The Mexican government ignored clear warnings that the nation’s most notorious criminal, Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, planned to escape from the maximum-security Altiplano prison long before his eventual flight in July, according to an in-depth investigation published this week by Mexico’s Proceso news magazine.
Federal authorities failed to prevent Guzmán’s escape through a mile-long tunnel leading out of his cell on July 11, despite receiving a constant stream of information about the Sinaloa Cartel boss’ activities while behind bars, according to intelligence reports leaked to Proceso through the WikiLeaks-style whistleblowing platform Méxicoleaks.
Insight Crime, a site that monitors organized crime in the Americas, noted that the leaked information points to one of two possibilities: “a massive institutional failure to act on intelligence or corruption that reaches even higher up the chain than previously suspected.”
Click here to read this article in full at Latin Correspondent.
Ivan Cazarín Molina was the alleged second-in-command of the Jalisco New Generation cartel.
One of Mexico’s most wanted criminals, the “Tornado Commander”, who is accused of running an all-powerful drug cartel, was drunk and enjoying a game of football on the street outside his safe house in Guadalajara when federal agents swooped.
Ivan Cazarin Molina, alias Víctor Hugo Delgado Renteria, is the suspected second-in-command of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, one of Mexico’s most powerful criminal organisations.
Police believe he controlled the cartel’s drug-trafficking and money-laundering operations in the Guadalajara area. They are also investigating his “probable participation” in the downing of a military helicopter on 1 May.
“The arrest of Ivan Cazarin Molina is the result of six months of intelligence, desk and field work,” Mexico’s federal police announced. “He’s linked to at least seven outstanding investigations into federal crimes including drug trafficking and homicides.”
Click here to read this article in full at The Independent.
I also contributed to this report by Jo Tuckman for VICE News.
Classmates of Mexico’s 43 missing students condemn new police repression
Mexicans continue to demand justice and the safe return of the 43 students who disappeared in September 2014.
When Mexican authorities violently intercepted a convoy of buses carrying students from the Ayotzinapa teacher training college in Guerrero state last week it inevitably evoked memories of that infamous night last year when 43 of their classmates disappeared at the hands of local police officers.
Six people were killed when the police began firing on the students’ buses and other vehicles outside the town of Iguala on September 26, 2014, while the missing 43 are believed to have been massacred shortly afterwards. The surviving students have clashed frequently with the authorities since then as they demand the safe return of their classmates, but the confrontation on November 11 was arguably the worst since that fateful night.
It unfolded in almost identical fashion, with the students commandeering means of transport to ensure they could attend a demonstration, only for police to chase, intercept and then repress them.
Mexic0’s government has been heavily criticized over its handling of the investigation into the missing students.
This time there were no deaths but eight students were hospitalized and at least 12 more were injured after police beat them and fired tear gas into their vehicles. Another 13 were arrested for allegedly stealing gasoline from a pipeline in Guerrero, although they were released just hours later…
Click here to read this article in full at Latin Correspondent.
The Tequila Files 