Tag: Mexico

In one of the most turbulent areas affected by Mexico’s drug war, more violence is expected after two rival militia leaders were exonerated by a judge for acting in self-defense.

The March 10 ruling resulted in the release from prison of Hipólito Mora, founder of one of the first so-called autodefensa groups in the town of La Ruana, Michoacan, along with 26 of his men, according to a Vice News report. Luis Antonio “El Americano” Torres, leader of the rival Buenavista group, was expected to be released very soon.

A recent report by in the Dallas Morning News suggests that the historically strong ties between the State of Texas and Mexico may be under a considerable amount of strain. Despite the region’s powerhouse cross-border economy, recent decisions regarding illegal immigration and border security have left Mexico feeling rebuffed.

The President of Mexico has announced a plan to allow some foreign customs and immigration agents to carry firearms inside Mexico. This comes as a dramatic change to Mexico’s current policy of prohibiting any foreign nationals from possessing a firearm inside

Federal agents discovered an underground tunnel crossing the border into Mexico from Naco, Arizona on Tuesday as part of an investigation after a traffic stop that yielded over two tons of marijuana, with a value of approximately $3 million.

Calling them the “most significant drug dealers” he’d dealt with in two decades on the bench, U.S. District Chief Judge Ruben Castillo sentenced twins Pedro and Margarito Flores to 14 years each in prison for smuggling at least 71 tons of cocaine and heroin and nearly $2 billion in cash from 2005 to 2008 for Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel. The Flores brothers served as the control point for the drug trafficking organization in the Windy City for years, and would have received life sentence had they not agreed to fully cooperate with U.S. authorities to bring down major players in the cartel.

Mexican drug cartels may be raking in billions of dollars in profits every year, but new figures from both the United States and Mexican sources indicate marijuana from south of the border may be accounting for a much smaller share than before. Some drug war observers believe that legalization measures in certain U.S. states are causing not only a decline in marijuana smuggling, but a decline in Mexico’s homicide rate as well.

Sandra Ávila Beltrán, also known as the “Queen of the Pacific” for her alleged cocaine smuggling and money laundering activities, was released from a Mexican prison after winning her appeal. Most people picture the highest level leaders in a drug

Mexican drug cartels, along with an untold number of global criminal and terrorist organizations, launder billions of dollars every year through banks and money service businesses. In order to curb this cartel activity, the Mexican government has severely limited the amount of American dollars that can be deposited into numbered accounts. A side effect of this policy, however, has been that Mexicans and travelers who pass through the country’s airports can quickly and easily profit from buying U.S. dollars at a loss, then selling them a few feet away for pesos at a roughly 3 percent profit.