Small Wars Journal: Mexican Cartel Tactical Note #29

Mexican Cartel Tactical Note #29: By Robert J. Bunker and Marisa Mendoza

Vehicular Ramps Used to Bypass Border Fencing, "As borders tighten, smugglers raise their game"

  Photos from Border Patrol-Campo Ca

…Ongoing measures to erect 670 miles of new fence on the border are credited with helping to cut arrests to some 870,000 last year from 1.1 million. Nevertheless, smugglers are trying and, in many cases succeeding, in breaching every kind of barrier thrown in their paths.

Sturdy steel posts have been sunk in the ground in many areas to stop vehicles crossing north, although drug traffickers have responded by building elaborate vehicle ramps to drive cars over the top, border police say.

“It’s like the old show ‘The Dukes of Hazzard,’ cars flying through the air,” said James Jacques, a supervisory Border Patrol in San Diego, Calif.

Illegal border crossers are also routinely beating pedestrian barriers using ladders tailor-made in clandestine Mexican workshops, border police say, while others have used screwdrivers to try to clamber over new 14-foot tall, steel-mesh barriers designed to deny handholds.

One such attempt was foiled. “It took the man a while, and by the time he got to the top, we were waiting for him,” said Andrew Patterson, a Border Patrol agent in Yuma, Arizona…

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Silvestre Piolo Blas: From Professional Soccer Player to Heroin Trafficker

An Original Borderland Beat Story written by Chuck B Almada

***Note From Chuck: Hi to all Borderland followers and fans, I had to take a brief hiatus from contributing to the blog due to professional and educational reasons, but now I am happy to be back full of energy and eager to report on important stories and issues that matter to all of us. For the past few days, I have been working on this story, a story that perhaps none of you have heard about. This story is by far an exclusive to Borderland Beat and I hope you all enjoy it. This story was possible thanks to information received from reliable sources and also with information obtained through the Open Records Act that helped corroborate some of those facts***

ATLANTA, GA- Early this month, several Spanish language outlets, including Univision, ESPN Deportes, El Debate, and even the Official Twitter account of Monarcas Morelia announced the death of former professional soccer player, Silvestre Blas Fierros better known as “Piolo.”  Up until today, the details surrounding the death of the 23 year old were unknown. Univision originally reported:

“Through social media, Monarcas Morelia revealed that their former player, Silvestre Blas Fierros died this past Wednesday from unknown causes in the United States. Blas Fierros lived in the United States after leaving Monarcas Morelia, the team in which he debuted in 2014 against Necaxa when he was 20 years old. As of right now, there has been no information regarding the death of the soccer player. In their Twitter message, Monarcas Morelia limited their information to only sending their condolences to the family of the soccer player" (Univision, 2017)

After conducting extensive research throughout the web, all news outlets contained similar information as the above statement, with none mentioning details surrounding the soccer player’s death. Through several reliable sources, Borderland Beat received exclusive information regarding the death of Piolo and his activities in the United States prior to his death.

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Border Patrol Tunnel Rats

By Javier,  Guest reporter Borderland Beat

They are called "tunnel rats", when referring to the U.S. Border Patrol agents who descend  into underground Narco Tunnel that have appeared along the U.S., Mexico border over the past 20 years.  What may appear clear above ground, could have border patrol on duty below the surface.

Sinaloa Cartel  capo Chapo Guzmán, is credited as the innovator behind the drug tunnels, used primarily to traffic drugs.  But the most infamous usage of the Guzmán tunnels, which increasingly have become very sophisticated over the years, was on  the night of July 11, 2015, when chapo disappeared into the underside of his prison cell shower, descending a ladder,  to the tunnel, hopped on a motorbike and exited to freedom.  Albeit, for only six months.

Arguably, the greatest factor of Sinaloa’s trafficking success, are the tunnels. It provides  the ability to transport drugs, in bulk,  to its number one customer, the United States.

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International coaine trafficker of the Comorra Mafia in Napoli arrested in Tamaulipas

Translated by Otis B Fly-Wheel for Borderland Beat from a Milenio article

Subject Matter: La Cosa Nostra, Italian Mafia, Tamaulipas
Recommendation: No prior subject matter knowledge required

Giulio Perrone, alleged member of the Italian Mafia from Napoli, has been sought by law enforcement for 10 years for his probable responsibility in international cocaine trafficking.

Giulio Perrone, alleged leader of the Italian mafia in Napoli, was detained by elements of the PGR in Tamaulipas, for his alleged involvement in international cocaine trafficking.

The detainee, 64 years of age, originally from the province of Gragnano, Italy, had a red notification in Interpol and a sentence of 20 years, 11 months and eight days in prison, handed down by the Napoli court.

Perrone, who has been for 10 years in the list of most sought after fugitives by the Italian Government, delivered by the authorities of his country.

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Arturo Beltran Leyva, the life, the death of "El Barbas" part 3 "The final stand of Don Arturo"

Arturo Beltran Leyva, the life, the death of "El Barbas" part 3 "The final stand of Don Arturo"

Written for Borderland Beat by Otis B Fly-Wheel, with additional material and photos the BB archive.

Subject Matter: Arturo Beltran Leyva, El Barbas, El Fantasma, El Botas Blancas, La Muerte
Recommendation: Read Part 1 of this article here see link
                              Read Part 2 of this article here see link

Born in the cradle of narco's, La Palma ,Badiraguato Sinaloa in December of 1954,though some put his birth day as September 1961. Arutro Beltran Leyva also known by the nicknames, "El Barbas", El Botas Blancas, El Fantasma and La Muerte, he worked with small time poppy growers and learnt his trade from Amado Carrillo Fuentes , and later became known as Jefe de Jefes, boss of bosses. His life was characterized by the extreme violence he visited upon anyone who stood in his way. He was eventually cornered and killed by Mexican Marines with the ELINT intelligence help of the US 7th Special Forces group in Cuernavaca, leading to a power vacuum and the "Hydra Effect".  

Big thanks go out to Chivis and BB's friend Narcomics, for the images. Follow them on Facebook and Instagram @narcomicscorp

Reporter: Otis B Fly-Wheel

An alliance with the Executioner
As Don Arturo made his plans to take what he saw as rightfully his from the Sinaloa Federation, he realized that he would not be able to do it with the personnel available to him in the BLO. Despite the large amount of crews in his organization ( see crews section in Arturo Beltran Leyva part 2 ), he saw common ground with Los Zetas.

Los Zetas were unhappy at this time with Osiel Cardenas Guillen from the Cartel del Golfo and were making their own plans to split from their parent organization and seize power for themselves. Leading Los Zetas at this time were Heriberto Lazcano Lazcano, "The Executioner" and Miguel Trevino "El Z-40". Los Zetas also found common ground with Arturo in his willingness to resort to horrific violence to achieve his aims as a first resort.

Arturo arranged a meeting with the heads of Los Zetas in Torreon, Coahuila. At this meeting it was agreed that three cities were key to their plans for domination. Torreon, Acapulco and Aguascaliente. Torreon was a strategic city for drug trafficking and was previously dominated by the Sinaloa Federation.

The war for Torreon was defined when Los Zetas/BLO alliance attacked Carlos Herrera Araluce in Gomez Palacio, Durango, who was key for the Federation in the city. By some miracle Herrera Araluce and his wife survived the attack, and immediately left the country for Spain. Los Zetas then delivered an ultimatum to Lawyer Alberto Romero, who later disappeared in the form of a letter and a video showing the torture of a Police commander of Coahuila, Enrique Ruiz Arevalo.

The Federation and the Juarez cartel retreated from Torreon, next was Acapulco, and another campaign of be-headings, kidnapping, and executions saw the Federation driven from the town. Lastly was Aguascalientes, which suffered the same fate as the other two cities with the Federation being driven out and BLO/Zetas sharing the plaza.

To dethrone the Federation, El Chapo and El Mayo must die

Don Arturo knew that if he was going to kill "El Chapo" Guzman Loera, currently languishing in prison in the USA, that first he would have to get rid of the people protecting him. As Arturo had been in charge of paying off bribes to those in power high up in the Army, PGR and Mexican Government he was uniquely placed to know exactly who to kill. Indeed the Sinaloa Federation had relied on the extravagance of Arturo and his brothers to charm, or bend the arms of those in power so the Federation could continue its drug production, logistics and sales without interference.

Arturo knew that on while El Chapo had holistic protection, to get close, he had to kill those protecting him locally, the Municipal and State Police in Culiacan and the surrounding regions, who were in the position to tip off  El Chapo to any upcoming threats to him or his immediate family.

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The US government is worried 'El Chapo' Guzman's legal team may have cartel infiltrators

Posted via forum by Mica, and republished with the permission of the author Christopher woody. For Business Insider

 

Guzman, right, and defense attorneys Michael Schneider, center right, and Michelle Gelernt, center left, in a court sketch, January 20, 2017. REUTERS/Christine Cornell

 Former Sinaloa cartel kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman has pleaded not guilty to the array of charges against him and his next court date is May 5.

But the legal wrangling around the Mexican capo has not slacked.

In the most recent development, US prosecutors slated to face Guzman in an Eastern District of New York courtroom have asked that US authorities investigate any foreigners added to Guzman's legal team.

US Attorney Robert Capers and Arthur Wyatt, Narcotic and Dangerous Drug Section chief for the Justice Department's Criminal Division, argued that, based on their experience, an unvetted member of the defense team could compromise the case brought by the government.

"If a foreign lawyer or investigator that also was a member of the Sinaloa cartel was united with the defense team, [they] could travel to the United States, review the evidence that is protected, and travel later out of the United States with that knowledge," Capers and Wyatt wrote in a letter to Eastern District judge Brian Cogan.

"If a member of the cartel traveled to the United States and found out the identity of a cooperating Mexican witness, [they] could later travel to Mexico with this information and give the name of the witness to other members of the Sinaloa cartel who could kidnap or kill the family of that witness," the letter added

Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman arrives at Long Island MacArthur airport in New York, January 19, 2017, after his extradition from Mexico. Reuters

The letter was confirmed to Univision by Jose Refugio Rodriguez, one of three Mexican lawyers who represented Guzman in his home country.

He said that while they are not allowed to act as lawyers on Guzman's behalf in the US, they had been advising his current legal team and could visit him in the future.

Refugio Rodriguez said it was the right of prosecutors to look into the background of members of the defense team, but he said he took issue with this specific request as it seemed to cast Guzman's Mexican lawyers as complicit with the kingpin, which he said violated the presumption of innocence

Guzman's defense attorneys, Michael Schneider and Michelle Gelernt outside the federal courthouse in the Brooklyn, New York, January 20, 2017. Reuters / Joe Penney

 In their letter, Capers and Wyatt denied that they did not trust Guzman's Mexican lawyers, but said that in the past "foreign professionals," including lawyers, had used their status to commit crimes and bribe officials.

Guzman's US lawyers — Michael Schneider and Michelle Gelernt, two court-appointed public defenders — criticized the request as a "prohibition" on foreigners joining the defense and said the prosecutors' letter did not offer legal arguments for why "the citizens of other countries are less trustworthy than Americans."

According to Refugio Rodriguez, Guzman's US lawyers have already brought a motion against the request, "because lawyers cannot be treated like criminals."

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Duarte’s wife found abundance she craved

Posted by DD republished from Mexico News Daily

Karime Macias;  "I deserve abundance"

The wife of former Veracruz governor Javier Duarte was a tireless shopper, spending 8 million pesos on clothes, personal articles and luxury hotels during her husband’s first 14 months in office, according to documents obtained by the newspaper Reforma.

Karime Macías Tubilla, who disappeared with her husband last October, spent US $511,740 in the United States, 1.27 million pesos in Mexico and 51,000 pesos in a jewelry store in Brazil between December 2010 and January 2012, a credit card statement revealed.

Macías, believed to be the person who copied the phrase “I deserve abundance” 45 times in a notebook discovered last month in the city of Córdoba, went on shopping sprees in which she spent an average of 675,000 pesos a month, nine times the monthly salary of her husband, now wanted on corruption charges.

The credit card purchases were racked up on an American Express Platinum card in the name of Moisés Mansur Cysneiros, a close friend of Duarte and a presumed accomplice in his alleged embezzlement of public funds.

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La China will return to Baja California Sur

Translated by Otis B Fly-Wheel for Borderland Beat from a Zetatijuana article

Subject Matter: La China, Melissa Calderon Ojeda
Recommendation: No prior subject matter knowledge required

The transfer of Melisa Calderon Ojeda aka La China, to a Federal penitentiary in the State of Morelos was illegal, estimates a Judge of La Paz district, who conceded an amparo and ordered that she be returned to the penitentiary from which she was transferred in March of 2016.

Reporter: Luis Carlos Sainz
Due to penitentiary authorities in Baja California Sur illegaly moving the ex Jefa de Sicarios of the Las Fuerzas Especiales de Damaso, Meliso Calderon Ojeda, a Federal Judge conceded an amparo and ordered her return to La Paz penitentiary.

Melisa Margarita Calderon Ojeda is currently imprisoned in Cefereso No. 16 Femenil in Caotlan del Rio, in the State of Morelos, however, her return to her former penitentiary will depend on resolving the revision that was put before the Public Ministry of the Federation.

Her original transfer was agreed to because she required special forms of security or vigilance, so the authorities in BCS solicited a space for her in the Morelos Maximum Security Prison, and commissioned the OADPRS with base in Mexico City to authorise her transfer, which they did on 23rd of March 2016.

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Sinaloa Cartel Sicario arrested in Tijuana

Original article available at El Mexicano
Translated by El Wachito

Elements of the Preventive State Police (PEP) captured Sicario that had links to the Sinaloa Cartel. He was found in possession of a modern assault rifle that had capabilities to perforate armored vehicles of the highest bulletproof grade. 

He was detained in Colonia Planetario, delegacion San Antonio de los Buenos.

At the moment of his arrest, he was traveling at high speeds. The gun was of caliber 5.56 and attached a grenade launcher.

According to the PEP, at the moment of the arrest, the Sicario was heading to a location where he would locate a Cartel de Jalisco Nueva Generacion(CNJG) member to execute him.

According to ZETA, the Sicario is identified as Rafael "N', 25 years old, and arrived to Tijuana a month ago from Sinaloa.

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The Santa Fe, Veracruz Grave

The latest report of the exhumation work in the collective grave of Colinas de Santa Fe in Veracruz highlights that most of the remains found in the grave are of young high school and college aged men and women.  The search groups narrate that they haven’t walked through half of the land and they don’t stop from discovering corpses.  People continue to disappear in Veracruz, in the context of the war declared by the delinquency against the local government.  240 bodies from 170 clandestine graves have been exhumed.

By: Ignacio Carvajal García | Translated by Valor for Borderland Beat

Mexico City/Veracruz, March 7, 2017— Blogexpediente had access to the latest report on exhumation work in the collective graves of Colinas de Santa Fe, and what stands out the most of the 240 bodies exhumed so far is that they mostly consist of young people.

The last cutoff on the works in the collective graves of Colinas de Santa Fe state that 240 bodies from 117 clandestine graves have been exhumed.

And in the middle of the cluster of bodies, the mothers of the collective Solecito, who are actively working in this grave, what has surprised them is the high number of young people among the victims.

“Most of them are young people, women and guys, although people with gray hairs have also been found, despite the advanced state of decomposition, that detail has been observed,” said a source close to the work on the grave, at the request of anonymity.

Among the findings of the various graves, which show the slaughter of young people; clothing, footwear, and intimate clothing corresponding to the ages of 14 and 25 are also abundant.

The information that this medium accessed shows that the finding of bodies far from diminishing increases, and these graves are not even half of the terrain.

The last cutoff on the works in the collective graves of Colinas de Santa Fe state that 240 bodies from 117 clandestine graves have been exhumed. Photo: Cuartoscuro Archive

They consist of 125 graves located until the beginning of March, of which 177 have been worked on, which have resulted in the findings of 240 skulls, which is equal to the number of victims, more than half, correspond to boys who were high school or college aged.

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"El Kevin" Found executed in Navolato

Original article available at ZETA
Translated by El Wachito

Julio Oscar Ortiz Vega, alias "El Kevin" was found dead -encobijado- last Sunday, in the parking lot of a mall in Navolato, Sinaloa, his body -had signs of bullet wounds- has already been claimed by his family, according to Denise Maerker. This information was also confirmed by the local newspaper El Noroeste.

"El Kevin" was rescue by an armed commando of 50 sicarios, last September 30th, after ambushing a military convoy that was protecting an ambulance of the Mexican Red Cross, in Culiacan. El Kevin was medically treated by military personnel in an hospital of Badiraguato, after a firefight.

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El Lucifer, head of Sicarios for Fuerzas Especiales del Damaso arrested in BCS

Translated by Otis B Fly-Wheel for Borderland Beat from a Zetatijuana article with additional picture from the Borderland Beat archive

Subject Matter: El Lucifer, Las Fuerzas Especiales de Los Damaso
Recommendation: See Link to article on El Lucifer

On Monday afternoon, March 6, in the streets of San José del Cabo, Los Cabos municipality, in Baja California Sur, "El Lucifer", an alleged plaza leader and chief of Sicarios for the Dámaso Special Forces (FED), was arrested. 

According to data obtained by ZETA, a surprise operation was carried out to identify the occupants of vehicles with tinted windows, to find arms and drugs that are flooding the conflict zone, in calles Batalla de Puebla and Eduardo Rodriguez in the El Zacatal colonia. They stopped a particular vehicle and captured the Jefe de Plaza in La Paz and Los Cabos, together with two women of approximately 18 years of age.

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Juan Carlos Sierra Santana, leader of Los Viagras shot dead in confrontation

Translated by Otis B Fly-Wheel for Borderland Beat from a Proceso article

Subject Matter: Los Viagras, Michoacan
Recommendation: See link to article by Chivis on Juan Carlos Sierra Santana

Reporter: Francisco J Castellanos
Juan Carlos Sierra Santana, La Sopa, one of the seven brothers that heads the criminal organization Los Viagras ( Otis: also see Fuerzas Rurales Michoacan), lead by El Gordo Santana, was taken down Sunday afternoon during a confrontation with antagonistic groups in the limits of this town and Buenavista, informed sources from the SSP and the Army.

La Sopa was killed by wounds sustained by bullets. The confrontation was reported by the authorities, but the local Police did not intervene. At the site of the confrontation hundreds of rounds, rifle magazines, rifles, 40 mm grenades and tactical equipment was confiscated.

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He Livestreamed About the Cartels—Until He Was Shot Dead

By: Andrea Noel Republished from The Daily Beast

TIJUANA—After a long day of driving and livestream reporting from the narco hotbed of Guerrero state, Cecilio Pineda Birto took his dusty car to a local carwash in the sleepy little riverside town of Pungarabato on Thursday evening.

There, while Pineda was resting in a hammock and waiting for his newly washed car, two men opened fire on him then fled the scene on a motorcycle with the murder weapon in hand.

But the closest witnesses to the attack—the carwash attendants—were not questioned by authorities, as they immediately went into hiding, state attorney general Xavier Olea Peláez said.

First responders were unable to revive the journalist, who had reported for local and national media outlets like La Voz de Tierra Caliente and El Universal. He was soon after pronounced dead, just past 7:30 p.m.

Pineda covered the crime beat and had made a name for himself as a fearless journalist working to keep his community informed, often livestreaming on-the-scene reporting to his more than 31,000 Facebook followers, as he did on Thursday, just hours before his death.

That afternoon, while driving along a Guerrero highway, cellphone in hand, he complained in a livestream about the local and state government’s inaction, corruption, and collusion with dangerous and organized criminals—as he so often did.

His target in what would be his final video was Raybel Jacobo de Almonte, a criminal more commonly known as El Tequilero—the subject of an ongoing, statewide, months-long, failed manhunt. More specifically, he spoke out against the authorities and public officials who are believed to grant Almonte official protection and collude with his criminal underlings.

“Even the hitmen for El Tequilero … have revealed his location,” Pineda said, referring to the feared criminal organization known as Los Tequileros. “The government does not want to arrest them, even though they know exactly where they are.”

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CJNG the winner in the war between narcos

Translated by Otis B Fly-Wheel for Borderland Beat from an El Debate article

Subject Matter: Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generacion
Recommendation: No prior subject matter knowledge required

There is a Federal intelligence report that analyzed the involvement of the most dangerous cartel of the last six years, as the most dangerous in 2016.

The document affirms that in the last year the criminal group led by Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, El Mencho, and the Gonzalez Valencia family, who go by the nickname Los Cuinis, have consolidated a meteoric rise in the strategy of expansion, where they control almost totally six coastal states of the country, Colima, Jalisco, Michoacan, Guerrero and the two of Baja California, and are exercising power in zones that were historically in the hands of other groups.

The other zones are the states of Nuevo Leon, San Luis Potosi, Tamaulipas, Veracruz, Morelos, Puebla, Quintana Roo and Mexico state. The organizations that, according to the document have been resisting the advance of the CJNG are; The Pacific Cartel, The Cartel del Golfo, Los Zetas, The Knights Templar and La Familia Michoacana.

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