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Monday, March 15, 2021

Mexican Drug Cartels Have Turned Once-Thriving Guadalajara Into a War Zone

"MX" for Borderland Beat

By Nathaniel Janowitz from VICE News

A police officer stands guard outside el sabino, where recently authorities discovered the largest mass grave in Jalisco history. (photo: nathaniel janowitz/Vice News)

GUADALAJARA, Mexico — Early one morning in May 2019, a man stumbled naked through a middle-class neighborhood in central Guadalajara before collapsing on a street corner. He bore obvious signs of torture: His body was covered with cuts and blood. When police raided the nondescript house he’d escaped from, they found a horrific scene: nine living kidnap victims and the skulls of seven others.

Nearly two years later, there's little evidence of the gruesome events that took place at that quaint orange house on Rio Bravo street in an otherwise typical residential neighborhood in central Guadalajara. There’s a small sign saying Clausurado (“Closed”), a padlock secures the front gate, and a weathered flyer for a nearby sushi restaurant hangs off the door.

A neighbor, who declined to give their name, told VICE World News that they'd never heard screams or smelled odd odors, but they’d occasionally heard the sound of “a mechanical drill, like they were preparing something,” coming from the inside of the house. They were never quite sure who was living there, “like, all the time someone would go inside, and afterwards, other people would come and then some would go, and only at night.”

Only when the police came and quarantined the area, and as forensics vehicles lined the street, did the neighbor begin to hear the grisly details of what was an extermination house. The victims described how they were kidnapped and constantly tortured, then one by one others would be brought to a back room and strangled to death. Their bodies were then dismembered and disposed of at separate sites.

In the two weeks following, authorities found two clandestine graves connected to the house, one containing 25 corpses in the municipality of Tlajomulco de Zuñiga, and another with 30 bodies in the El Campanario neighborhood of the Zapopan municipality, which at that point was the largest grave in Jalisco history.

But it wouldn't hold that record for long. The discovery of the Rio Bravo house broke a dreadful levy, and a flood of similar kill houses and mass graves began to appear across the city.

THIS QUAINT ORANGE HOUSE ON RIO BRAVO STREET WAS A CARTEL EXTERMINATION HOUSE. (PHOTO: NATHANIEL JANOWITZ/VICE NEWS)​

Isabel Velarde drank an iced frappuccino in a coffee shop, wistfully recalling her teenage years in the early ’80s, when she'd stay out late with her friends in her hometown of Guadalajara, the state capital of Jalisco and one of Mexico's most populous cities. Back then, she and her friends had little fear of the renowned drug traffickers based there, known as the Guadalajara Cartel, because “they had codes.”

“No one bothered us. It was the opposite: They protected us,” said Velarde.

The oft-mythologized story of the Guadalajara Cartel was most recently featured on the Netflix series Narcos Mexico, which details how the demise of what's broadly considered the country's first modern drug cartel spawned numerous infamous and brutal kingpins, like Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán and Amado Carrillo Fuentes, known as the Lord of the Skies.

But even after the eponymous cartel fragmented around 1990, the city of Guadalajara remained a relatively safe haven for narcos to live and raise their families, and especially to launder money. The influx of cash helped Guadalajara become Mexico's second city and an economic and cultural hub, like the Chicago to Mexico City's New York/Washington/LA hybrid.

The Guadalajara Cartel is history now, and a new cartel has taken on the state's name: the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, known by its Spanish acronym CJNG. The rise of the CJNG over the past decade ties directly to the downward spiral of Guadalajara and the rest of the state into violent disorder. Since December 2018, Jalisco has registered more disappearances than any other Mexican state, accounting for more than 20 percent of all cases in Mexico.

“The government doesn't have order. There's no longer a rule of law,” said Velarde, visibly upset. “It's a narco-state.”

Please use this hyperlink to view the full story at VICE News

44 comments:

  1. I was in Guadalajara in 2018, and it is a stunningly beautiful place, but I did see the aftermath of a killing, early in the AM, in a Los Oblatos colonia, the fog was still in the street.

    in the downtown central area, there is a monument to the disappeared, thousands of people on a mural, it's a beautiful but haunting image.

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    1. @J: What You described in Your post is exactly how Guadalajara was portrayed in NARCOS: MEXICO. What a stunning city—with breathtaking architecture and masonry work.

      But every city has its dark side.

      M.F.

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    2. The dark side in Jalisco or Guadalajara or anywhere México is the state government whose state police lift people off the street with all the impunity in the world and squeeze their victims of money and property because that is all that matter to the governor in charge.
      Any state with high levels of crime can be surely declared a disaster state because somebody is or wants to be governor.
      From the BC to the gulf states to the yucatan and chiapas, and guerrero, proof is the puddings of mass graves found all over México and governors already convicted and accused.
      Military and federal elements on the scene just come and go for the oppertunity to make coin, not waves, remember Morelos' graco ramirez of PRD party who turned from a socialist into a pinochet/franco practicing follower while "his" state drowned in crime and drugs courtesy of his friends and police while he kissed EPN's ass every chance he got along with all the progressive governors now wanted, hiding, or under arrest...
      --We need to grow the fack up and stop blaming everything on the cartels of mostly illiterate drug friends, Casas de la Muerte in Cd Juarez were proven to be SINS OF CHIHUAHUA STATE POLICE.

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  2. El Cholo From N.P controls Guadalajara with support of SINALOA mercenarys that's why Mencho had to make a video Snitching on the GOVERNOR. Viejo mmugroso Del Mencho can't handle the hummilliation CDS and N.P are giving him all over Jalisco 😀 and this State supposed to be the HEART of his Organization 😭

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    1. 10:41 trolling much? 🤣

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    2. @12:55 Read the full story on VICE if you don’t believe him.

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    3. 10:41 are you high??? CJNG controls Guadalajara

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    4. Gueys dont fead the troll🧝😂

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    5. CJNG controls shit, they are bitching because the governor they took to power enrique alfaro has betrayed and sold their arses down the river like cheap leaky chalupas.
      As seen in Nayarit, Tamaulipas, Veraceuz, Zacatecas, etc, it is not the narcos, but the state government's fault.

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    6. 10:41am KNOWS NOTHING about what he’s talking as I’d he’s full of inside info. Get a job.

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    7. 10:41 STOP copying MY STYLE and posting nonsense COMMENTS!! Your MAKING me look BAD..

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    8. Al Cholo se le acabo el corrido.

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  3. This mfs makes other crime groups around the globe looks like amateurs! Even colombia or Brazil dont have shit like this

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    1. Nothing new happening in Guadalajara thats not been done elsewhere but in other coutries theres no dumb ass criminal grouos to do shit so in the open cus in other countries like colombia or italy the goverment has balls enough to order the kill or capture of any boss that gets out of line like el mencho. He wld be dead or in prison elsewhere. But in mexico where the goverment wld sell their mamas for dollars he gets awaay with this shit.

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    2. The biggest mafias are never in the news..these guys are clowns abusing the citizens..you are a baboso.

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    3. 241 baboso being too nice I say worst this parrot repeats the same stink over and over

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  4. El Mencho aka El Torcido betrayed El Señor Nacho Coronel and brought war and misery to Jalisco.
    Look at Culiacan Sinaloa it is a model city in all of Mexico because los Patrones respect the civilians.

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    1. 12:56 only people dying in Culiacan are those tied directly to criminal organizations. Innocent people don't get kidnapped and tortured by tweekers like they do in Jalisco and michoacan

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    2. 2:13
      Sinaloan criminals regularly kidnap innocent people especially U.S. citizens and hold them for ransom.

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    3. You most be new 2:13 CDS complete scum and when they cant scumbag you they will tell on you

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    4. 2:13 sure bro just like the kids in tj that got killed and burned by cds im sure those kids did something horrible to deserve what happened to them, in culiacan they do the same shit but people dont talk aboit it cause if they do they end up the same way, cds are the bigest rats and hipocrits

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    5. 213 my question how about all the kidnapped raped femicides. 213-excuse " well they deserve it cause there related to someone in criminal org so its ok

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    6. Estás pendejo. Que te hace pensar que estos eran inocentes? Yo voy a Jalisco cada dos años. Desde Guadalajara hasta la costa en Barra de Navidad. Toda esa área es de Mencho. Toda mi familia vive por esas partes y todo tranquilo. Cálmate morro!

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    7. Sicario 006 doesn’t know anything. Mancho didn’t betray anyone. He became boss by default. Just like most of the current leaders of the other cartels.

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    8. Chena, who is saying these were innocents? Who are you replying to?

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    9. 12:03 - The dude that says that only the ones en la maña get killed in Culiacán. He’s implying the ones dying in Guadalajara were innocent.

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  5. I live in GDL,the amount of new construction of high rise luxury condos is unbelievable,most stay empty suchas in chapultepec ...so its obviously laundered money...the US turn a blind eye as long as the moneys spent on infrastucture...a beautiful GDL is a buffer city for the states !
    The Tapatios are accustomed to the violence and love the narcos...we have narcos as neighbours in an upper middle class barrio....they reap what they sow !

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    1. I lived in Jalisco, Chapala, Jocotepec and Zapopan in Plaza Andares from 2016-2019 and I felt the same way. There was more building than anywhere including the US.

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    2. "the US turn a blind eye"
      Err its Mexico isnt it?What do you want the US to do?

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    3. Too many non-tourist murricans in México, only when they get caught or killed does the US make waves, feigning innocence as in the Camarena case, or the Zapata murdered by Zetas or the US marinas supposably attacked by El Barbas, BUT they accused Henarco Garcia Luna's police who went and changed into their police uniforms before coming to investigate the "attack", now i suspect it was STAGED to heat it up VS el barbas beltran leyva.
      Genarco was generiusly funded by the Mierda Initiative to topple mexican cartels in a war on Drugs that left the business orphaned for Alvaro Uribe Velez and his US partners...

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  6. If SNITCHALOAS would STAY in SINALOA and NOT try to invade JALISCO, there would be way less KILLINGS

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    1. I always see you on every comment I assume it’s all one person because of the keyboard pattern but I just want to say stop being a keyboard warrior and go outside man damn you’re almost in the same level as that one dude that keeps talking about special ops for Chapo and the other scottish zeta guy

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    2. 2:39 jalisco has been the chamberpot of criminals since the narco-priista Grandfathers of present jalisca governments murdered Cristero General Goroztieta after surrendering to him...since then, the church and federal government reconciled kissed and made out, now including La Luz Del Mundo Church...

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    3. Sinaloa is all over mixed in with big numbers I assume. I’d see Sinaloa tags everywhere the years I lived there. They rode around like they owned the place. From beaters to real nice brand new Town Cars with aftermarket rims obviously ballers. Anybody smart enough to legally make that money there is smart enough to not destroy it looking so tacky.

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    4. 3:26 IF you ALWAYS see my comment that means YOUR on this page as MUCH as I am
      At least I contribute to the COMMENT section with INTERESTING facts.. Why don't YOU try THAT instead of whining LIKE a LITTLE kid 😆

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    5. 3:26 Thank you!

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    6. It was really Nacho that controlled most of Guadalajara. Since his death Sinaloa has been fighting like hell to keep it. But most of the fighting is in Trajomulco de Zúñiga.

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    7. 3:26 is a young kid. Always with some ignorant BS and emojis

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    8. "dude that keeps talking about special ops for Chapo and the other scottish zeta guy"
      It really is some boring ass shit

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    9. Guadalajara was an open city ecen Oziel Cardenas used to chill over there had ranches in jalisco.

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  7. Theres a vid of those torture house in gdl where they are cutting people up, it sounded like they were training the young new members by what they were telling them. The vids on a gore site.

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  8. Isabel Velarde is out of her mind when she said cartels had codes back in those days. That they will protect you. My ass they will protect you. The difference between now and then is the fact that then it was just one cartel in those areas. When the one big cartel split. War started. And is ongoing since 1990.

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