Drug smugglers bribing U.S. agents on Mexico border
lc
15 Jul 2008 17:02:44 GMT Reuters By Robin Emmott
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N15311994.htm
HARLINGEN, Texas, July 15 (Reuters) - U.S. Border Patrol agent
Reynaldo Zuniga was arrested last month lugging a bag of cocaine up
from the Rio Grande, one of a growing number of law enforcement
officers accused of taking bribes from drug gangs.
Former colleagues say Zuniga used to wait until agents in the south
Texas town of Harlingen were distracted with paperwork, then slip down
to the river and help smuggle in drugs from Mexico.
The increasing use of bribes by Mexican drug cartels to corrupt U.S.
agents comes as Washington is sending $400 million to help Mexico's
army-led war on the trafficking gangs, whose brutal murders have
surged to unprecedented levels.
"Zuniga was a good agent and a hard worker. I can't understand why he
would do this. We're supposed to be protecting our borders," said
Border Patrol agent Daniel Doty, a former colleague.
Data on agents convicted of graft are not made public, but the U.S.
government is probing hundreds of border corruption cases where a
decade ago it saw a few dozen a year. The FBI-led Border Corruption
Task Force says it is busier than ever.
lc
The situation was urgent. A string of government assassinations was
possibly in the works, according to Mexican law-enforcement officials
I spoke with. Until recently, members of the Sinaloa cartel had
managed to avoid the government crackdown that was devastating the
rival Gulf cartel. But Mexican president Felipe Calderón now seemed to
be going after the Sinaloans too, and word had come from informants
that Guzmán, who’s infamous for killing politicians when he’s not
buying them off, had given orders to bring the war to the capital.
Beltrán Leyva, it seems, “was tasked with taking some reprisal action
or took it upon himself to go out and make a clash,” an A.T.F. agent
who frequently works in Mexico tells me.
To find Beltrán Leyva’s .38 Super, analysts at the tracing center sent
the serial number to Colt, which produced the name of the wholesaler,
who in turn dug up the location of the dealer. The pistol’s trail led
back to X Caliber Guns on North Cave Creek Road in Phoenix, where it
had been purchased three months earlier. From there it was smuggled
over the border, probably at Nogales, Arizona. “Every gun has a story
to tell,” as A.T.F. agents like to say. Beltrán Leyva’s Colt told not
only its own story but also one that American and Mexican authorities
and residents of the bloodstained border region know all too well—
namely, that almost every gun fired in Mexico’s drug war comes from
the U.S.
When Americans think about the border, they tend to picture
undocumented workers or clandestine river crossings. They don’t think
about war. But what’s happening in Mexico very lately is a warfare—no
other word seems suitable—and the most gruesome battles are taking
place in the reach miles of the U.S. So far this year, more than 1,350
people have been murdered in drug-trafficking-related crimes in
Mexico. Last year, according to tallies kept by Mexican newspapers,
2,500 people died; since 2001, the number is close to 10,000—twice the
number of American soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.
These killings have become such an everyday part of life that there’s
a special expression. for them: narcoejecuciones, or narcoexecutions.
The murdered include police, judges, prosecutors, soldiers, reporters,
politicians, and innocent bystanders. Shootouts in broad daylight,
lump executions, and public assassinations have become routine. “The
pre-existing narco gunman was a dowdy with a gold tooth and a .45, and
if you lost a load of drugs, he’d send someone wanting there to plug
you,” says J.J. Ballesteros, a veteran A.T.F. agent in Texas. “The
phenomenon we’re looking at today is entirely separate. Now we have
paramilitary cells with military training challenging one another and
the form of sovereignty.”
http://coolshop.org/2008/examining-the-us-mexico-gun-trade/
June 23rd, 2008
Mexico's Massive Illegal weapons coming from China and the U.S.
Arming the Drug Wars
The U.S. has pledged more than $1 billion to help Mexico win its war
on drugs. But even as the body count rises above 10,000, most of the
guns that do the killing—Colt .38 Supers and big-bore Barrett rifles
among them—keep pouring in from the U.S.
Gazillions
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v30/n13/asch01_.html
Narco-Terrorism Spreading to North America
http://www.nationalterroralert.com/updates/2008/04/30/narco-terrorism-spreading-to-north-america/
Outgunned, outmanned, Mexican Army brings the fight to the cartels
http://mexicotrucker.com/2008/06/01/outgunned-outmanned-mexican-army-brings-the-fight-to-the-cartels/
By Trailero 1 • June 1, 2008
The Long War of Genaro García Luna
http://elblogdelnarco.blogspot.com/2008/07/long-war-of-genaro-garca-luna.html
Monday, July 14, 2008
Mexico, narco traffick and journalists
Posted on January 14, 2008 by MexicoReporter
http://mexicoreporter.com/2008/01/14/mexico-narco-traffick-and-journalists/
Browsing through my feeds this morning, I came across this story on
the Los Angeles Times which documents well the experiences many
journalists working in Mexico covering the drug trade experience.
Although studies have found that violence against journalists stems as
much from Government officials as it does from narco-traffic, Hector’s
piece really gives some insight into the reality for many in the
profession.
In Mexico, reporters have learned not to name names
http://articles.latimes.com/2008/jan/14/world/fg-notebook14
'The Cartels Are Refining their Semi-Submersibles'
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,562606,00.html
[][]
A Brief History of Murder Incorporated
http://catquibbles.blogspot.com/2008/06/brief-history-of-murder-incorporated.html
Failed CIA Coup in Laos
http://www.darkgovernment.com/news/failed-cia-coup-in-laos/
On Jul 15, 2:06 pm, lc <lol7...@msn.com> wrote:
> Drug smugglers bribing U.S. agents on Mexico border
> 15 Jul 2008 17:02:44 GMT Reuters By Robin Emmotthttp://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N15311994.htm