica, has made marijuana more available in varying ways, whether it is for medicinal or recreational use.

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President Enrique Pena Nieto said Thursday he will ask Mexico's Congress to raise the limit on decriminalized marijuana for personal use to 28 grams, or about one ounce. Currently, only possession of five grams, or less than a fifth of an ounce, is exempt from prosecution. "This means that consumption would no longer be criminalized," Pena Nieto said. Possession of larger amounts would still be punishable under drug trafficking laws. Pena Nieto said the "so-called war on drugs" has caused huge suffering in Mexico, and that instead of prosecuting drug consumers, the country should be focused on fighting criminals. The move comes after Mexico's Supreme Court approved an appeal by four people to allow them to grow and possess marijuana for personal use. That helped launch a national debate on marijuana policy.

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MEXICO CITY - President Enrique Pena Nieto said Mexico will move to legalize marijuana for medicinal use in what was seen as a stark shift for a leader who has made clamping down on all forms of drug trafficking a hallmark of his tenure.

Speaking to the United Nations, Mr. Pena Nieto said Tuesday he would also raise the amount of marijuana that would be de-criminalized for personal consumption, calling its use a public health problem and urging policies that avoid punishing users.

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Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto said Tuesday that he is open to the legalization of medical marijuana in Mexico and that his government would announce new measures in the coming days.

"I am giving voice to those who have [in public forums] expressed the necessity of changing the regulatory framework to authorize the use of marijuana for medical and scientific purposes," he said in a speech at the United Nations General Assembly in New York.

Speaking at a special session where world leaders had gathered to rethink global strategy in the war on drugs-the first such meeting in two decades - Pena Nieto said that drug use should be addressed as a "public health problem" and that users should not be criminalized.

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MEXICO CITY (AP) - A public recruitment drive by a Mexican drug cartel using fliers promising high wages and good benefits reflects the expanding power of the gang, experts said Friday.

The recruitment fliers advertised jobs as security guards or bodyguards under the name of a fake company, and promised good benefits, a Christmas bonus and "growth in the short term," according to Jesus Eduardo Almaguer, the chief prosecutor in western Jalisco state.

Those recruited were, however, employed as street-level drug dealers, not guards. They were sent to the town of Lagos de Moreno for a quick 10-day training course featuring paintball fights.

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Competition from U.S. growers is cutting into Mexican pot's value and size of the market

Legal marijuana may be doing at least one thing that a decades-long drug war couldn't: taking a bite out of Mexican drug cartels' profits. The latest data from the U.S. Border Patrol shows that last year marijuana seizures along the Southwest border tumbled to their lowest level in at least a decade. Agents snagged roughly 1.5 million pounds of marijuana at the border, down from a peak of nearly 4 million pounds in 2009.

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Legal Marijuana Is Cutting into Mexican Drug Cartels' Profits.

The latest data from the U.S. Border Patrol shows that last year marijuana seizures along the southwest border tumbled to their lowest level in at least a decade. Agents snagged roughly 1.5 million pounds of marijuana at the border, down from a peak of nearly 4 million pounds in 2009.

The data supports the many stories about the difficulties marijuana growers in Mexico face in light of increased competition from the north. As domestic marijuana production has ramped up in places such as California, Colorado and Washington state, marijuana prices have fallen, especially at the bulk level.

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MORELIA, Mexico - Pope Francis delivered his most searing indictment of the Mexican underworld Tuesday, encouraging the nation's youth to value themselves and resist the temptation to join forces with "criminal organizations that sow terror."

Since his arrival Friday, Francis has made no secret of his desire to challenge the drug syndicates that have corroded Mexican life for decades. He commanded bishops to be more proactive in facing down the scourge of narcotics and denounced gangs as dealers of death.

On Tuesday, in the cartel bastion of Michoacan, he mounted his most full-throated assault, imploring young people not to lose faith and become the "mercenaries of other people's ambitions."

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