Crime Time

Cartel Watch: DFW 'command-control' center for dope

The execution hit on a Mexican lawyer a few weeks back in Southlake surprised a lot of people.

But law enforcement officials and analysts say the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex is now a key “command and control” center for moving drugs and people across the country.

“When you have these kinds of incidents in your nicer communities, it really resonates and brings home the cartels’ reach,” said Fred Burton, a security analyst with Austin-based Stratfor Global Intelligence who monitors the cartels.

“There’s a perception that these guys don’t do that kind of stuff here, but in reality they do. They are selective, but if they do want to kill somebody, they’ve been successful in doing it, as evidenced by what happened in Southlake.

“If you are in a large city in America, in all likelihood there is a cartel presence there. No city is untouched anymore.” 

Star-Telegram Staff writer Steve Campbell reports.

-- Bill Miller

Two more details about Southlake shooting

Add caliber of weapon and the style of the escape vehicle to what is known about the killing of a lawyer from Mexico in Southlake nearly two weeks ago.

Authorities would not confirm late last week some reports that Juan Jesus Guerrero Chapa had been an informant for federal officials.

But authorities they did report that the gunman likely used a 9 mm handgun to kill the lawyer and then fled in a Toyota Sequoia.

Guerrero, 43, was in the passenger seat while his wife loaded shopping bags into their Range Rover when the shooting occurred May 22.

Deanna Boyd has this update.

-- Bill Miller

Read more here: http://www.star-telegram.com/2013/06/01/4899144/police-release-new-details-in.html#storylink=cpy

Cartel Watch: Investigative report describes cartels' Metroplex movements

We just watched a report by NBC 5 Investigates about how Mexican drug cartels are sending members to North Texas.

Federal agents say they're setting up “command and control” units to direct drug shipments all over the country.

NBC 5's Scott Friedman reported that the Drug Enforcement Administration says this is a dramatic change they’ve noticed for about six years.

“You name it," said at DEA official. "There’s no city limits sign for these guys. Wherever they can fit in, they’ll move in, sometimes as normally as a normal family.”

Scott and company did a terrific job on this report, which should alarm everyone. See it here.

-- Bill Miller

 

Kaufman killings: Gov. Perry raises drug cartel theory

A white supremacist prison gang, a disgruntled former county official, a caller to tip line ....

All have surfaced in the wake of the slayings Saturday of Kaufman DA Mike McLelland and his wife, Cynthia.

Investigators haven't yet named anyone as actual suspects, and the tip line caller has been arrested for making a threat, not the killings.

But, while speculation swirls in the case, Gov. Rick Perry has added drug cartels to the mix.

"We know the drug cartels are very, very active in this country," Perry said Wednesday. "It goes back to the whole issue of border security and the failure of the federal government ... to expend the dollars necessary to secure the border with Mexico."

Read more in this report, which includes material from Bill Hanna of the Star-Telegram, The Associated Press, the San Antonio Express-News and the Los Angeles Times.

-- Bill Miller

 

 

 

Cartel Watch: Drug gangs bury their own

Heavy gunfire on March 10 raked the streets of Reynosa, Mexico, a border city across from McAllen, Texas.

The violence lasted several hours, leaving burned and bullet-ridden vehicles smoldering in several neighborhoods.

The death, officials say, was only two.

But the men who handle the city’s dead insist the real figure is dozens more, and perhaps more than 50.

"Physically, there are no bodies," said Ramon Martinez, director of Funerales San Jose in Reynosa, who put the toll at between 40 and 50. "It’s very delicate."

Ask where those bodies are, and people get scared.

Cartel members, some say, are burying their own casualties.

Observers point out that, without an accurate death toll, the seriousness of drug turf battles south of the border is underplayed.

Read the complete story by Christopher Sherman of The Associated Press.

— Bill Miller

Cartel Watch: Beauty queen snared by narco culture's tangled web

A year ago beauty contestant Maria Susana Flores was pursuing a full calendar of pageants, including one as far away as China.

She had the chance to compete for the coveted Miss Sinaloa title, and then, Miss Mexico.

But "Susy" had also chosen another path at the crossroads of power and beauty in Sinaloa -- a Mexican state known for drug lords and pageant queens.

In November, she died holding AK-47 in a spray of gunfire from Mexican special forces troops.

"I swear," said her mother, "I would have never imagined, ever in my life, that my daughter would die like this."

Susy's fate took the fateful turn when she started dating a drug cartel soldier.

It's all here in this report by Adriana Gomez Licon of The Associated Press

Cartel Watch: 'El Chapo' as infamous as 'Scarface' in Chicago

A drug kingpin in Mexico who has never set foot in Chicago has been named the city's new Public Enemy No. 1 - the same notorious label assigned to Al Capone at the height of the Prohibition-era gang wars.

The Chicago Crime Commission announced the move last week, saying it considers Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman (above) even more menacing than Capone because he's the leader of the Sinaloa cartel, which supplies most of the narcotics sold in the city.

"What Al Capone (right) was to beer and whiskey during Prohibition, Guzman is to narcotics," said Art Bilek, the commission's executive vice president. "Of the two, Guzman is by far the greater threat. ... And he has more power and financial capability than Capone ever dreamed of."

The Associated Press has more information on this.

Read more here: http://www.star-telegram.com/2013/02/14/4620565/cartel-kingpin-chicagos-new-public.html#storylink=cpy

 

Police chief in Cartel border stronghold is missing, police say

The police chief of the violent Mexican border city of Nuevo Laredo is missing, according to reports.

An investigation was underway Monday into the disappearance of Roberto Balmori Garza.

Local media reported that two of Balmori Garza's brothers were found shot dead Sunday inside the trunk of a car in the neighboring state of Nuevo Leon. One of his brothers was a federal investigator, media reported.

Nuevo Laredo, a stronghold of the Zetas drug cartel, has been the scene of bloody drug-gang turf battles since the beginning of the year.

Read more here: http://www.star-telegram.com/2013/02/18/4628250/police-chief-of-mexico-border.html#storylink=cpy

The Associated Press has this story.

Read more here: http://www.star-telegram.com/2013/02/18/4628251/police-chief-of-mexico-border.html#storylink=cpy

Cartel Watch: El Wicho gets 7 years; border county employees helped Zetas; ruthless gang nabbed

It has been awhile since we posted a Cartel Watch, so to get caught up, we direct you to these headlines from The Associated Press:

Matamoros cartel boss 'El Wicho' sentenced to seven years

Ex-border county workers plead guilty to charges

Drug gang nabbed in 16 killings, dismemberments near Mexico City

-- Bill Miller

Cartel Watch: Christmas dinner turns into bloodbath in war between 'El Chapo' and Zetas' allies

A group of armed men stormed a town in the mountains of the western state of Sinaloa on Christmas Eve and shot nine men to death with assault weapons, then dumped their bodies on a sports field as part of a war between Mexico's two most powerful cartels, officials said Wednesday.

They said El Platanar de Los Ontiveros had become part of a dispute between the Sinaloa cartel controlled by Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, Mexico's most-wanted man (shown here), and remnants of the Beltran-Leyva cartel who have allied themselves with the Zetas, a paramilitary organized-crime group founded by ex-members of the Mexican special forces.

The nine victims were eating Christmas dinner when gunmen entered the town on foot, surrounded them, and opened fire with assault rifles.

They decapitated one victim with a machete and dumped the bodies on field, officials said.

The army had set up a checkpoint nearby to hunt for drugs, but the killers had avoided it by entering the town on foot.

Read more in this report from The Associated Press.

Read more here: http://www.star-telegram.com/2012/12/26/4508317/9-slain-in-mexican-town-as-cartels.html#storylink=cpy