Santa Muerte: Inspired and Ritualistic Killings

Borderland Beat

Dr. Robert Bunker authored a three part report on Santa Muerte for the FBI Bulletin.  On this post I have combined all three parts. 

Prominent in Dr. Bunker’s end notes is the name Tony Kail.   

Mr. Kail has been involved in researching religious cultures for over twenty years. He has served as a Subject Matter Expert (SME) on unfamiliar religious cultures and extremists groups to numerous public safety agencies; he has authored several books on religious cults including Santa Muerte.

I was reminded of a question that derived out of the Jose Treviño trial, I asked Mr. Kail  about it:

Chivis: In the Treviño trial Mamito’s Santeria religion  became a part of his testimony;

The witness was  asked why defendant Colorado Cessa sent him cigars.  "He sent me cigars because of my faith," he further elaborated saying "Santeria is based on the Lacumi beliefs of the Yoruba in Africa... then it came through Cuba with slaves. I sent people to do a cleaning on the part of Colorado."  

He was asked about ritual of animal sacrifice which he ignored probably because it was posed more as a statement than a question, the last remark on District Attorney's Gardner's redirect was, "Santeria doesn't justify killing people...” It was met by silence and Judge Sparks excused the witness.

Chivis: What is the significance of the cigars?

Kail: The use of Santeria is fascinating. The cigar in Santeria is used for two reasons. One it is used as an offering to deities such as Elegua. The smoke from the cigar is blown into the face of the cement stone representing the deity. Cigars may be left in his shrine as well for some of the other deities.

Secondly, it is used in cleansings. The smoke from the cigar is blown by a Santero/Santera onto the body of a client to cleanse them of negative energy. The priest may start at the head and move down the body of the client to cover them with smoke. This cleansing is known as a 'despojo'.

I have seen some cases where cigars were used as a tool to cleanse objects representing clients. For instance, a Santero could take a photo of a client and blow smoke onto the photo while praying to the orishas to cleanse the client.

The act follows a spiritual law observed in magico-religious cultures known as the law of similarity. This law states that if you affect and object that is similar to a person or object, then it will affect it. Affecting the photo would affect the person in the photo.

Chivis: How prevalent is the practice of Santa Muerte among Narcos? And..

1) Is it an accurate statement to say that the majority of Santa Muerte Followers are good people living within the boundaries of law?

2) What becomes so confusing is the 'hybrid' nature of these cults, how does this manifest?

 

3) It appears that Los Zetas has the largest narco following of Santa Muerte, in my state of Coahuila controlled by Zetas, there are many shrines, I have seen 5 shrines myself and the government allows them to stand, even on public land.

Kail: Santa Muerte does seem to be very popular among the narcos. However, the majority of her followers are law abiding citizens who go to her for matters relating to love, social oppression and healing. The narcos are very attracted to her as she has been 'demonized' and creates fear among many communities. There is evidence that she is worshiped among narcos like Zetas and street gangs like the Latin Kings. She is called upon by some police in regions of Mexico that I have seen.

The term 'hybrid' is perfect. Yes, there appears to be a 'Frankenstein' religious culture that the narcos have built that takes pieces from African traditional religions and Latin American folk religions. I have seen evidence of these organizations using Cuban Santeria also known as Regla de Ocha, Palo Mayombe aka Las Reglas de Congo, Puerto Rican Espiritismo, Mexican Curanderismo as well as others. They will take artifacts and rituals and use them for selfish purposes.

I believe they practice 'cultural misappropriation' and take a traditional culture like Santeria that is practiced worldwide without any connection to drugs and misuse the sacred rituals of this religious faith.

I have spoken with ritual specialists who tell stories of people who seek them out to buy their services to perform rituals to harm their enemies. Some of these are members of drug trafficking organizations. Sadly, when groups like this are arrested, members of these faiths that do NOT commit crimes are given a bad name.

I continue to see elements of the magico-religious cultures in the narco culture and in reports of narco activity.

Mr. Kail's books can be found on Amazon or his website.

“La Santisima Muerte,” performed by Necrophobic, from the album Death to All

Santa Muerte: Inspired and Ritualistic Killings by Dr. Robert Bunker

The narcotics wars in Mexico have increased in scope and intensity beginning with President Felipe Caldéron’s December 2006 de facto declaration of war against the cartels and gangs. The deployment of Mexican military forces in counterorganized crime and stability and support roles directly responded to the loss of the country’s control within many regions—identified as areas of impunity—of the country.

Since this conflict began, over 45,000 people have died in the fighting, and the areas of impunity have grown to include wide swaths of territory constituting hundreds of locales now under control of the cartels. The criminal insurgencies waged by the cartels and gangs, centered on a strategy of securing nongovernmental interference with their illicit narcotics and other criminal economic activities, have received much attention and debate. Far less has focused on some of the darker spiritualistic parts of the drug wars.

One component entails the rise of the cartel and gang narcocultura (drug culture) variant of the Cult of Santa Muerte (literally translated as “Holy Death”).² This variant of the cult promotes greater levels of criminality than the more mainstream and older forms of Santa Muerte worship. Sometimes it can be so extreme that it condones morally corrupt behaviors—what many people would consider as resulting from an evil value system that rewards personal gain above all else, promoting the intentional pain and suffering of others, and, even, viewing killing as a pleasurable activity.

While addressing the rise of such dark spirituality requires a balanced perspective (e.g., avoiding a repeat of the Satanism scare of the 1980s), enough ritualistic behaviors, including killings, have occurred in Mexico to leave open the possibility that a spiritual insurgency component of the narcotics wars now exists.

Not all of the narcotics leaders, their foot soldiers, and assassins have remained religious or, alternatively, embraced secularism.

But, evidence suggests that the numbers of defections to the cults that worship a perverted Christian god (e.g., La Familia Michoacána and Los Caballeros Templarios) and the various unsanctioned saints (e.g., Jesús Malverde, Juan Soldado, and Santa Muerte) have grown for years

This rise in deviant spirituality has not come as a surprise. Mexico still contains a significant population of persons living in poverty and feeling disenfranchised by a government system perceived as being based on patron-client relationships and the influence of wealthy ruling families. This underclass produces a disproportionate amount of unsanctioned (folk) saint worshipers—though only a small percentage of them end up as killers for gangs and cartels. Still, many of these men and women who brutalize, torture, and kill others need a way to rationalize their activities.

If not offered solace via mainstream Catholicism, they will seek comfort elsewhere.³ While the adherents of a more benign drug saint, such as Jesús Malverde, can engage in nonreligious killing, others who worship Santa Muerte increasingly appear unable to separate their criminality from their spiritual beliefs.

For U.S. law enforcement agencies, the rise of a criminalized and dark variant of Santa Muerte worship holds many negative implications. Of greatest concern, the inspired and ritualistic killings associated with this cult could cross the border and take place in the United States. 

Dark Spirituality

Santa Muerte ideology has developed in Mexico for approximately a half century and has spread into the United States and Central America. The cult’s popularity has increased with its ties to illicit narcotics trafficking in Mexico in the late 1980s and early 1990s. As a “saint of last resort,” Santa Muerte always has had a following among those who live in extreme circumstances.

As one expert explains, “The Santa Muerte cult could best be described as [following] a set of ritual practices offered on behalf of a supernatural personification of death…she is comparable in theology to supernatural beings or archangels.”⁴

 The cult appears to have more European than Aztecan origins, with some individuals describing Santa Muerte as a new age Grim Reaper-type goddess, a bad-girl counterpart to the Virgin of Guadalupe.⁵ Her imagery includes that of a robed skeleton carrying a scythe and globe or scales. Part of her popularity results from her characterization as nonjudgmental (amoral) and a source of supernatural intervention for her followers who engage in the correct rituals and provide the proper offerings and sacrifices.

Over half of the prayers directed at her include petitions to harm other people via curses and death magic.⁶ Still, many Santa Muerte followers appear benign—typically poor, uneducated, and superstitious individuals who practice a form of unsanctioned saint worship mixed with varying elements of folk Catholicism.

However, a sizeable minority of worshipers follow the fully criminalized variant of Santa Muerte worship steeped in narcocultura. The harsher version has gained popularity in Mexico as the criminal insurgencies taking place in the country have spread and intensified. For most of the cartels’ foot soldiers and their gang associates, brutal deaths prove almost certain. Such a form of imminent mortality facing adherents makes the worship of Santa Muerte spiritually dark.

The death of someone’s enemies, protection from harm (or, at least, hope for a quick and glorious death), cultivation of a dangerous reputation, and ability to enjoy the benefits of fabulous riches—including the company of beautiful women—become paramount. With the stakes so high, the sacrifices and offerings to Santa Muerte have become primeval and barbaric. Rather than plates of food, beer, and tobacco, in some instances, the heads of victims (and presumably their souls) have served as offerings to invoke powerful petitions for divine intervention.

 

Table 1. Santa Muerte Color Significance
Color	Symbolism
Red	Love and passion
Black	Power against enemies
White	Personal protection
Green	Response to injustice/legal issues
Gold	Attempt to attain wealth
Bone	Peace and harmony in life
Blue	Spiritual harmony and concentration
Copper	Removal of negative energies
Purple	Transformation of negative events to positive opportunities
Silver	Luck and success
Seven colors	Properties of the colors gold, silver, copper, black, purple, red, and green
This table serves only as an example. Applicable groups may be syncretic, drawing on multiple belief systems and having different meanings for the same characteristics.
Source: Tony Kail, Santa Muerte: Mexico’s Mysterious Saint of Death (La Vergne, TN: Fringe Research Press, 2010): 128.

 

While not a fully developed religion, Santa Muerte has self-proclaimed priests, temples and shrines, and many ritualized elements. Mexican authorities arrested one high priest, Romo Guillén, on kidnapping charges in December 2010. Individuals in his gang posed as members of the Los Zetas Cartel.⁷ In 2009 he called for holy war against the Catholic Church. During that same year, the Mexican army destroyed numerous Santa Muerte shrines. Members of the Catholic Church and the army see the growth of this cult as a dangerous development.⁸

Santa Muerte rituals vary, and worshipers disagree about some of the symbolism and the proper procedures to gain the spiritual and physical results petitioned. However, adherents generally consider Santa Muerte a jealous and vengeful deity who demands that her followers conduct the rituals and sacrifices properly to avoid her divine wrath.

Candle magic, herbs, oils, amulets, spiritual energy, and various mystical items play an important role (table 1). Often, the colors and mixtures of items employed determine ceremonial intent and arrangement of the altar. Components of the rituals also hold importance. Candles help to focus worshiper concentration and act as a conduit so that Santa Muerte receives the prayers.

Smoke blown, alcoholic drink spit out, and narcotics smeared on statues are thought to help activate them. The bases of candles and statues also may have items or artifacts embedded in them and may be anointed with oils and herbs to enhance their power.

 

More extreme forms of worship involve bowls of blood—animal and human—at the altars and smeared on the religious icons and on the devotee as part of a blood pact.⁹

Part 2:

Killings in Mexico

Similar circumstances have helped link killings in Mexico to Santa Muerte worshipers. While such incidents—including those with ritualized components—represent a small minority of murders perpetrated by Mexican cartels and gangs, enough allegedly have taken place to generate alarm.

• In the rough neighborhood of Tepito, Mexico City, in 2004, authorities arrested a local car thief who later died in prison. A powerful criminal figure, he killed virgins and babies once a year and offered them as sacrifices to Santa Muerte to gain her favor and magical protection.¹⁰
• During 2008 in Nuevo Laredo, Gulf Cartel enforcers captured Sinaloa Cartel members, took them to public Santa Muerte shrines, and executed them. Analysis by a U.S. law enforcement officer suggests that the perpetrators killed them as offerings to Santa Muerte.
• In Ciudad Júarez in 2008, authorities found decapitated and stacked bodies at crime scenes in five separate incidents. Links were inferred to Santa Muerte worshipers.
• In December 2009 and January 2010 in Ciudad Júarez, perpetrators murdered individuals in apparent Santa Muerte ritual killings. Regarding one incident, authorities found at the crime scene the remnants of an apparent altar and the words “Santa Muerte” and cuídanos flakita (take care of us, skinny) spray painted. In the second crime, gang members burned a victim behind a house containing an altar and a small Santa Muerte statue. Interviewed neighbors said that the killers—part of the Hillside 13 Gang—asked for “something big”; as a result, the perpetrators performed multiple human sacrifices.
• In Culiacan in January 2010, a suspect placed a decapitated head by the tomb of deceased cartel leader Arturo Beltran Levya. Earlier, after Beltran Levya was killed in his apartment, authorities found items related to the cult of Santa Muerte, suggesting that one of his former fellow gang members may have presented the head as an offering.
• In April 2010 in Camargo and Miguel Aleman, perpetrators tortured and decapitated individuals, carved the letter “Z” into their chests, and placed the victims’ heads on the roof of a desecrated, graffiti-covered roadside chapel. Based on the graffiti messages, the victims belonged to the Gulf Cartel. The perpetrators comprised members of the Los Zetas Cartel, which has embraced Santa Muerte as its patron saint. Many of the group’s members have tattoos of her image on their upper arm or chest.
• In Cancun in June 2010, investigators found the bodies of six tortured victims, three with their hearts cut out and with the letter “Z” carved into their abdomens, in a cave outside of the resort city. Presumably the killers belonged to the Los Zetas Cartel, and the victims belonged to a competing group.
• In July 2011 in Ciudad Júarez, Mexican police discovered a skeleton dressed as a bride at a Santa Muerte altar in a house used to hold kidnap victims. The perpetrators left two skulls and numerous cigarette packs as offerings. The circumstances behind the origins of the skeleton and skulls—if they were prior cult victims—remain unknown.^{11............................continues on following page................}

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Narco Message Accusing Men of Murder Left at Santa Muerte Altar in Colima City

By "El Huaso" for Borderland Beat

A message naming accused murderers was left on the front door of a shrine to Santa Muerte in Colima City, Colima. Borderland Beat spoke to Santa Muerte expert Dr. Andrew Chesnut to learn the significance of placing a message here.

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Santa Muerte: The Enigmatic Allure of the Beautiful Girl

Guest Reporter..... article from "The Revealer" Republished with permission of the author

By David Metcalfe

With an iconography drawn from the 14th century plague fields of Europe, where she walked behind the name La Parca, and with an ever growing number of devotees drawn from societies marginalized and dispossessed, la Nina Bonita, the Beautiful Girl, has become one of the fastest growing spiritual powers in the 21st century. To some she is known as la Poderosa Señora, the Powerful Lady, an untiring miracle worker and healer helping them to escape the ravages of poverty, sickness, violence and addiction that have become hallmarks of our time. To others, she is Nuestra Señora de las Sombras, Our Lady of the Shadows, an amoral and unflinching companion in their choice to pursue profits and power in the bloody worlds of drug trafficking, kidnapping, extortion, and murder. For those tied to orthodox religious groups and judiciary organizations she is a satanic usurper, a dark and vicious deceiver leading her millions of devotees down the fast road to hell.

Who is this alluring, conflicted and mysterious woman? If you have been paying attention to the news you might know her by her most common name – la Santa Muerte, Saint Death.

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Ciudad Juárez prison interview - sicario human sacrifice to Santa Muerte

Chivis Martinez Borderland Beat-From Small Wars Journal

"Edgar" in Juárez Cereso

Quite a bit if controversy now exists related to the narco variant of Santa Muerte veneration and worship which is very dark in its spirituality and amoral in nature. This is in contrast to more mainstream forms of Santa Muerte spirituality that are folk religion based within the broader Catholicism paradigm. As a result criticisms have now been made that narco variant perceptions are contrived, biased against the religious conventions of Santa Muerte adherents, or even part of some sort of conspiratorial agenda. Transcripts of a prison interview conducted by two Dutch documentary filmmakers—one of whom is a cultural anthropologist who recently completed his PhD focusing on the Mexican drug war—at VISITA CERESO CD with a Juárez Cartel sicario provides another example of the dark spirituality that the narco variant of Santa Muerte spirituality now represents. – The El Centro Senior Fellows

This interview of “Edgar” was conducted by Voeten and Engels, CeReSo, Ciudad Juárez, October 2016. It is an excerpt from the PhD thesis from Teun Voeten, titled: The Mexican Drug Violence: Hybrid Warfare, Predatory Capitalism and the Logic of Cruelty. 274-276. See also: Maaike Engels and Teun Voeten, Sacrifice. Belgian Canvas TV, 2017.

E

dgar is a young man of twenty-six years, and he is doing a ten-year sentence for illegal possession of firearms and kidnapping. He says he has killed nearly sixty people working as a sicario for the Juárez Cartel, but since there is no proof—he is not sharing the details—he cannot be convicted for these murders.

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Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua: Unknown Assailants Vandalize A Santa Muerte Shrine

"Sol Prendido" for Borderland Beat

Video translation is as follows:

Edgar: Little did we know that around the Camino Real Highway there was a place for the Santa Muerte, an altar. There the devotees brought money and other things. Unknown persons came to vandalize it though. Joana, you have the report. 

Joana: Edgar good evening. Acts of vandalism do not discriminate and on this occasion an altar dedicated to the Santa Muerte was affected. It is located on the Camino Real Highway and vandals came along to break its scythe. They came to open the altar because these are people who knew where the disciples who are truly devoted to her were putting their money. They knew where the money was placed for them. They opened it for the very purpose of taking their offerings.

Devotee: I placed her here on the Camino Real Highway because I had made a promise to her. Only she and I know what she fulfilled for me. And that is why she is here. So, I have no anger, I have no grudge against whoever did this to her. I hope that the money they took is used for something good, that they use it for something beneficial.

Joana: This altar is located on the Camino Real Highway, near the intersection of Calle Zoltepec. There the thieves took the money that the faithful leave to the Santa Muerte shrine. They also damaged the altar and the structure of the place. The faithful disciples were upset because they pointed out that there is no respect for the devotion of others. Now what is necessary will be done to protect this altar. And to try to prevent the looting and acts of vandalism.

Edgar: Here we can see the vandalism. Some will ask how is it possible for an altar of the Santa Muerte to be in a public place. Well, it's there. I don't know if the property where they placed this figure belongs to anyone. But it's there for all to see. And there are those who have those beliefs. Others will say that there is only one God. We will leave that up to you.

Canal 44

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Mexico arrests leader of "Santa Muerte" cult

Sources: AP and Reuters

The leader of Mexico's Santa Muerte cult has been detained on suspicion of participating in a kidnapping ring, prosecutors said Tuesday.

"The nine captured ... passed themselves off as members of the Zetas," Prosecutor Miguel Angel Mancera told a news conference.

The "Santa Muerte" cult has become popular among drug traffickers in Mexico, in part because followers believe the skeletal figure of the female "saint" may protect them from death or arrest.

David Romo,42, the self-styled archbishop of the church, was one of nine suspects placed under a form of house arrest for 30 days pending investigation.




Romo told reporters at a news conference called by prosecutors to announce the detentions that he is the victim of political persecution and claimed he was tortured.

"In this pre-election time, they are moving (against) a lot of innocent people, to fill their quotas," Romo said. He said he didn't even known some of the other eight suspects.

He also charged that he had been "severely tortured" with electric shocks and beatings.

Romo's church stood behind him, saying in a statement that he had been "tortured in a bestial way," and called on followers to demonstrate outside the government detention center where he is being held.

A spokeswoman for the Mexico City prosecutors office, Esperanza Velarde, denied the accusations of torture. She said Romo "knows he is lying" and "is trying to defend himself."

The prosecutors office alleged Romo participated in a kidnap gang known as "El Aztlan," a name that refers to the mythical homeland of the Aztecs.

The office said he recruited people to launder ransom payments through their bank accounts, and then transfer the money back to Romo or one of his aliases. Romo would then hand over the money to the kidnappers at the church's main shrine in a ramshackle but gaudily decorated building in one of Mexico City's toughest neighborhoods, it said.



Prosecutors claimed Romo got a cut of 25,000 pesos ($2,040) for each payment transferred.

The church's followers have long protested what they say is an undeserved reputation as criminals. They say people from all backgrounds worship the "Santa Muerte", at ceremonies that include an altered version of the Roman Catholic Mass.

The saint is often depicted as a skeletal "grim reaper" draped in white satin robes, beaded necklaces and carrying a scythe or a globe. Followers leave offerings of tequila, rum, beer, cigarettes, cash, flowers and candy at altars adorned with rosaries and candles. At Romo's church, chains are hung on walls as examples of favors granted by the saint, often including getting out of jail.



The church's website features ceremonies to help prisoners get out of legal problems.

It is not the first time the church has come into conflict with officialdom. In March 2009, city workers accompanied by army troops toppled and crushed more 30 Death Saint shrines on a road in the city of Nuevo Laredo, across the border from Laredo, Texas.



City authorities said the roadside shrines were built without permission on public land, and argued the shrines gave Nuevo Laredo a bad image. Followers of the church protested what they called religious persecution.

In 2005, the government canceled the church's official recognition as a religious group, arguing it had violated its own statutes. Only officially recognized churches are allowed to raise money and own property in Mexico.

When the group registered with the Interior Department in 2003, it declared its purpose was to "conserve the Holy Tridentine Mass" of the Roman Catholic Church. A dissident priest from the group said it had violated that precept.

The group did not mention in its registry application that its main activity is to pray for the intercession of Saint Death. The saint is not recognized by the Roman Catholic Church, but followers use elements of Catholic rites.

Romo has denied any wrongdoing and said his church condemns violence and has no links to drug traffickers, but that he leaves the door open to everyone.


The Catholic Church frowns on the cult, whose origins may trace back to Aztec and Mayan death-gods or to ancient European traditions, but many devotees call themselves Catholics.

The lure of the death saint is that she is said to honor requests without judging them.

President Felipe Calderon launched an army assault on Mexico's drug gangs on taking office in December 2006, but his crackdown has sparked shocking violence across the country, worrying Washington and foreign investors.

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Saint Jude, Santa Muerte, and the Drug Trade: How Saints Are Used as Supposed Protection in the Drug Trade

“Sol Prendido” for Borderland Beat 

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The Ranch of Horror

Borderland Beat: By Ignacio Carvajal for Expediente

Santa Muerte Hell

“Can you take us to the graves at El Diamante, please?” somebody asks an official from Tres Valles township. Until that question, the bureaucrat had been welcoming, good-humored even; but on hearing where they wanted to go, his face reddened. He looked around from place to place. His chin trembled. He did go there, but reluctantly and at the first opportunity he fled – full throttle, ignoring speed bumps, puddles, and potholes.

The entrance to El Diamante is the opening to Eden. At the end of the meadow on this ranch, once the property of the late Fernando Cano Cano, first mayor of Tres Valles, trees are laden with fruit, a fish farm to one side. Pastures spring up at the corners to the property. A river runs through it.

It’s a golden dream for any farmer. But for the thirty-one people who were murdered and buried here, it’s where they went from paradise to hell.

After three months, last Monday night Navy personnel finally acknowledged it as a burial site. Nobody could have imagined that, under leafy trees on one side of a ravine hid horror: death, suffering, and shame half-covered by soil.

A smell hovers over the site. Green flies swarm around rotting flesh, crawling with maggots. There are thirteen holes. From each one they have exhumed two or three people. The investigators left a short time ago. They worked with nothing. Help came from soldiers stationed in Xalapa and Veracruz.

One person who was there, and whose identity is being protected, says that the investigating agents couldn’t cope. After hours of digging and removing rotten flesh, exhaustion overwhelmed them.  Officers from the Veracruz Investigations Division (AVI) had to lend a hand, putting their firearms to one side to pull on rope to extract the dead. “The exhumed bodies were tied up. It was complicated because they didn’t have hands or feet. Sometimes we had to help.”

“We tired from pulling up so many bodies. There was this moment when we had to shovel and blood and rotting stuff came out,” the official said.


OFFERINGS TO "LA FLACA" (skinny woman)

Dirty dishes. Leftover food. Smelly mats. Damp towels. Pirated CDs. Dirty clothes scattered all over. Medicine. A shrine to the Santa Muerte. Black candles. The Seven Powers of  Santería.  A toilet overflowing with crap. It’s the inside of the house located on the rise of the El Diamante ranch. In this place, about two kilometers from the police station and town hall of Tres Valles, twenty-four men and seven women were murdered. How was it possible to massacre so many people so near to the police station?

Until a few days ago the inhabitants were a group of hit-men. They enteres the ranch through a breach that runs from the city, along railway tracks, through groves of trees and a red clay trail.

Inside the building, what causes most fear is the image of the Santa Muerte.  It’s clearly a copy of Michelangelo’s Pietà, with Christ lying at the feet of the skinny woman.

The thirty-centimeter image is mounted on a box with a twenty-liter capacity. Around it are more than a dozen candles of the Seven Powers of Santería: Obatalá, Elegguá, Oggún, Orunlá, Yemayá, and Ochún.

More candles are placed inside the dwelling. They could be more than forty, or thirty-one. Perhaps the same number of victims buried in the clandestine cemetery.

Still inside, one finds chile, tomatoes, a frying pan filled with potatoes and sausage and on a chair, a saucepan filled with potatoes. They were about to eat. At present, the scant unofficial information provided by military sources doesn’t mention detainees, pointing to a timely escape.

The mats – from the National System for Overall Family Development (DIF) – stand out, strewn all over. It’s a mess left behind by officials who didn’t pay attention to a single detail: dozens of keys left behind beside the well – keys to houses, cars, drawers, and boxes. Keys that once belonged to the people dragged here and murdered. 

POSSESSED

El Diamante is a watchtower: from its rise there’s a view of Tres Valles, and on the other side a meadow sown with fine, nourishing pasture. A sonorous ravine nearby snakes below the ranch, shaded by fruit trees. Police reports call it an “abandoned ranch.” But its infrastructure looks in good shape.

In the town they confirm that it belonged to the late Fernando Cano Cano, a member of the Party of Institutional Revolution (PRI) and the first mayor of Tres Valles. Nobody can say how a group of murderers and death fanatics took over the ranch.

The difference between the last tenants and the owners is clear: they were very religious. In a corner, there’s a chapel to the Virgin of Juquila.

Inside the three-by-three chapel, with an altar in the middle, and cubbyholes in its walls, are mats, used condoms, excrement. There are signs of frantic sex, wild nights, alcohol, torture, and decapitation.

The thugs used this place for everything but praying to Christ’s mother. Her images are no longer in the cubbyholes: they have been destroyed.

In the chapel, they didn’t leave flowers or candles to the Virgin. But they left bottles of whiskey and a bag of bread rolls to Death. An offering.

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Houston, Texas: Local Religious Leaders Remain Blind Around Santa Muerte Followers

"Sol Prendido" for Borderland Beat

Sol Prendido personal video collection

In 2013 Italian Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi condemned the cult of Santa Muerte as the embodiment of Latin America's "culture of death." Despite a strong disapproval by the Roman Catholic Church. An idolization for the Our Lady of Holy Death continues. 

In the US alone devotes of the cult image, a female deity, is said to number between 10 to 12 million worshipers. 

According to DEA records Saint Death is a spiritual icon that has been found among members of the Gulf, Sinaloa, and Juarez drug cartels.

Journalist Diego Osorno indicated in his book La Guerra de los Zetas that one of the first altars dedicated to Santa Muerte in northern Mexico was found in the house of a Gulf Cartel kingpin, Gilberto García Mena aka El June, when he was arrested in a small town called Guardados de Abajo, in Tamaulipas, in 2002.

And as stated by journalist Olga Wornat, in her book 'Felipe El Oscurro' the former secretary of Public Security, Genaro García Luna, currently imprisoned and fighting a case in the US, is also a devotee to the Holy Death. 

* The following video was recorded yesterday while visiting the La Tia Pancha flea market in north Houston. 

Infocatolica. Miami Racked  DEA Museum  Infobae  Borderland Beat Archives

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Dozens of Catholic Priests murdered by Organized Crime during Calderon-Peña Administrations

Written by Lucio for Borderland Beat

Catholic Priests, are among the bravest drug war heroes of Mexico, and they are being killed at an escalating and appalling rate. Few are reporting the full story, or are reporting the numbers inaccurately, including the Catholic Church.

The fact that Mexico is one of the most dangerous places on earth for reporters is well known, what is far less written about is the violence perpetrated against  Catholic Priests.

Mexico is officially now the most dangerous place on earth for Catholic Priests.  While long in the top group of most dangerous places for priests, Mexico is now its leader.  For the sixth consecutive year, Mexico tops the list in murders and disappearances of Catholic priests in Latin America.

What must be established, murders and kidnappings of priests receive little attention outside regional reporting hubs.  It is a perplexing, how a story of dozens of  priests being murdered by cartels during  2 administrations goes unrecognized, or for example, a story  about 5 priests being killed in November–December of 2013 in Tamaulipas and Veracruz,  is but a tiny blip on the media radar. 

Inaccuracy of numbers

It must be pointed out, that priests are kidnapped, often from churches or rectories, but  the "disappearance" never budges  from  being labeled as such,  to being counted as “killed” or "dead", unless there is a body. Those  kidnapped and not found, are  not recorded on a drug war casualty list. 

In fairness, neither is any other group of people, which renders summations weak and without merit. 

 Nonetheless, the point being, as the title of this post says;  ' "dozens" of priests killed during the Calderon-Peña Administrations', astonishing in of itself, still is an accurate tally.

Then there is misreporting, much like municipalities are known to ascribe to, in attempting to lower the rate of violence.

For example, with four days remaining in 2012, in the state of Michoacán, padre Santiago Álvarez Figueroa, vanished. Although he had received dozens of death threats leading up to his disappearance, Authorities were quick to discount he had fallen prey to organized crime, instead this story was offered, “we think he was in an automobile accident”, this was reported by Jesus Reyes Garcia of the governor’s office, who later revised the version when the vehicle of the priest was not found and parishioners rejected the account.

What is known, Father Santiago, 27, had just finished celebrating Mass in the tiny town of Jacona, he entered his car and headed home to his hometown of Paredones. He called one of the nuns, advising  he was on his way back home.  

He never arrived.

Reyes is now incarcerated for collusion with organized crime, he was temporary governor while Governor Fausto Vallejo Figueroa was in the U.S. getting a new liver. Vallejo Figueroa resigned on the heels of the controversy of his son’s arrest.  His son known as ‘El Gerber’, was arrested after a Tutateca video of him with the Caballeros Templarios leader surfaced.

Santiago’s  body was never found.  He is not listed as murdered, he is with the other priests in perpetual limbo on the “disappeared” list. His Bakersfield, California, family, has no doubt he was murdered by organized crime, most likely the culprits are Caballeros Templarios.

Torture, including rape prior to murder

Organized crime killings of priests are particularly brutal.

The recovered bodies of priests depict odious, barbaric torture and killing.  Decapitation, dismemberment, incineration, strangulation, drowning, torture and rape are the methods used against priests in additional to the “conventional” killing methods of gunshot, or stabbings.

Take the case of  Padre John Ssenyondo of Chilapa, Guerrero.  The Ugandan priest loved his adopted country of Mexico, and wanted better for its people. He had lived in Guerrero for 5 years, preaching to the most impoverished if Mexican populous.  And by all accounts his parishioners loved the outgoing priest with the quick wide smile.

But they also worried about his safety.  For his sermons had become strong and firm against organized crime.  Many think that was his downfall.  

In April of 2014, Padre John disappeared while traveling back from conducting mass (service) in the mountains of Guerrero.  His disappearance went almost without notice, if not for the discovery of a mass grave.

The Catholic Church was quiet about the case, the regional rector of the cathedral, Javier Casarrubias Carballido,  never commented on the missing Priest.

Parishioners spoke among themselves, a persistent rumor was that a cartel leader asked the priest to baptize his child, and the request was denied.  That scenario seems unlikely, since in the Catholic religion, the sins of the father would be deemed irrelevant to the child.
 

The other scenario is the more likely of the two, the priest would not heed to warnings to  halt sermons against organized crime. He had begun drawing the link of local officials and organized crime.

A mass grave was discovered in the outskirts of Chilapa, Chilapa is about 30 miles east of Chilpancingo, the state capital.

The remains of Padre John were among the 13 bodies buried in a mass narco fosa. The bodies were decapitated and dismembered, and incomplete. Padre John’s skull and various other bones were discovered, he was identified by dental records.

Why are priest targeted?

Long held rumors of priests ingratiating themselves towards organized crime groups for financial gain, benefiting their parishes, is persistent, but inaccurate.  That would be the exception not the norm.  Organized crime regards priests as the enemy. The following lists a few of the reasons why.

Sermons: outspoken priests, who preaching against organized crime, and the collusion of government officials and police.  Organized crime groups prefer to remain under the radar, and feel threatened by those who may encourage an organized backlash against their activities.  Same can be said about municipal governments and police. 

Assisting Economic Migrants:   Migrants, mostly from Central America, are highly exploited by cartels, and are at the core of narco occupational diversification.  For example the sex trade, kidnapping, extortion, human trafficking, and forcible recruitment into cartel work including becoming sicarios (hitmen).  Those who shelter migrants and advocate for migrant issues, interrupt business, resulting in bottom line impact.  Catholic clergy are the operators of 95% of migrant shelters.  They are also their greatest advocacy group, in and out of Mexico.

Who can ever forget the images of 72 migrants slaughtered in Tamaulipas in 2010?  72 human beings, executed for the crime of refusing recruitment into the Los Zetas cartel.

Throughout Mexico Catholic Priests create a safe haven for migrants.  Priests provide migrants shelter, assistance, medical care and other forms of care.  Cartels consider this an intrusion into their source of revenue.  Priests who run the migrant shelters such as Casa Migrante’s are constantly being threatened.  

Catholic based Rehab Centers: Alcohol and drug rehab centers have become fewer in number than two years ago.  There were a string of attacks by cartels, resulting in the destruction of centers or mass killings of inhabitants.  19 killed in a Chihuahua rehab in photo at left.

Cartels exploit the centers, extorting and forcibly recruit sicarios and drug traffickers, often death threats are realized when a rehab group resists. Others are killed for failing to pay for drugs or betraying a dealer

Supporting Autodefensa Movements:  Autodefensa groups are organized as a union consisting of 13 states.  Some priests are  targeted because of their support of these groups, or direct involvement.

Refusing requests:  In the narco world,  it is notable that there are large groups of Santería followers. Although the religious based cult is syncretized with Catholicism and Mesoamerican, it is strictly condemned by the religion.  Small “Santeria Chapels” are erected that seem to pop up overnight, that “honor” the Santeria offshoot Nuestra Señora de la Santa Muerte.

While there are millions of good people, often the marginalized people of society, which practice the “religion”, with no intention to harm others.  It is organized crime that have taken it to a sinister level, thinking that Santa Muerte will protect them from harm or imprisonment while they conduct criminality, including murder.

                                          This Santa Muerte chapel was bulldozed in Allende

                                                 This Acuña chapel was  destroyed in 2013

In 2013, Tamaulipas and Veracruz priests began receiving demands that Catholic altars in churches feature statues of Santa Muerte. Going further that masses be said in honor of Santa Muerte.  Parishioners say It is because of the refusals that some priests disappeared.

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