Culiacan Public Security Director Sergio Leyva-Lopez Resigns After 7 Municipal Police Officers Arrested & Released for Protecting Los Chapitos Linked Agent

"Socalj" for Borderland Beat

Following the resignation of Sergio Antonio Leyva López as Secretary of Public Security and Municipal Transit of Culiacán, local authorities are seeking a new director, one with a military background.

His resignation came after seven Culiacan Municipal Police Officers were arrested after an altercation they had outside of a medical clinic with state agents investigating two men who were admitted to the clinic with gunshot wounds. 

However, Mayor of Culiacán Juan de Dios Gámez Mendívil asserted that his resignation was for "personal reasons" unrelated to these events.

UPDATE: On June 5, the seven police officers were released from custody in Mexico with no charges being filed.

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Drone Footage Captures Explosive Attack Between Rival Gulf Cartel Factions

"Enojon" for Borderland Beat 

(Still image of drone attack against 'Los Metros' convoy)

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SUV With Anti-Drone Armor Seized After Shootout in Costa Rica Town of Culiacan, Sinaloa

 "Enojon" and "Char" for Borderland Beat 

Photograph By Link Sinaloa TV (A modified white Chevrolet Suburban) 

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Tabasco State Police Sound Off on Crimes and Severe Mistrust Within the State

 "Enojon" and "Char" for Borderland Beat

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Los Chapitos Threaten FESC Officials Through Handwritten Banner In Mexicali, Baja California

 "Enojon" For Borderland Beat

Image By: Villalugo Informa (Image of banner hanging from pedestrian bridge)

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2 Police Officers Killed in Guanajuato, Most Dangerous State for Cops With 40 Dead This Year [Updated]

"El Huaso" for Borderland Beat

This afternoon, three Celaya police officers were attacked in two separate events, leaving two dead and the third wounded. 41 police officers have been killed in Guanajuato this year, the most dangerous state for police officers in Mexico.

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After Threats, Municipal Police Resign and Mayor Flees Town of Charapan, Michoacán

By “El Huaso” for Borderland Beat

The Municipal Police force have resigned and the mayor of Charapan, Michoacán has fled the area following threats from criminal actors, joining the 29,000 persons currently displaced by conflict in Mexico.

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Alejandro Camacho Escobar, Guanajuato Sub Secretary of Citizen Security, Killed in Ambush

 By "El Huaso" for Borderland Beat

Yesterday evening, Alejandro Camacho Escobar, the Guanajuato Sub Secretary of Citizen Security, was killed by three armed gunmen in tactical gear while driving outside Guanajuato City.

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Municipal Police Chief of Huitzuco, Guerrero Seriously Injured in Shootout

By "El Huaso" for Borderland Beat

Julio López López speaking on TV, separate event. Photo from API Guerrero.

Julio López López, the director of Municipal security of Huitzuco, Guerrero, was injured in a gunfight with armed civilians on Tuesday night, December 20, 2022. According to a press release, López and several officers were responding to reports of a stolen vehicle between the towns of Eschuchapa and Atopula, to the east of Huitzuco, when they were ambushed around 7 p.m..

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Couple is Attacked and Police Confront Aggressors

Two people were injured this afternoon from projectiles of firearms fired by unidentified assailants.

The injured were a man and a woman who were transported to the hospital who were said to be injured in the intersection of Santiago Troncazo and Durango.

So far authorities have not released the identity of the injured since they were rushed to the hospital before they could be ID'ed.

It also reported that in the vicinity of where the attack was occurred were two units of the municipal police who after they realizing what had happened, rushed to the scene and confronted the attackers.

During the confrontation between police and gunmen there were no reports of any injuries and as is usual, the attackers managed to escaped avoiding arrest.

The two victims are reported to be in serious condition with the woman having received most of the more serious injury.

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44 Police Officers Killed so Far in the State of Chihuahua

Nearly two years after the operation task force was implemented in the state of Chihuahua called "Operation Joint Chihuahua" the numbers of people killed has increased considerably, where also a large number of police officers have been killed in the line of duty .

This operation, besides having a huge economic cost, represents the fight against organized crime, it also comes with a cost of police officers who have lost their lives for the safety of Chihuahua and has taken a major blow to police agencies and families .

The figures highlight that the performance of police officers in 2008 was concentrated in Ciudad Juarez with 91 executed; in Chihuahua there was 48, 6 in the city of Parral, 6 in Villa Ahumada, 5 in Aldama, 3 in Guadalupe Distrito Bravo; 3 in Janos and 2 in Praxedis and G. Guerrero, for a total of 164 slain officers.

Some of those attacks against the police left dismembered a full police forces, like the cases of Aldama, Villa Ahumada, Namiquipa, Janos, Nuevo Casas Grandes and Galeana.

The figures also highlight that in 2009 alone so far at least 44 elements of different police agencies, including military, federal police, ministries, state and municipal police of Chihuahua died in the line of duty.

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Biden Escort Involved in Wreck

By ABQNews Staff

A Bernalillo County Sheriff's deputy escorting Vice President Joe Biden's motorcade was hit this afternoon at Gibson and Carlisle.

Police say a woman drove around two police units blocking the intersection and hit a car driven by a sergeant with BCSO.

No injuries or arrests have been reported, but the sergeant has been taken to Presbyterian Hospital for evaluation.

A sheriff's spokeswoman would not say whether the vice president had already gone through the area at the time of the accident.

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Soldiers wary of often corrupt Mexican police

By OLGA R. RODRIGUEZ and JULIE WATSON

The Associated Press

When soldiers tried to halt a suspicious-looking SUV that was being escorted through Monterrey by a state policeman, the officer radioed for backup. In minutes, police from 40 patrol cars surrounded the troops, drawing their guns and sending the soldiers diving for cover in an hour-long standoff.

Confrontations like that are happening with increasing frequency in Mexico's wealthiest city as soldiers fight corrupt police officers helping drug cartels - in addition to taking on the drug dealers themselves.

This year alone, police and soldiers have confronted one another more than 65 times, The Associated Press has learned - a growing and dangerous trend in the war on drugs.

Things are so bad, the general in charge of army operations in northeastern Mexico told the AP, that he has warned police chiefs his men are ready to open fire on police if it happens again.

"The moment they shoot at us, get in our way, use their guns to protect criminals, they become criminals themselves," said Gen. Guillermo Moreno, who commands troops in Nuevo Leon and Tamaulipas states along the Texas border.

President Felipe Calderon has acknowledged that corruption permeates Mexico's low-paid police at all levels and therefore has opted to combat the billion-dollar drug-smuggling industry by relying primarily on the military, which has seen remarkably fewer cases of bribery by traffickers. His administration also has sent in federal police and soldiers, both of whom are higher paid and usually better educated, to go after police on the take.

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Strike against Mexican cartel began in Roswell

Recently newspapers all over the country published accounts of the nationwide drug bust that brought down a massive Mexican drug cartel's operations in 20 states and netted more than 300 arrests.

But what they didn't say was that a Roswell cop who is a member of the Atlanta High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area task force (HIDTA) and a partner developed the break that led to those nationwide arrests.

When Gwinnett County District Attorney Danny Porter, DEA Atlanta Field Division Special Agent in Charge Rodney G. Benson, HIDTA Director Jack Killorin and Roswell Police Department Chief Ed Williams announced Oct. 28 the arrests of 38 defendants in metro Atlanta, you could excuse Chief Williams for having perhaps the widest smile.

He takes a lot of pride in the fact that his officer played a major role in pushing over a row of dominos that together has crippled drug trafficking in the United States for at least one major drug cartel.

The defendants were arrested Oct. 21 as part of Project Coronado, a nationwide operation that targeted the distribution network "La Familia Michoacana" or "La Familia."

Hundreds of federal, state and local law enforcement officers made the arrests across metropolitan Atlanta.

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Police Charged in Death of Federal Official

The Attorney General's Office through its office in the state of Chihuahua filed criminal charges against members of the municipal police and the state police known as Cipol who are suspected in the murder of the federal public prosecutor Miguel Angel Meneses Maciel who was killed last week.

The police officers implicated in this crime were identified as Robert Garcia Jair Rey, Claudia Mercedes Ramirez Castaneda, Alberto Chairez Hernandez Arnulfo Padilla and Victor Manjarrez, who are police officers of the State Public Security "Cipol." Also charged were Jesus Ortega Eduardo Delgado Luis Delgado and Oscar Clemente who are police members of the Municipal Police.

In this regard, these six individuals were officially ordered to be apprehended for their responsibility in the commission of the crime of homicide, and were also held responsible for attempted murder, abuse of authority and tampering with evidence or facts at the crime scene.

They are said to be responsible for the death of federal prosecutor Miguel Angel Meneses Maciel who was head of the Bureau of Criminal Research in the capital city.

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Disbanding Local Police Forces to Combat Corruption

Mexico's top security official proposed disbanding Mexico's 2,022 municipal police forces and combining them with state law enforcement agencies to better combat corruption and crime.

Local police have fewer resources to fight crime, and their lower salaries make them more susceptible to corruption, Mexican Public Safety Secretary Genaro Garcia Luna said.

"Public safety should be a state policy," he added.

Consolidating police forces would improve communication among officials, he said, and bring greater security to areas where local police have traditionally lacked the means to fight crime. Nearly 90 percent of the country's municipal police forces have staffs of less than 100 people, he said.

Garcia Luna spoke to reporters at the end of a meeting of public safety chiefs from Mexico's 31 states and the capital, where officials presented a report titled "A New Police Model."

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Living the Life of a Police Target

Hours after the killing of a commander of the Municipal Public Security Ministry, officers of all police agencies were threatened by a message written on the wall of an elementary school. The message threatened retaliation against police officers for working with the army and allegedly supporting the cartel of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman.

The lawman, identified as Noel Rosales Martinez, 35, was shot dead yesterday morning with high-powered weapons, as he drove his truck down the avenue Francisco Villarreal Torres, at the intersection of Sorgo Street.

The incident alerted police agencies, especially the city police whose officers were instructed to "keep their guard up" to prevent further attacks.

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Mexican Police Suspect in Chief's Killing

Five police officers and five other suspects were arrested Thursday in the investigation into the assassination of an army general who had been appointed police chief of this northern Mexican town over the weekend.

Brig. Gen. Juan Arturo Esparza was the latest military officer killed after taking over a Mexican municipal police force plagued with corruption. President Felipe Calderon has acknowledged that police forces throughout Mexico are rife with officers in the pay of cartels, and he has relied heavily on the military to fight drug trafficking.

The attack Wednesday had its origins in an illegal quarrying company, said Alejandro Garza y Garza, the Nuevo Leon state attorney general.

He said one of the suspects was facing investigation for operating the company and enlisted the help of a local hotel owner with ties to a powerful drug cartel to intimidate officials in Garcia, a town outside the northern city of Monterrey.

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Tough day for Mexican police

- Agents of the organized crime division of the Mexican federal department of justice (SIEDO) arrested 12 Guerrero state police investigators for apparent connections with narco criminals. The state agents were summoned to an anti-narcotics office to presumably carry out an operation. On arrival, they were disarmed and arrested on federal warrants by SIEDO agents assisted by military units.

- State police in La Union, Guerrero, responding to a report of the discovery of a body, were ambushed by a group of hit men. The attack wounded five of the officers and killed another.

- A federal police commander and an agent were gunned down in Mexicali, Baja California, when they arrived at a residence suspected of narco activity. The attack also wounded another federal agent accompanying them.

- In another incident, a municipal police captain in Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua, was assassinated while driving his personal car.

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Winning Battles, Soon the War?

Mexico continues to improve its federal police forces, with the FBI as its model. The government has concluded that training and education key to improvement and for the past year the federal police have made an effort to recruit college graduates. Increasing pay (to deter the allure of bribes) is another reform.

Improving the federal police, according to government leaders, will have a “trickle down effect” on state and local police – at least that's the idea. The program is another example of President Calderon's “systemic war” (also called systemic reform) to modernize Mexico.

The NGO Reporters Without Borders recently reported that Mexico has become “one of the most dangerous places to work as a reporter...” For years drug cartels have made it a practice to kill pesky journalists.

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