The FBI's blow against the Barrio Azteca last week showed that the region's dominant gang has continued to operate in spite of past racketeering cases that sent gang bosses to prison for life. Experts said breaking a criminal organization as large as the Barrio Azteca is not done in one swing, but could take years in the same fashion the Italian mob was eventually crippled. U.S. Attorney John E. Murphy on Wednesday announced a federal indictment of 35 alleged leaders, members and associates of the Barrio Azteca. [continues 1312 words]
Mexican authorities on Friday found the bodies of three relatives of an anti-violence activist killed last year in the village of Guadalupe in the Juarez valley. The deaths are the latest in killings eliminating members of the family of slain human-rights activist Josefina Reyes Salazar. The bodies were of a sister and brother and sister-in-law of Reyes Salazar, who was shot in January 2010 after hunger strikes and protests against the violence and disappearances in Juarez. Carlos Gonzalez, spokesman for the Chihuahua state prosecutor's office, said the bodies of Maria Magdalena Reyes Salazar, Elias Reyes Salazar and his wife, Luisa Ornelas, were found with messages alluding to organized crime. [continues 273 words]
More than 100 people were arrested in the El Paso region in a crackdown on Mexican drug cartels in response to the killing of an ICE agent last week in Mexico, officials said Friday evening. In Chihuahua City, authorities announced that a high-ranking member of the Juarez drug cartel was killed in a shootout with federal police earlier this week. U.S. officials said 104 people were arrested as of Friday in the El Paso division of the DEA, which covers West Texas and New Mexico. The division has offices in El Paso, Las Cruces, Albuquerque, Midland and Alpine. [continues 474 words]
An ICE agent from El Paso is being hailed as a hero after surviving an attack that killed another agent on a Mexican road earlier this week. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Special Agent Victor Avila Jr. was released from a U.S. hospital Wednesday after being shot twice in the leg in the attack Tuesday that killed Special Agent Jaime Zapata in San Luis Potosi state. "As we mourn Special Agent Zapata's death, we also recognize Special Agent Avila's great heroism," said ICE Director John Morton. [continues 298 words]
It has become routine. A person is shot and wounded in Juarez, a Mexican ambulance carries the victim across an international bridge and a U.S. ambulance takes the patient to University Medical Center of El Paso. Since the start of the Juarez drug war three years ago, 200 people wounded in Mexico have been treated at El Paso's county-run hospital at a cost of $4.7 million, according to the latest figures from UMC. Three-quarters were U.S. citizens. [continues 730 words]
It is unlikely the arrest of the suspected leader of the Aztecas gang over the weekend will end the bloodshed in Juarez, said an researcher who studies Mexico. Mexican federal police arrested Arturo Gallegos Castrellon, known as "El Farmero," who allegedly told police he was responsible for 80 percent of the homicides in Juarez since August 2009. Gallegos, 32, was arrested along with two other people during a raid Saturday at a home in Juarez. Police seized two rifles, two handguns, drugs and four vehicles, including a bulletproof pickup. [continues 1016 words]
The body of the kidnapped brother of the former attorney general of Chihuahua has been found. Mario Angel Gonzalez Rodriguez's body was found Wednesday night in a grave near Chihuahua City following the arrest of a gang of kidnappers and killers allegedly led by a former Cipol police chief, reported El Heraldo de Chihuahua. Gonzalez, a lawyer and the brother of former state attorney general Patricia Gonzalez Rodriguez, was abducted from his Chihuahua City office by a group of gunmen on Oct. 21. Videos were later posted on YouTube.com showing Mario Gonzalez surrounded by masked men with rifles and confessing that he and his sister worked for the Juarez drug cartel. Patricia Gonzalez denied the allegations. [end]
He was called "Don Chuy," a narco-trafficker who swaggered in his Stetson, flashy gold jewelry and expensive cowboy boots. Don Chuy mastered obscenity-laced tough talk that stopped arguments, a stare that could disarm men and the attitude of a big-time player in border drug dealing. He carried a .380-caliber handgun in a boot. A backup gun dangled from a gold chain on his chest. It was a five-shot .22-caliber pistol so small that a police officer once missed it during a pat-down search. [continues 1404 words]
The kidnapped brother of the former Chihuahua attorney general appeared in an Internet video on Monday confessing ties to the Juarez drug cartel. Gunmen kidnapped Mario Gonzalez Rodriguez, a lawyer and brother of former Attorney General Patricia Gonzalez Rodriguez, on Thursday in Chihuahua City. On Monday, a video appeared on the Internet showing Mario Gonzalez handcuffed, sitting in a chair, and surrounded by five men dressed in desert camouflage, wearing black ski masks and holding assault rifles. At gunpoint, he answers a list of questions asked by a man off-camera. The group holding Mario Gonzalez is not identified in the video and the authenticity of his answers is unknown. [continues 173 words]
Mexican federal intelligence indicates suspected Aztecas gang leaders arrested earlier this month acquired a rocket launcher supposedly to target federal police, officials said. Federal police arrested [name1 redacted] and [name2 redacted] at a house in Juarez, but the rocket launcher was not on a list of firearms and other items seized. [name1 and name2 redacted], both age 29, are accused of leading an Aztecas gang crew and are suspected of taking part in at least 10 homicides in Juarez. [name1 redacted], alias "[name1 alias redacted]," was reputedly the crew leader, a federal police spokesman said. [name2 redacted] , alias "[name2 alias redacted]," was allegedly second in command. [continues 248 words]
Mexican President Felipe Calderon on Wednesday told a journalists group that authorities have made an arrest in the death of a Juarez newspaper reporter slain two years ago. Calderon's announcement comes as the editor of the Juarez news website La Polaka.com has reportedly received political asylum in the U.S. after fleeing Mexico in fear of his life. During a meeting with members of the Committee to Protect Journalists and the Inter American Press Association, Calderon said investigators have arrested a suspect in the homicide of Armando Rodriguez, the committee reported. Details were not disclosed. [continues 432 words]
Mexican flags waved, children tooted horns, fireworks boomed and mariachis played as a crowd of up to 10,000 people celebrated Mexico's 200th birthday Wednesday night in Downtown El Paso. The festivities in San Jacinto Plaza were larger than last year because it was Mexico's bicentennial and because many revelers preferred to celebrate the traditional "grito," or cry for independence, in El Paso rather than in violence-plagued Juarez. El Paso police, who had a heavy presence at the event, estimated the crowd to be between 9,000 and 10,000 people, compared with about 6,000 to 7,000 a year ago. The Mexican Consulate sponsored the festivities. [continues 444 words]
Forty percent of Mexico gun crimes traced by the ATF last year used guns originally sold in Texas, according to a report issued Tuesday by a coalition of U.S. mayors. The bipartisan advocacy group Mayors Against Illegal Guns reported that 2,076 guns recovered at crime scenes in Mexico were tracked to Texas by the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and Explosives. Texas had the highest percentage of any state in the study. Another 36 percent of guns seized in Mexico were traced to sales in New Mexico, Arizona and California, according to the report by the coalition of 500 mayors. El Paso is not listed as part of the group. [continues 566 words]
Four women were killed in three incidents as the violence continued Monday in Juarez. The first case was about 3 a.m. when the body of an unidentified woman was found wrapped in a bedcover in an industrial park, Chihuahua state police said. There were no visible injuries. The cause of death had not been determined, but the case was labeled a homicide. Just before 6 a.m., two women were shot to death at the intersection of 15 de Septiembre and Monte de las Cruces streets in west Juarez, state police said. [continues 303 words]
The Merida Initiative, which supplies millions of dollars in U.S. money to Mexico for its fight against the drug cartels, has opened an office in Mexico City. The U.S. Embassy in Mexico on Wednesday announced the opening of the Merida Initiative Bilateral Implementation Office. The office allows for daily communication by staffers from both nations working together for the transfer of equipment and training programs under the initiative. The office staff will not be involved in intelligence gathering or operations. [end]
Mexican federal police found parts of a mutilated body, possibly of a federal officer, scattered on a boulevard next to the Rio Grande in Juarez on Tuesday evening. A severed head was left atop the sun roof of a black sport utility vehicle near the fairgrounds on Cuatro Siglos boulevard, which runs parallel to the Cesar Chavez Border Highway in El Paso. A note was reportedly left with the body accusing corrupt federal police of working for the Sinaloa drug cartel led by Joaquin "Chapo" Guzman. [continues 148 words]
Allegations Of Corruption Spur Inquiry Mexico's Attorney General's Office has opened an investigation into allegations of corruption within the federal police in Juarez. The investigation is in response to an uprising by hundreds of federal police officers on Saturday against some of their commanders, whom they accused of taking money and having connections to drug traffickers. The commanders were taken into custody at gunpoint, handcuffed and smacked around by their ski-masked subordinates, who claimed corruption was putting their lives at risk. [continues 230 words]
Journalists in Juarez demonstrated during the weekend as part of protests across Mexico asking authorities to do more to safeguard members of the news media and freedom of the press. A demonstration on Saturday in front of the Mexico attorney general's office building in Juarez coincided with a march of more than 1,000 journalists in Mexico City. The demonstration was to "condemn the constant aggression we have been subject to in this climate of insecurity and violence in the entire country," stated the Juarez Society of Journalists and Communicators. [continues 220 words]
EL PASO -- Texas Gov. Rick Perry's recent misstatements about car bombs exploding in El Paso drew more heat Wednesday. State Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, no stranger to criticizing Perry, added to the chorus during an afternoon news conference. "We cannot let the governor of Texas lie about us to get votes," Shapleigh, D-El Paso, said. "He is pandering to extremists. We are not his political pinata." Perry has been taking fire after saying during an interview on border security on Fox News that bombs had exploded in El Paso. Perry later made a similar comment in Laredo, saying a car bomb exploded in El Paso, according to Pro8News. [continues 244 words]
The threat of more deadly car bombings like the one earlier this month has forced Juarez authorities to take measures to protect police stations, and authorities reported finding more explosives in Chihuahua on Wednesday. The car bombing that killed three people apparently was ordered because law-enforcement agencies are perceived to be siding with either the Sinaloa and Juarez drug cartels, which have unleashed a wave of violence in the city that has claimed the lives of nearly 6,000 people since 2008. [continues 948 words]
