By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com Amid the seemingly endless stream of depressing news out of Mexico involving violence and drugs comes a little bit of good news. The Associated Press reports that Mexican Marines in the central state of Puebla on Sunday captured Sergio Villarreal Barragan, leader of the embattled Beltran Leyva drug cartel. Known as…
By The Washington Post Editorial Page WASHINGTON — SECRETARY OF STATE Hillary Rodham Clinton caused a stir last week by suggesting that Mexico’s drug-trafficking gangs were beginning to resemble an insurgency, like that which has plagued Colombia. She’s right in the sense that the cartels have come to effectively control parts of the country, where…
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com Despite their efforts, U.S. and Mexican authorities are seizing no more than one percent of the billions of dollars in drug proceeds being smuggled south into Mexico, according to an analysis by the Washington Post. The cash is being smuggled in spare tires, engine transmissions and truckloads of baby diapers, the…
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com A suspected member of the violent Juarez Drug Cartel in Mexico has been extradited to the states, the DEA in El Paso said. Felipe DOMINGUEZ-Vargas was extradited on Aug. 10 and made his initial appearance on drug charges in U.S. District Court in El Paso on Monday, according to Joseph M….
The Washington Post Editorial Page WASHINGTON — Give Mexican President Felipe Calderon credit for honesty as well as courage. Last week he presided over a three-day public conference to assess the results of nearly four years of war against Mexico’s drug cartels. Most of the facts were grim: — According to the chief of the…
In these small little towns in California, not only are some of the politicians extremely corrupt, but they’ve become places where gangs and Mexican and Colombian drug cartels operate freely. Investigative reporter Jeffrey Anderson examines the problem. By Jeffrey Anderson Washington Times BELL, Calif. — The gang graffiti that coats freeway overpasses, exit signs and…
By Matt Castello ticklethewire.com For a big-time Louisiana drug trafficker, the dog and cockfighting ring served as the ideal venue to help expand his drug ring. Pedro Mendez Ramos, of Church Point, La., who authorities described as “an avid pit bull and cock fighter”, used more than 300 gamecocks and 60 pit bulls as a…
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com The murderous ways of the Mexican drug cartels may seem very scary, but so is another phenomena: The cartels are apparently shutting up the media. The Washington Post reports journalists, fearing for their lives, “are adhering to a near-complete news blackout, under strict orders of drug smuggling organizations and their enforcers,…
