Feral Jundi

Sunday, January 10, 2010

Mexico: Mexican Drug Gangs Worship Saint Death

Filed under: Law Enforcement,Mexico — Tags: , , , , — Matt @ 9:59 AM

   You learn something new all the time.  I am sure there are numerous tattoos and symbols that these drug cartels are rallying around, but this one is pretty unique.  At least law enforcement has another way to identify these jackasses.

    The other little piece of interest in this story, is about Senor B.  He is a businessman that resorted to using ‘machine gun totting’ security in order to protect his business from drug cartels and corrupt police.  The point is, he didn’t trust anyone, to include the police, and so he resorted to using heavily armed private security and turned his business into a small fortress.  I am sure this same situation is repeating itself throughout the country, and it would be interesting to hear more about the evolution of the private security market there. –Matt

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Mexican drug gangs worship Saint Death

As bloody feuds grip the traffickers, many are turning to a grim icon. Tony Allen-Mills reports from Ciudad Juarez

January 10, 2010

Tony Allen-Mills in Ciudad Juarez

She was yet another desolate victim of the endless drug wars ravaging the northern Mexican borderlands, one of more than 2,600 people murdered in Ciudad Juarez last year. When police found her body in a residential area close to the Rio Grande river, there were two distinctive signs that she had been caught up in the bloodsoaked feuding between the rival Juarez and Sinaloa cartels.

First, her head had been crudely hacked off — a trademark cartel warning to rivals. Second, her torso bore a distinctive tattoo of a cackling skeleton dressed in suggestive female clothing.

Police recognised it at once as Santa Muerte — best translated as Saint Death, a macabre feminine icon who has replaced the Virgin Mary as an improbable source of unholy comfort to Mexico’s legions of gangsters and hitmen.

(more…)

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Mexico: Drug War Update–Tijuana Gets A Tough Guy, Drug Cartels Lose Leyva

Filed under: Law Enforcement,Mexico — Tags: , , , , , , , — Matt @ 8:39 AM

    Big news with the drug war down south.  The Mexican Navy kills Beltran Leyva, a major drug boss with a two million dollar bounty on his head.  No word if anyone actually collected on that bounty.

    The other story that grabbed my attention is the new security jefe in Tijuana.  This guy is definitely working on being ‘bad ass of the week’.  I just hope he stays alive long enough to do some damage upon the cartels.

   Finally, I would like to say that if Mexico thinks they are doing all they can to stop these guys, think again.  Mexico could certainly open up the cartel killing market using the Letter of Marque concept, and open up a new front in the drug war.

     Mexico has a bounty system for these cartels already, but in order for it to work properly, they need to bring in companies under that system. Individuals, who have no way of protecting themselves and fear retribution if they turn in a drug boss or his buddies, are not likely to partake in a bounty system. But entire companies will join in, because they have the means to protect itself and usually has the kind of guys who can take care of themselves.

     And if there are hundreds of companies going after cartels, along with the police and military, well then you have a diversified strategy with a total drug war concept. More importantly, they need to give the companies involved with taking on the cartels, legal protections–hence the reason behind the LoM.

    One last thing. Mexico is not a signatory of the Declaration of Paris. And what is really cool about the LoM, is it is warfare on the cheap.  Just the kind of solution a country would need in case they ran out of money do to a protracted war or were in a deep recession because of other factors throughout the world.

     Drug cartels are loaded with loot, they fight to bring over billions of dollars of hard cash into the US in order to launder it, and they buy all sorts of ridiculous things with that money.  Privateers would love to take that wealth away from the cartels as well as kill or capture individuals to collect on the state offered bounties.  Seems pretty logical to me.  Dios mio. –Matt

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Death of a Mexican drug lord

Mexican forces won this battle, killing Arturo Beltran Leyva. But the war is far from over.

December 19, 2009

Understandably, Mexican President Felipe Calderon is trumpeting the navy’s success in taking down Arturo Beltran Leyva, wanted in the United States and Mexico for his part in the $15-billion to $20-billion-a-year drug trade. He was a criminal known to behead his rivals and believed to be responsible for last year’s killing of the federal police chief in his Mexico City home; he was the most powerful cartel boss to be removed by security forces since Calderon launched his drug war in 2006. The operation reportedly was the result of improved U.S.-Mexican intelligence cooperation, and although the naval troops failed to take Beltran Leyva and six cohorts alive, it should yield a trove of new information. Moreover, the battle between cartel grenades and the navy’s mounted machine guns was carried out without civilian casualties or, apparently, some of the other abuses that have marked army operations.For all the accomplishments, however, the operation reveals the extent of unfinished business in Calderon’s campaign. Beltran Leyva was discovered at a luxury apartment complex near the governor’s mansion in the city of Cuernavaca, just south of the national capital. Clearly he felt he had bought enough protection from security forces to stray far from his home base in Sinaloa and into the weekend getaway for Mexico City’s rich. But someone either infiltrated his inner circle or turned on him — possibly for the $2-million bounty on his head. (more…)

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Mexico: Drug Cartels Siphon Liquid Gold

Filed under: Crime,Mexico — Tags: , , , , , — Matt @ 8:32 AM

“Every possible encouragement should be given to privateering in time of war.” -Thomas Jefferson 

*****

   Now this is ridiculous. Yet again, my solution to this is simple.  The Mexican government should issue Letters of Marque and Reprisal to companies, both foreign and domestic, and give them the legal authority to destroy the cartels and get a percentage of what these animals own.  You create a free market based killing mechanism, and allow it to do it’s thing, and I guarantee you will see these vile organizations dry up.

   They are a threat to Mexico and to the free world, and I just don’t see the current drug war strategy working out too well. Actually, it is a dismal failure, and we are witnessing how bad it really is. I say diversify, and allow private industry to help, much like how private industry helped out my country during the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812.

   Thomas Jefferson, one of the founding fathers of my country, was a smart man.  His quote about privateering rings true today, as it did several hundred years ago.  I owe the survival of my country, in part, to the concept of privateering. So there must be something there, and especially if it was written into my country’s constitution. Too bad that weapon of warfare just sits over the mantel and collects dust like some old rifle from a war long ago.-Matt

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Mexico’s drug cartels siphon liquid gold

Bold theft of $1 billion in oil, resold in U.S., has dealt a major blow to the treasury

By Steve Fainaru and William BoothSunday, December 13, 2009

MALTRATA, MEXICO — Drug traffickers employing high-tech drills, miles of rubber hose and a fleet of stolen tanker trucks have siphoned more than $1 billion worth of oil from Mexico’s pipelines over the past two years, in a vast and audacious conspiracy that is bleeding the national treasury, according to U.S. and Mexican law enforcement officials and the state-run oil company.

Using sophisticated smuggling networks, the traffickers have transported a portion of the pilfered petroleum across the border to sell to U.S. companies, some of which knew that it was stolen, according to court documents and interviews with American officials involved in an expanding investigation of oil services firms in Texas.

The widespread theft of Mexico’s most vital national resource by criminal organizations represents a costly new front in President Felipe Calderón’s war against the drug cartels, and it shows how the traffickers are rapidly evolving from traditional narcotics smuggling to activities as diverse as oil theft, transport and sales.

Oil theft has been a persistent problem for the state-run Petroleos Mexicanos, or Pemex, but the robbery increased sharply after Calderón launched his war against the cartels shortly after taking office in December 2006. The drug war has claimed more than 16,000 lives and has led the cartels, which rely on drug trafficking for most of their revenue, to branch out into other illegal activities.

(more…)

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Executive Protection: R.L. Oatman On Film In Mexico, Protecting Author Brad Thor

Filed under: Executive Protection,Film,Mexico — Tags: , , , — Matt @ 9:56 AM

   This is a show I would like to see.  Oatman is famous in the executive protection (EP) world, and the courses he teaches are fantastic from what I have heard.  It is definitely on my list for future training. R.L. Oatman is also the author of several excellent books on the subject of EP and security.

   What really makes this interesting, is the author that he is protecting while filming in the slums of Mexico. The author’s name is Brad Thor and he is writing a thriller about battling the gangs and crime in Mexico.  Brad Thor has made quite a name for himself in the military/police/contractor world, and this show should be packed with all sorts of industry best practices for EP.  Check it out. –Matt

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Towson security firm seen at work in Mexico

Team protects author researching drug trade, kidnappings

Gus G. Sentementes

December 1, 2009

Robert L. Oatman does executive protection – and no, he isn’t a beefy, brainless bodyguard.

He is a fit, trim and congenial figure who likes to wear crisp suits and who works with his team to draw up complex plans for shielding people they’re paid to protect. It’s a point of professional pride that none of his clients have ever been attacked on his watch over the past 20 years.”If you’ve got to touch your gun, it means you’ve made a mistake,” said Oatman, 62, whose R.L. Oatman & Associates Inc. is based in Towson. “It’s not about the gun. It’s all about planning.”Much of the work that Oatman and his associates do is low profile and behind the scenes, since most clients don’t want attention drawn to them and they want to avoid dangerous situations. Because of the confidential nature of his work, Oatman avoids publicity and ordinarily would’ve scoffed at the idea of allowing a film crew to shoot him and his team in action – until the right opportunity called.A New York-based television production company called him up a few months ago, wanting to send a crew to shadow him and his team on one of their missions for a new show called “Dangerous Drives,” on Fox’s Speed Channel cable network.It turned out to be a new kind of adventure for Oatman, who has been on many in his 40 years of law enforcement and executive protection experience. In September, Oatman and his team protected thriller writer Brad Thor on a trip to some of the grittiest parts of Mexico City while the author did research for a book on drug trafficking and kidnapping – and a film crew taped their efforts.

 

(more…)

Friday, November 20, 2009

Funny Stuff: Mexican City of Ciudad Juarez Calls For U.N. to Help Quell Violence

Filed under: Funny Stuff,Mexico — Tags: , , , , — Matt @ 10:36 AM

      I apologize for laughing, but come on?  Obviously these guys have not done their homework with researching the track record of the U.N.

     You don’t bring in peacekeepers, when there is no peace to keep. The cartels and drug gangs would use blue helmets for target practice, and then go back to fighting each other and the Mexican army and police.-Matt

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Mexican city of Ciudad Juarez calls for U.N. to help quell violence

By Soraya RobertsDAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Thursday, November 12th 2009

Having the highest homicide rate in the world does not make for good advertising, and businesses in the Mexican city of Ciudad Juarez are tired of the bad rep.

Local business groups announced today that they will ask the United Nations for help in quelling the violence, reports The Associated Press.

Representatives from businesses like assembly plants and retailers plan to submit an official request for UN aid to the Mexican government and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

“This is a proposal … for international forces to come here to help out the domestic [security] forces,” said Daniel Murguia, president of the Ciudad Juarez group of the National Chamber of Commerce, Services and Tourism. “There are a lot of extortions and robberies of businesses. Many businesses are closing.”

The U.S. government has sent more than 5,000 soldiers from El Paso, Tex., but the killings and extortion have not abated.

Ciudad Juarez, population 1.5 million, has an average of seven homicides a day, with the total at 1,986 for this year through mid-October.

“We have seen the UN peacekeepers enter other countries that have a lot fewer problems than we have,” Murguia said. “What we are asking for with the blue helmets [UN peacekeepers] is that we know they are the army of peace, so we could use not only the strategies they have developed in other countries … but they also have technology.”

Mexican troops have trained local police and joined in patrolling the city, but to no avail. Rival drug gangs remain at war, and thieves have taken advantage of the atmosphere to target businesses. Thousands of stores and firms reportedly have moved or shut down as a result.

Story here.

 

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