Trend Setters

November 22, 2017 Crime , North America , OPINION/NEWS

AP photo

By

Ricardo Swire

Caribbean internal security intelligence officials continue to focus on Mexico, as a turf war between Los Zetas and Gulf Cartel continues in north eastern districts. Each Cartel controls sections of border State Tamaulipas. Seven Gulf Cartel cells challenge three Los Zetas sections for State dominance. The Narcos have created an environment of hostility and fear using America as the bonanza for firepower. Both Cartels monopolize drug trafficking transit links between northeast Mexico and Texas. Mexican Marines, supplemented to perform law enforcement duties, have kept sustained pressure on criminal elements in hot zones.

Tamaulipas is birthplace of the Gulf Cartel or Mexico’s oldest criminal organization. Not long ago the State governor’s Lead Close Protection Officer was arrested as part of a conspiracy to kill the State Intelligence Chief. In Tamaulipas’ main city Reynosa, adjacent McAllen Texas, violence reflects Los Zetas versus Gulf Cartel skirmishes. Sixty percent of Reynosa’s 2017 murders committed during May and June. A May 2017 police report noted twenty-three residents murdered in Reynosa city. Sixteen bodies riddled with bullets discovered inside abandoned vehicles.

Mexican Federal government statistics on Reynosa noted one hundred and forty-four killings in September 2017. One hundred and sixty-seven percent more than 2016’s fifty-four for a similar period. Despite government intervention Reynosa’s violence continues to increase. Southward in the port city Veracruz nine Cartel operatives died in a gunfight with Mexican Armed Forces patrols. In January 2017 Veracruz recorded more than one hundred murders. The previous month one hundred and thirty-two citizens were killed.

Regional internal security intelligence officials are cognizant that the populated State, with Caribbean coastlines south of Tamaulipas, is Los Zetas’ main base. Coahuila and Nuevo Leon, two border States west of Tamaulipas, are main Gulf Cartel and Los Zetas battlegrounds. Veracruz is enveloped by the paramilitary organized crime syndicate to the point where residents say the letter “Z” at the end of Veracruz symbolizes Los Zetas control. Veracruz’s capital city Xalapa included. “El Sangres” is “Section Commander” of Los Zetas assassins in Veracruz and leads twelve “Angelitos” or little angels.

On May 22, 2016 six patrons of a Xalapa gay club were murdered, thirteen wounded, after unidentified gunmen entered approached the DJ booth and started shooting. The Gulf Cartel’s “Comandante Toro” has directed operations across the Rio Grande and Texas, abutting the Gulf of Mexico. His vast network of informants, lookouts and gunmen allowed him to control all criminal activity in Reynosa, located immediately across the border from McAllen, Texas.

In November 2015 to demonstrate notoriety Comandante Toro’s Hitmen attacked a Mexican military armored vehicle travelling on a community street filled with civilians. A baby and three residents were killed when the military truck driver lost control and struck a food stall. A Saturday April 22nd 2017 shootout with Mexican Marines resulted in Comandante Toro’s termination. A Gulf Cartel key “Financial Operator,” named on the US DEA’s Most Wanted List, was recently intercepted by internal security forces in Mexico City. A Los Zetas splinter aka “Cartel of the Northeast” top Capo also detained by Mexican Federal Police. In 2015 Cartel of the Northeast detached from Los Zetas.