Saturday, October 20, 2012

Amid drug war, Mexico fights wave of common crime ~By Michael Weissenstein

http://www.mercurynews.com/top-stories/ci_21819938/amid-drug-war-mexico-fights-wave-common-crime

Updated: 10/20/2012 06:43:37 PM PDT





In this Sept. 18, 2012 photo, people watch firefighters put out a smoldering car allegedly used in a robbery at a Coca-Cola distribution center in Morelia, Mexico. The robbers pistol-whipped three security guards, grabbed thousands of pesos in cash and fled. In cities and towns across Mexico, a nearly six-year offensive against drug cartels has been accompanied by a surge in common crime: assaults and robberies that grab no headlines but make life miserable for ordinary citizens.

MORELIA, Mexico -- On a cool September evening, about a half-hour after the sun set on the rose-colored Baroque cathedral of this colonial city in western Mexico, three men burst into a Coca-Cola distribution center on the edge of town.

The robbers pistol-whipped three security guards, grabbed thousands of pesos in cash and fled into a poor neighborhood of crumbling brick houses. Sirens screaming, state police arrived to find the white Nissan Sentra they believe was the getaway car being engulfed in flames.

"You can't even go out at night here," homemaker Yolanda Villa said, poking her head out the door of her home around the corner. "They beat you, kidnap you, rob you," her 9-year-old son Luis said, finishing her sentence.

Surge in crime

In cities and towns across Mexico, a nearly six-year offensive against drug cartels has been accompanied by a surge in common crime: assaults and robberies that grab no headlines but make life miserable for ordinary citizens. Some experts blame the drug war for distracting law-enforcement from pursuing common criminals. Others say drug cartels have turned to common crime as a way to fund their clashes with each other, and with troops and federal police.

Some of the first effects were felt in Morelia, the once-sleepy capital of Michoacan state, where Mexico launched its war on drugs.

The clashes in Michoacan began when local traffickers who had worked with the Gulf cartel became disenchanted with the tactics of that cartel's brutal enforcement wing, the Zetas, and formed their own gang with the avowed intention of keeping the Zetas out. The state's Pacific coastline and rugged, green countryside are ideal for clandestine operations such as methamphetamine labs.

A war erupted between the new group, which called itself La Familia Michoacana, and the Zetas, military defectors known for exploiting areas they control through extortion, kidnapping, drug trafficking and other crimes.

Declaring war

Less than two weeks after taking office in December 2006, President Felipe Calderon ordered thousands of troops to Michoacan, his home state, with orders to quash the violence.

Hundreds were killed across the state in battles between traffickers and in government actions. In September 2006, gunmen threw five severed heads onto the dance floor of a bar in the city of Uruapan, a crime so ghastly it made international news.

Meanwhile, common crime began to increase, with reported robberies rising 35 percent from 2006 to 2011 in the jurisdiction that includes Morelia, an international tourist attraction once best known for its Spanish-language schools, lush green parks and immaculately preserved 16th-century architecture. Robberies appear to be on track to rise again this year.

Nearly six years later, the military remains in Michoacan. Its operations have helped splinter La Familia into two dueling groups that themselves are fighting with at least two other cartels, including the Zetas, along the edges of Michoacan.
Soldiers and federal officers still clash almost daily with heavily armed cartel gunmen. Kidnappings are frequent, and discoveries of dismembered, beheaded bodies are a regular occurrence throughout much of the state.

Homicides rose 68 percent in the state from 2006 to 2011. They rose 35 percent nationwide.

Making progress

As for the street crime, state officials say they are making progress in Morelia through purges of corrupt and incompetent police officers and better management of the remaining police, and they say some crimes, including several kinds of robbery and assault, are decreasing. But Morelia residents say they don't feel safer.Nationwide, robberies increased 45 percent from 2005 to the start of 2012, with the number of bank robberies almost quadrupling, from 200 to 768.

Mexicali, on the California border, saw a 70 percent surge in robberies from 2006 to 2011, although the figures seem to be falling slightly this year.

The Pacific Coast resort city of Acapulco, hit by a vicious struggle among small local drug gangs, saw robberies rise by around 400 percent. The northern city of Chihuahua saw a nearly 30 percent rise.



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