Myra Zamundo Guzman, 17, a student at Ricardo Flores High School in Tijuana recalls how gunmen drove up the day before and killed three students who were sitting outside in a car. In another neighborhood, a 17-year-old was shot dead outside his home. (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times / January 6, 2010)

Tijuana reels amid a surge of violence

Competing Mexican drug cartels are destroying each other ... and that's where 'Warrior' begins ...."
http://www.warriorthemovie.com
http://www.warriorthemovie.blogspot.com

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-208917617001990565&q=warrior+mexican+OR+drug+OR+cartels+duration%3Ashort+genre%3AMOVIE_TRAILER

"the action adventure fantasy feature film "Warrior" ... about the son of a divine force ... is a story of a young man's quest to find his true identity set against the twin backdrops of Native American folklore and the treacherous Mexican drug trade and a portrayal of the classic confrontation between "good and evil" ... filmed in the exotic jungles of Costa Azul in the State of Nayarit and the urban grit of Puerto Vallarta in the State of Jalisco, Mexico .. with action, adventure, romance, comedy, a multi-ethnic cast, a major movie studio music score and spectacular cinematography ..."

latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-fg-tijuana-violence11-2010jan11,0,5013056.story
latimes.com
MEXICO UNDER SIEGE

Tijuana reels amid a surge of violence
After some gains in Mexico's drug war in 2009, Tijuana has had a bloody turn of events in the new year. More than a dozen people, four of them students, were reported slain in the last week.

By Richard Marosi

January 11, 2010

Reporting from Tijuana

It's been a bloody new year so far in this violence-racked city, leaving authorities stunned and apparently speechless. Three teenagers in school uniforms were mowed down by automatic-weapons fire Wednesday. Another youth was shot multiple times last week as he sat in his car outside his parents' upscale home.

Four people were decapitated, at least 10 people were killed in drive-by attacks, and five people were kidnapped, including two security guards and a prominent businessman.

Just a few months ago, Tijuana was hailed by some as a success story in Mexico's war on drug cartels. Top officials from the U.S. and Mexico, including President Felipe Calderon, praised the city's efforts as a model for the rest of the country.

The city's leading crime fighters -- Army Gen. Alfonso Duarte Mugica and Secretary of Public Security Julian Leyzaola -- were named "men of the year" by Baja California's leading news weekly. Authorities boasted that they were closing in on the city's notorious crime boss, Teodoro Garcia Simental.

Now the bodies are piling up at the morgue again, and authorities appear dispirited by the turn of events. After the drive-by shooting of the three teenagers -- two boys and a girl -- outside their high school, authorities didn't even hold a news conference.

"What are they going to say? They have no answers," said Vicente Calderon, a veteran journalist who runs the local news website Tijuanapress.com.

Narco-violence has flared regularly since early 2008, when war broke out between rival factions of the Arellano Felix drug cartel. That year, the city's homicide toll peaked at 844.

By the middle of 2009, however, the crime rate had receded as the warring gangs were believed to have reached a truce. Mugica, the military commander, paraded captured crime bosses through the Morelos military base downtown, and Leyzaola continued his purge of corrupt officers from the police force.

Mayor Jorge Ramos' "state of the city" speech in November emphasized Tijuana's progress against organized crime and the presentation included video of favorable comments from U.S. Ambassador Carlos Pascual and San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders.

Since December, however, the violence has surged. The rival gangs appear to have broken their truce and are, at times, employing different and deadlier tactics.

Attackers have firebombed police cars and a funeral home with Molotov cocktails. They've shot up a hospital. Women are increasingly targeted. At least two of the recent beheading victims were women, one of whom was left naked outside a cemetery, a narco-message left between her legs.

Although most of the victims remain young men -- typically foot soldiers or drug dealers -- gunmen seem more willing, perhaps deliberately, to kill anyone associated with their targets.

"These acts of violence appear more and more like narco-terrorism," said Victor Clark, the director of the Binational Center for Human Rights in Tijuana.

In late December, the government seemed to score a major victory. Gilbert Sanchez Guerrero, a former police officer and top lieutenant for crime boss Garcia, was arrested in an early morning raid at his upscale condominium in Ensenada.

His apprehension led to the arrests of at least seven more Tijuana police officers suspected of corruption.

But, as in so many cases in Mexico's battle with organized crime, the blow was followed by another round of bloodshed, including an attack on New Year's Eve, when gunmen broke into a home and killed an elderly couple and two other people.

Last week, 17-year-old Jose Fernando Labastida Fimbres, the grandson of a supermarket magnate, was shot as he sat in his Audi outside his home in a hillside neighborhood. A student at Mater Dei Catholic High School in Chula Vista, a San Diego suburb, the youth was memorialized by hundreds at a local church.

Two days later, gunmen wielding AK-47s shot dead the three teenagers, who had just finished final exams at Ricardo Flores High School.

Scores of students witnessed the gunmen's car creep up on the teenagers' vehicle and open fire, sending their Jeep Cherokee into an electrical pole as nearby students scrambled for safety.

Though media reports, citing anonymous sources, say Labastida Fimbres and one of the other teens may have had links to organized crime, authorities have made no statements on the motives.

Officials at Ricardo Flores High School, located in a tough east Tijuana neighborhood, do random drug tests and searches of students' backpacks, but teenagers said those precautions aren't enough anymore.

As students lingered outside school last week, many said they choose their friends with great care now and don't get into a car unless they know the person driving it.

"We're scared it could happen again," said Myra Zamudio Guzman, a 17-year-old who saw the shooting.

Through all the recent violence, law enforcement officials have been mostly silent. To some observers, their reticence betrays a sense of impotence. It's as if authorities have exhausted their tough rhetoric, they say.

One of the few government officials who made a public appearance last week was Baja California's secretary of tourism. Oscar Escobedo Carignan announced a public relations initiative to improve the city's image.

The negative portrayals are unfair, he said, blaming the media and citing per-capita crime figures that he said supported his case:

"We [Tijuana] finish with 20 homicides per 100,000 people. Brazil gets 150 homicides, and they get the Olympics."

richard.marosi@latimes.com

Copyright © 2010, The Los Angeles Times

br />

U.S. anti-drug aid slow to arrive, study finds
Security help for Mexico promised under the so-called Merida Initiative, including helicopters and scanners for contraband detection, has been held up by red tape, a U.S. agency says.

Competing Mexican drug cartels are destroying each other ... and that's where 'Warrior' begins ...."
http://www.warriorthemovie.com
http://www.warriorthemovie.blogspot.com

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-208917617001990565&q=warrior+mexican+OR+drug+OR+cartels+duration%3Ashort+genre%3AMOVIE_TRAILER

"the action adventure fantasy feature film "Warrior" ... about the son of a divine force ... is a story of a young man's quest to find his true identity, after being separated from his biological parents at birth on an island in the archipelago of Vanuatu off the coast of Australia, set against the twin backdrops of Native American folklore and the treacherous Mexican drug trade and a portrayal of the classic confrontation between "good and evil" ... filmed in the exotic jungles of Costa Azul in the State of Nayarit and the urban grit of Puerto Vallarta in the State of Jalisco, Mexico .. with action, adventure, romance, comedy, a multi-ethnic cast, a major studio movie music score and spectacular cinematography..."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-fg-mexico-aid4-2009dec04,0,4114036,print.story latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-fg-mexico-aid4-2009dec04,0,7288387.story
latimes.com
MEXICO UNDER SIEGE
U.S. anti-drug aid slow to arrive, study finds
Security help for Mexico promised under the so-called Merida Initiative, including helicopters and scanners for contraband detection, has been held up by red tape, a U.S. agency says.

By Ken Ellingwood
December 4, 2009

Reporting from Mexico City

A small fraction of U.S. aid for Mexico's drug war under the so-called Merida Initiative has been delivered because of red tape and the time needed to order helicopters and other equipment, a U.S. government report concluded Thursday.

An examination by the Government Accountability Office said that just $26 million had been spent by the end of September, or 2% of the nearly $1.3 billion in security aid that had been appropriated for Mexico under the multiyear program.

The GAO, Congress' investigative arm, said delays also stemmed from congressional restrictions and the need to ready Mexican and U.S. agencies for a big jump in the flow of bilateral assistance.

Because of the delays, "few programs have been delivered and limited funding has been expended to date," the report said.

Mexican officials, locked in a bloody three-year offensive against drug cartels, have complained that the promised U.S. help, including Bell helicopters and scanners that detect contraband hidden in cargo trucks, has been too slow to reach them.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton promised during a visit here in March to speed up delivery of the equipment. The GAO report said her push succeeded in trimming the time required to obtain the aircraft. Five Bell BH-412 helicopters are scheduled to arrive later this month.

So far this year, the U.S. has supplied 26 armored vehicles, 30 scanners and five vans outfitted with X-ray technology. Still on order, the report said, are an unspecified number of Black Hawk helicopters, which generally take 12 to 18 months to build, the agency said.

Then-President George W. Bush and Mexican President Felipe Calderon announced the Merida plan in October 2007, 10 months after Calderon launched his government's military-led crackdown on drug gangs.

The aid package, reflecting a huge boost in U.S. security assistance for Mexico, includes vehicles, computer equipment and training for police, court personnel and jailers. The aim is to bolster the Mexican government's ability to fight organized crime, but also to improve the judicial system and improve rule of law overall.

Thursday's report prompted calls in Washington for more urgent action to help Mexico.

"As President Calderon confronts his country's brutal drug cartels head on, we must cut through our own government's red tape to get Merida Initiative assistance flowing to Mexico more quickly," said Rep. Eliot L. Engel, a New York Democrat who chairs the House Foreign Affairs Committee's subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere.

The GAO cited congressional requirements, such as human rights conditions added last year that withheld 15% of funds until the State Department certified that Mexico was investigating and prosecuting abuses. The department issued the finding despite persistent complaints of abuses by Mexican troops and an opaque system of prosecution.

It also took time to hire employees at the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City and at recipient Mexican agencies to manage a sevenfold increase in aid, the GAO report said.

The State Department acknowledged that spending had not been as quick as planned, but said that didn't tell the whole story. The department said Merida aid was being put to robust use, such as the training this year of thousands of Mexican federal police officers.

ken.ellingwood@latimes.com

Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times

br />

One man's war zone is another's paradise

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-baja14-2009dec14,0,4471195.story

One man's war zone is another's paradise
From the insulated safety of Baja's luxurious seaside gated communities, American expatriates say reports of kidnappings and violent drug cartels seem a world away.

Competing Mexican drug cartels are destroying each other ... and that's where 'Warrior' begins ...."
http://www.warriorthemovie.com
http://www.warriorthemovie.blogspot.com

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-208917617001990565&q=warrior+mexican+OR+drug+OR+cartels+duration%3Ashort+genre%3AMOVIE_TRAILER

"the action adventure fantasy feature film "Warrior" ... about the son of a divine force ... is a story of a young man's quest to find his true identity, after being separated from his biological parents at birth on an island in the archipelago of Vanuatu off the coast of Australia, set against the twin backdrops of Native American folklore and the treacherous Mexican drug trade and a portrayal of the classic confrontation between "good and evil" ... filmed in the exotic jungles of Costa Azul in the State of Nayarit and the urban grit of Puerto Vallarta in the State of Jalisco, Mexico .. with action, adventure, romance, comedy, a multi-ethnic cast, a major studio movie music score and spectacular cinematography..."

latimes.com
COLUMN ONE
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-baja14-2009dec14,0,420862,print.story

One man's war zone is another's paradise
From the insulated safety of Baja's luxurious seaside gated communities, American expatriates say reports of kidnappings and violent drug cartels seem a world away.

By Richard Marosi
December 14, 2009
Reporting from Rosarito Beach, Mexico

Bob and Carol Dawson love living in Baja California, but the region's violent reputation has put them on the defensive. They have been called delusional and reckless -- all because they choose to live in an oceanfront gated community about 30 or 40 miles and a world away from the U.S. border.

Americans living in this part of Mexico are often grilled, half-jokingly, about their sanity. They get asked whether they've seen decapitated heads rolling down the street. Friends wonder whether they wear bulletproof vests or drive around in armored cars.

When the Dawsons moved here in 1999 to retire, they were enticed by the area's charm and peacefulness. They bought an expansive home with ocean views for $175,000. "Live like a millionaire without a million bucks" is the local real estate mantra.

In recent years, the tranquillity has been eclipsed by the mayhem of battles between the Mexican government and organized crime. Military trucks brimming with heavily armed soldiers have rumbled through the manicured grounds of luxury developments; gunmen pepper local police stations with automatic-weapon fire; and Baja California's most notorious crime boss once eluded authorities by running through a beach popular among American retirees.

Since 2008, more than 1,000 Mexicans in the northern Baja California area have died in the drug violence. Rarely does a week go by without news of another person being beheaded or dissolved in acid or chopped up and left in a parked car.

But for most expatriates the violence seems as distant as headlines from Iraq. Along the 70-mile stretch of coastline from Tijuana to Ensenada, 14,000 Americans live in a bubble of relative security, many in gated developments or high-rise condominiums where they run a greater risk of being sideswiped by a golf cart or a wave-tossed surfer than staring down an AK-47-toting drug trafficker.

Not that expatriates are oblivious to the drug war. Bill Kirchhoff, the former city manager of Redondo Beach, said he suspects that some of the boaters speeding by his seaside house at Playa La Mision are drug traffickers. He's not moving back to the States any time soon, though, saying a few precautions can keep people out of harm's way.

"A lot of people simply don't understand the level of danger that exists in this kind of environment," he said. "But if you're aware of it, you can manage it to a great extent."

Bob Dawson, 66, said the dangers are exaggerated, but shares a pioneer attitude. "We're a different kind of breed even to try this," he said.

From the balcony of their home one row back from the ocean, the Dawsons can see dolphins dancing in the waves and pelicans gliding low over the surf break. Carol keeps watch for the first signs of migrating whales; Bob pours his locally famous margarita mix -- dubbed Bobby-Ritas -- for neighbors.

They just don't get many visitors.

Loved ones beg them to move and many won't visit, including their son-in-law, who for much of the last few years has refused to bring their grandsons to visit. "He thinks we live in a dream world," said Carol, 65. "But if I feared danger to my life, I wouldn't be here."

The curving, craggy coastline of northern Baja California, a one-hour drive from San Diego, was once a popular getaway for Southern California residents. They came for the solitude and the surf. They would unwind at gringo bars and spend weekends at funky beachfront hotels.

In recent years, the coastal stretch has taken on an upscale look with condominiums, spacious homes, bed-and-breakfasts, and spas rising on bluffs. In the nearby Guadalupe Valley, hacienda-style inns and wineries sit amid vineyards blanketing the tawny hills.

The area attracts a range of Americans. Young telecommuters and Internet entrepreneurs live alongside artists and urban refugees in hillside villages. Retirees enjoy five-star luxury resorts with vanishing-edge pools, private beaches and shuttle service to the border.

For less than $300,000, people can buy a spacious home on an 18-hole golf course at Baja Mar. Ocean-view houses with balconies and gardens can be had for $400,000.

"Look at this. I can't live in La Jolla like this," Richard Cargill, 66, said as he took in the ocean views from his deck at the Palacio Del Mar resort. The retired mortgage banker paid $490,000 for the 2,300-square-foot condominium one year ago. "I call this the smart man's San Diego."

For the Dawsons, the appeal was an early retirement. Bob, who used to own a paper packaging company, and Carol, a former flight attendant, cut their expenses 30% when they moved down from Santa Ana. They live in the Las Gaviotas development about six miles south of Rosarito Beach, where 298 homes sit behind high walls and visitors must pass through a gate manned 24 hours a day by security guards. There's a clubhouse, a pool, tennis courts and a promenade lined with mini-mansions that overlook the palapa-dotted beach.

After the Dawsons bought their home as a weekend getaway in 1996 they passed out keys to relatives, and their two daughters brought friends down on weekends. "This was a party house," Bob Dawson said.

In those days the beach and pool at Las Gaviotas teemed with families and children on weekends. "It was filled with laughter and noise," Carol Dawson said. "It was fun."

Five years ago, anticipating more visitors, the Dawsons expanded their house, adding two bedrooms, a bathroom and an elevator. They started a property management business catering to Americans who owned second homes in the area.

Then the troubles started.

The Mexican government's crackdown against organized crime struck Baja California in 2007. A few Americans fell victim to the upheaval late that year, when heavily armed men dressed as police pulled over a San Diego-area family on the coastal road. They pointed guns at their heads, pocketed cash and jewelry, and stole their truck and trailer.

That attack, along with the robbery of a surfer and the rape of his girlfriend on an isolated beach, was repeated in media accounts of Baja California violence. Though the situation has calmed considerably, some media outlets continue mentioning the incidents, angering residents and Mexican officials.

To the Dawsons, the recycled reports give the distorted impression that Americans are constantly under siege. Media coverage of "a shootout in the States lasts one day," Bob said. "We have a shootout here, and it lasts for years."

The negative publicity has taken its toll. At Las Gaviotas, dozens of houses sit empty, many with "For Sale" signs. Of the 11 homes managed by the Dawsons, not one was rented in September and only a few have been leased since.

Passing through the development's tall gates for a quick trip down the road to Rosarito Beach, the Dawsons encounter a somewhat shabby landscape of roadside coconut stands and shanties. They drive by construction-supply and appliance stores, restaurants and other businesses where owners have downsized or closed down because the expected influx of baby boomers never materialized.

The Dawsons point to the fancy Las Rocas resort, where their nephew's wedding was nearly spoiled in April when the maid of honor considered canceling because she was worried about crime. Security concerns have contributed to a shutdown of filmmaking at nearby Baja Studios; entertainment-industry workers on movies such as "Titanic" and "Master and Commander" once injected millions of dollars into the local economy.

Outside the studio gates, where a replica of a tall ship is docked, the Mexican military runs a northbound checkpoint. Masked marines with assault weapons question drivers. In the distance, another marine mans a .50-caliber machine gun.

A marine quickly waves the Dawsons through. "It makes me feel safe," Bob said as he passed the military's sign: "Welcome to Baja California. This is a routine military checkpoint."

Kirchhoff, the retired Redondo Beach city manager, feels uneasy whenever he comes to a checkpoint. "They're there for a reason and it's not a good one," he said.

Earlier this year, Baja California crime boss Teodoro Garcia Simental was believed to be at a party at an oceanfront resort a few miles from Kirchhoff's property, but he escaped onto the beach, according to officials and media reports.

Kirchhoff said federal police and soldiers scoured the area in helicopters, boats and trucks, and walked up the sand to search neighboring properties. "They were chasing some of the most heinous criminals in Baja. That ought to give anybody cause for concern," said Kirchhoff, 67.

But it's not enough to get him to leave his sprawling home perched over the beach and his four-acre ranch near- by. Kirchhoff and other expatriates who have been touched by crime -- usually home break-ins or petty theft -- have adapted to the risks. They drive junky cars, avoid late-night trips and stay away from crime hot spots like eastern Tijuana.

The Dawsons also have their own rules. They never carry large amounts of cash, and they keep a stash hidden in the car just in case they're robbed. The couple says they use the kind of common-sense rules that people follow in any community affected by serious crime, like Los Angeles or their former hometown. Carol says she feels safer in Las Gaviotas, where she leaves her front door unlocked.

"I heard gunfire in Santa Ana. I've never heard gunfire here," she said.

It's a point she's made countless times to her son-in-law, without success. "He was very hard-nosed about coming down here," she said. "He thought people were putting their children in danger."

A few weeks ago, Carol was returning from an errand when she was greeted at the front door by squeals of excitement. "Surprise, Grammy," yelled her two grandsons. Her son-in-law, seeing that crime has declined significantly from two years ago, made the trip from Laguna Niguel with his family.

It was like old times. The boys batted a Wiffle ball on the putting green, took walks on the beach with their three golden retrievers and played in the pool. Carol's daughter and son-in-law got side-by-side massages at a spa, played golf at Baja Mar, and the family dined at the La Fonda restaurant down the coast.

Carol Dawson and other expatriates see signs that things may be turning around. Some hotels are selling out on weekends and there are more surfers trickling down south of the border. Then there's her son-in-law's change of heart.

"I think he finally realized," she said, "that it can't be all that bad."

richard.marosi@latimes.com.
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times

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Mexican drug lord Teodoro Garcia Simental, known for his savagery, is captured

http://www.latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-fg-mexico-arrest13-2010jan13,0,4064511.story

"Competing Mexican drug cartels are destroying each other ... and that's where 'Warrior' begins ...."
http://www.warriorthemovie.com
http://www.warriorthemovie.blogspot.com
http://imdb.com/title/tt0320751

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-208917617001990565&q=warrior+mexican+OR+drug+OR+cartels+duration%3Ashort+genre%3AMOVIE_TRAILER

"the action adventure fantasy feature film "Warrior" ... about the son of a divine force ... is a story of a young man's quest to find his true identity set against the twin backdrops of Native American folklore and the treacherous Mexican drug trade and a portrayal of the classic confrontation between "good and evil" ... filmed in the exotic jungles of Costa Azul in the State of Nayarit and the urban grit of Puerto Vallarta in the State of Jalisco, Mexico .. with action, adventure, romance, comedy, a multi-ethnic cast, a major studio movie music score and spectacular cinematography ..."

latimes.com
MEXICO UNDER SIEGE
Mexican drug lord Teodoro Garcia Simental, known for his savagery, is captured
The crime boss 'El Teo,' who authorities say is responsible for massacres and beheadings, is quietly arrested in Baja California. Hundreds fled Tijuana to avoid being kidnapped.
By Richard Marosi and Ken Ellingwood
January 13, 2010
Reporting from San Diego and Mexico City

A Mexican drug cartel kingpin accused of dissolving victims in barrels of lye and waging a terror campaign that turned Tijuana into one of Mexico's most dangerous cities was captured early Tuesday in the port city of La Paz, federal authorities said.

Teodoro Garcia Simental, blamed for a years-long campaign of massacres, beheadings and kidnappings that chased away tourists and caused social upheaval in northern Baja California, was arrested by Mexican federal police without the suspect firing a shot, and immediately flown to Mexico City.

The heavyset Garcia, believed to be in his mid-30s, with close-trimmed hair and a goatee, scowled and dabbed at his mouth as he was paraded before television cameras at a police base wearing a zippered warm-up jacket.

Better known for savage killing rampages than narco-business acumen, the man nicknamed "El Teo" bedeviled Mexican authorities for years and narrowly escaped capture several times. Last January, authorities arrested the man they said admitted being Garcia's body disposal expert. Known as El Pozolero, or "the stew maker," he claimed, authorities said, to have dissolved 300 bodies in barrels of caustic chemicals.

Mexican federal authorities, acting on intelligence provided by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, said they tracked Garcia down after a five-month surveillance operation. He was captured in an upscale area in the southern part of the city.

"Today another Mexican cartel leader was taken off the street and is no longer able to carry out his bloody turf war," said Michele Leonhart, acting administrator of the DEA. "This was not an isolated event: It exemplifies the growing effectiveness of our information sharing with [Mexican President Felipe Calderon's] administration, and our continued commitment to defeat the drug traffickers who have plagued both our nations."

Though Garcia was not considered to be in the top echelon of Mexican drug lords, few reputed crime bosses have had such a ruinous effect on a region. Mexican authorities say he was responsible for hundreds of killings during a nearly two-year power struggle with rivals in the Arellano Felix drug cartel, in which he had once been a top-ranking lieutenant.

Garcia is said to have branched out from traditional drug trafficking and focused his criminal empire on extortion and kidnapping, targeting all levels of society. During his reign, hundreds, perhaps thousands, of Tijuana residents moved out of the border city to avoid being kidnapped, and more than 42 police officers were killed.

"It's a very good day for Tijuana," said former resident Gabriel Benavides, whose family moved to a San Diego suburb after a loved one was kidnapped by Garcia's crew in 2005. "He caused great pain to so many people."

The arrest was a dose of good news amid a spectacular surge in violence in drug-trafficking zones across Mexico. The country had already seen unprecedented bloodshed resulting from gang turf wars and the government's 3-year-old crackdown on organized crime.

In Tijuana, where more than 30 people have died this month, government officials hope that Garcia's arrest will bring some tranquillity. His main rival, Fernando Sanchez Arellano, could fill the power vacuum and impose order in the criminal underworld. But many observers warned that there could be fresh rounds of violence if one of Garcia's lieutenants makes a power play.

Garcia started as an errand boy for the Arellano Felix cartel and reputedly rose to power as the leader of a cell that turned kidnappings for ransom into a rich vein of revenue. Hundreds of residents -- attorneys, prominent businessmen, doctors -- were abducted and held at safe houses across the city.

When Sanchez Arellano, the cartel leader, tried to rein in his lieutenant, Garcia resisted and war broke out after a shootout between the rival gangs in April 2008 that left at least 13 people dead.

Much of Tijuana became a battleground and Garcia gained notoriety for ruthless and depraved tactics. Rivals were massacred, burned and tossed into vacant lots. Mutilated bodies were hung from freeway overpasses.

Last year, Mexican authorities started striking hard against Garcia, arresting several of his lieutenants in blows that choked off revenue and depleted his ranks of enforcers. Authorities last January came close to arresting Garcia at a resort south of Rosarito Beach where his gang was gathering for a party. He eluded capture by escaping down the beach that is popular with American retirees.

In recent months, the manhunt intensified and Garcia avoided going to Tijuana. Authorities had narrowed his whereabouts to southern Baja California and pinpointed his house through electronic surveillance of his telephone, according to a U.S. law enforcement official.

richard.marosi@latimes.com

ken.ellingwood@latimes.com

Times staff writer Tracy Wilkinson in Mexico City contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2010, The Los Angeles Times

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Andy Fernandez of South El Monte, a former student of Bobby Salcedo at Mountain View High School in El Monte, wipes away a tear as he sits at El Monte City Hall. Near him is a photo of Salcedo and his wife Betzy. The former teacher and assistant high school principal was killed in Mexico. (Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times / January 1, 2010)

Civic leader from El Monte, California is victim of Mexican violence

"Competing Mexican drug cartels are destroying each other ... and that's where 'Warrior' begins ...."
http://www.warriorthemovie.com
http://www.warriorthemovie.blogspot.com
http://imdb.com/title/tt0320751

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-208917617001990565&q=warrior+mexican+OR+drug+OR+cartels+duration%3Ashort+genre%3AMOVIE_TRAILER

"the action adventure fantasy feature film "Warrior" ... about the son of a divine force ... is a story of a young man's quest to find his true identity set against the twin backdrops of Native American folklore and the treacherous Mexican drug trade and a portrayal of the classic confrontation between "good and evil" ... filmed in the exotic jungles of Costa Azul in the State of Nayarit and the urban grit of Puerto Vallarta in the State of Jalisco, Mexico .. with action, adventure, romance, comedy, a multi-ethnic cast, a major studio movie music score and spectacular cinematography ..."


latimes.com/news/local/la-me-elmonte2-2010jan02,0,1294578.story
latimes.com
MEXICO UNDER SIEGE
Civic leader from El Monte, California is victim of Mexican violence
The killing of an El Monte civic leader on a visit to Durango shows how prevalent lawlessness has grown.

By Sam Quinones and Molly Hennessy-Fiske

January 2, 2010

The execution-style murder of a young El Monte civic leader in Mexico was viewed Friday as a stark sign of just how widely the country's savage drug violence has spread.

Bobby Salcedo, an assistant principal and school board member, had no ties to narcotics trafficking, his family and friends said. He is believed to be the first U.S. elected official killed in the 4-year-old spasm of carnage in Mexico.

Gomez Palacio, the city where he died, was once best known for its industry. But it has grown violent: Salcedo and the five men who died with him were among 11 killed in the city that night with signs of execution, according to media reports.

Salcedo had deep ties to the central Mexican city. The school administrator, who was born and raised in California, was a past president of the South El Monte-Gomez Palacio sister cities organization and raised money for scholarships, clinics, firefighters, orphanages and playgrounds.

He met his wife, Betzy, in 1999 when she went from Gomez Palacio to Southern California on a sister-city exchange student scholarship. They were visiting her family when he was hauled off and shot to death.

"I don't know if we lived in a bubble, but we never thought we would be targeted," said Salcedo's brother Carlos. "We were never looking over our shoulder."

But criminality and lawlessness have descended on Durango state, where Gomez Palacio is situated, like a pestilence, attacking the city of 240,000 people with ferocity. Last year, more than 600 people were killed in Durango, making it the fourth-deadliest state total in the country.

For immigrants from Durango in Southern California, the return home for Christmas was once a hallowed tradition. This year, however, the Federation of Durangan Clubs estimated travel home was off by as much as 60%.

"There's a lot of fear," said Carlos Martinez, the federation secretary. "People don't want to risk it."

Martinez said the federation was promoting a round-trip flight from Tijuana to Durango for $220, cheaper than the cost of a bus, but the airline canceled the flight because of a lack of sales.

Agustin Roberto "Bobby" Salcedo, 33, apparently wasn't very worried.

Joseph Vu, 34, a former co-worker and classmate of Salcedo, said they exchanged text messages hours before Salcedo was kidnapped. "He said he was going to have a few beers. That was it," said Vu, also an assistant principal at El Monte High School.

The Salcedos were dining with Betzy's former classmates at a bar called Iguanas Ranas, next to the Buchacas pool hall, Wednesday evening.

Shortly after midnight a group of armed and masked men burst into the bar and asked who owned a truck parked out front, investigators told The Times. No one claimed it so the gunmen went from man to man, slapping them around until zeroing in on Salcedo and five others. They were hauled away.

Their bodies were discovered several hours later, dumped in a field near a canal. Salcedo was killed by a single gunshot to the head and had apparently not been tortured, said an official in the state attorney general's office in Gomez Palacio, who did not want to be identified because he was not authorized to speak to media.

Most of the other men had also been killed with a single gunshot, but two bore numerous gunshot wounds, suggesting they were the targets, the official said. None of the men killed with Salcedo had criminal records, but investigators suspect one or two might have been drug dealers.

No evidence indicates that Salcedo had been specifically targeted, authorities said.

Residents of Gomez Palacio expressed surprise that Salcedo would have ventured to the strip on Miguel Aleman Boulevard, which has a well-established seedy reputation. Its bars, pool halls and nightclubs have been the scene of kidnappings and shootouts, and the area is an easy place to buy drugs.

"I think he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and with the wrong people," one resident said.

At Mountain View High School in El Monte, where Salcedo was once student body president, then later football coach and assistant principal, he was remembered as an involved administrator, attending sporting events, dressing up on Halloween and exercising often on the school's track.

"He's helped every aspect of the school," said junior Justin Spence. "Everyone knew him."

Former El Monte Police Chief Ken Weldon described Salcedo as conscientious and hard-working, a "giver" and a leader. "This is a dagger in the hearts of a lot of people," he said.

Salcedo's brother Carlos said that his sister-in-law called Thursday to tell him his brother's body had been found. He was the first in his family to hear the news. He said his mother broke down. "She kept saying, 'They took my Bobby,' " he said. Salcedo said his brother's body probably will be returned Monday and the family is hoping to have a service Wednesday.

The spasm of drug violence that has gripped Durango in the last few years has been fueled by a dispute over the territory.

The Sinaloa cartel and its leader, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, long controlled the area. But moving in from neighboring Coahuila are the Zetas, a ruthless gang that has splintered off the Gulf cartel in Mexico's northeastern border region.

One Southern California immigrant leader, who did not want to be identified for fear of retaliation, said people are routinely stopped at roadblocks run by well-armed men outside Santiago Papasquiaro, the town that serves as a gateway to the Durango sierra.

"They ask you, 'Which group are you from: ¿Los Zetas o Los Chapos?' " said the immigrant leader. "This happened to me twice. It's terrifying. The traditional Christmas trip home is over. We go now only when it's an emergency."

This violence has infected the once-peaceful lowland city of Gomez Palacio, which is both the state's wealthiest industrial hub and a distribution center for goods heading to the United States, a strategic point for the battling cartels.

In the last year, generalized criminality has set in across the city, encouraged by authorities' ineffectiveness, immigrants and residents say.

"It could be that a neighbor who doesn't have work calls up and extorts a neighbor," said Salvador Franco, president of the Gomez Palacio club in Southern California, who recently returned from the city. "They pretend to be traffickers or Zetas."

In the last year, many Gomez Palacio businesses have closed as their owners fled. Franco said he knew a family that received extortion and kidnapping threats and sold its two-bus transportation line and left for the United States.

"Things are serious," he said. "You have to be inside by 6 p.m. You can't be in a restaurant. You can't have a good car because you never know who's going to take it from you."

Martinez, the federation secretary, said extortion and kidnapping have become scourges of the city's middle-class business owners. He said a brother-in-law who is an architect moved his firm from an office to his house to avoid seeming wealthy and attracting attention. His brother ran a purified-water store for five years until receiving demands for weekly payment of protection money.

"Car lots, factories and restaurants have closed," Martinez said. "These are things you've never before seen in the state of Durango."

sam.quinones@latimes.com

molly.hennessy-fiske

@latimes.com

Times staff writers Hector Becerra, Jessica Garrison, Anna Gorman, Ruben Vives and Tracy Wilkinson contributed to this report. Wilkinson reported from Mexico City.
Copyright © 2010, The Los Angeles Times

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Soldiers at a Mexico City military school line up before leaving to aid in drug crop eradication. Two former top officials write in a recent book critical of the government's campaign against narcotics traffickers, "If what is good for us is decriminalization, that is what we should fight for." (Dario Lopez-Mills / Associated Press / June 15, 2009)

Book takes Mexico drug war to task

"Competing Mexican drug cartels are destroying each other ... and that's where 'Warrior' begins ...."
http://www.warriorthemovie.com
http://www.warriorthemovie.blogspot.com
http://imdb.com/title/tt0320751

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-208917617001990565&q=warrior+mexican+OR+drug+OR+cartels+duration%3Ashort+genre%3AMOVIE_TRAILER

"the action adventure fantasy feature film "Warrior" ... about the son of a divine force ... is a story of a young man's quest to find his true identity set against the twin backdrops of Native American folklore and the treacherous Mexican drug trade and a portrayal of the classic confrontation between "good and evil" ... filmed in the exotic jungles of Costa Azul in the State of Nayarit and the urban grit of Puerto Vallarta in the State of Jalisco, Mexico .. with action, adventure, romance, comedy, a multi-ethnic cast, a major studio movie music score and spectacular cinematography ..."


latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-fg-narco-book1-2010jan01,0,6239821.story
latimes.com
FOREIGN EXCHANGE
Book takes Mexico drug war to task
The book by two former Mexican government officials criticizes President Felipe Calderon's campaign against the drug cartels. The authors say the focus should be on smaller-bore crimes.

By Ken Ellingwood

January 1, 2010

Reporting from Mexico City

Almost everything to do with the Mexican government's war against drugs is wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

The threat from narco-trafficking is overblown. Fighting cartels won't stop the flow of illegal drugs or erase Mexican corruption. The real battle over drugs lies on the U.S. side of the border.

That's the gist of a provocative new book that challenges virtually every premise on which Mexican President Felipe Calderon has based his 3-year-old offensive against drug cartels.

"El Narco: La Guerra Fallida" ("Narco: The Failed War"), by two top officials under Calderon's predecessor, Vicente Fox, is one of the first book-length looks at the crackdown launched by Calderon when he took office in December 2006.

The Spanish-language book, which has sold well here, is controversial and stubbornly contrarian, to the point of suggesting that Mexico might be better off coming to terms with the drug capos and focusing on smaller-bore crimes that plague Mexicans.

"Calderon could have easily launched a major crusade against insecurity, violence and unorganized crime, on the type of minor misdemeanors that gave birth to Rudy Giuliani's zero tolerance stance in New York," the authors assert. "But that crusade would never have unleashed the passions, support or sense of danger that a full-fledged war on drugs actually did."

In "El Narco," former Fox spokesman Ruben Aguilar and former Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda attempt an end run past the usual debate over whether the Calderon anti-crime strategy is working. Instead, they maintain that the offensive was unnecessary, and they seek to poke holes in many of the reasons Calderon has offered for launching a campaign that has claimed more than 15,000 lives.

The president's assertion that Mexico faced a crisis of deepening drug consumption at home? They present figures showing that though domestic use has risen, it is minuscule compared with countries such as the United States.

Calderon's contention that drug violence had reached alarming levels when he decided to act? The authors quote studies showing that the nation's overall homicide rate had been in decline for years. (It has gone up since.)

"Why in the world was it necessary to declare an all-out war against the cartels because of growing violence, when violence was actually diminishing?" the authors ask.

The book argues that U.S. drug use -- the motor of the violent trafficking industry -- is largely unaffected by Mexico's enforcement actions. The answer for Mexico, it says, lies in swinging debate north of the border in favor of drug decriminalization or legalization.

"If what is good for us is decriminalization, that is what we should fight for," write Aguilar and Castaneda, a leftist intellectual and commentator who is the better known of the two.

The authors propose some public-safety measures, including creation of a national police force and a no-fly zone over southern Mexico. But rather than send troops to fight drug cartels, they argue, Mexico should focus on limiting the "collateral damage" that most aggrieves Mexicans: kidnappings, extortion, car theft and corruption.

This could mean "tacit quid pro quos" with gangs to get them to keep down criminal mayhem in Mexico's streets, the writers say, but it doesn't require a formal handshake.

"The narcos understand," they say. "If they were imbeciles, they wouldn't be rich."

Aguilar and Castaneda contend that in launching the drug offensive, the conservative Calderon sought to win legitimacy for his presidency after a disputed election victory in 2006. That thesis is heard often on the Mexican left.

Calderon hasn't directly referred to the authors, but he has sharply criticized those who he says would have Mexico run from the drug war or cut deals with traffickers. He says such approaches would "erode the foundations that support our society, as a state based on law."

Calderon has frequently characterized his crime crackdown as an attempt to clean and modernize a system that had become thoroughly corrupted through decades of official acceptance of the drug trade, or even outright collusion with it.

Last month, he urged Mexicans to "ignore those who naively want the government to just walk away from the fight, as if the problems would solve themselves by magic."

The outspoken authors of "El Narco" are uncharacteristically spare when it comes to solving Mexico's graft problem. They agree that drug-related corruption has long been part of the Mexican landscape, especially in small towns, but are skeptical of reports that traffickers' penetration of the system had hit grave new depths when Calderon sent troops into the streets.

"This is Mexico, not Norway," they write. "Narcos' complicity with municipal, state and federal authorities wasn't born yesterday."

ken.ellingwood@latimes.com

Copyright © 2010, The Los Angeles Times

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Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times /
Soldiers console the brother of a shooting victim in Ciudad Juarez last summer. Many Mexicans don?t trust authorities enough to report crime or suspicious activity

In Mexico's drug battle, the public is missing in action

"Competing Mexican drug cartels are destroying each other ... and that's where 'Warrior' begins ...."
http://www.warriorthemovie.com
http://www.warriorthemovie.blogspot.com
http://imdb.com/title/tt0320751

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-208917617001990565&q=warrior+mexican+OR+drug+OR+cartels+duration%3Ashort+genre%3AMOVIE_TRAILER

"the action adventure fantasy feature film "Warrior" ... about the son of a divine force ... is a story of a young man's quest to find his true identity set against the twin backdrops of Native American folklore and the treacherous Mexican drug trade and a portrayal of the classic confrontation between "good and evil" ... filmed in the exotic jungles of Costa Azul in the State of Nayarit and the urban grit of Puerto Vallarta in the State of Jalisco, Mexico .. with action, adventure, romance, comedy, a multi-ethnic cast, a major studio movie music score and spectacular cinematography ..."


http://www.latimes.com/news/nation-and-world/la-fg-mexico-society30-2009dec30,0,4738266,print.story
latimes.com
MEXICO UNDER SIEGE

In Mexico's drug battle, the public is missing in action
Faced with drug-cartel violence and signs of vigilantism against the gangs, ordinary people would argue that it doesn't pay to get involved.

By Tracy Wilkinson and Ken Ellingwood

December 30, 2009

Reporting from Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, and San Pedro Garza Garcia, Mexico -- The mayor had good news: A notorious thug from one of the drug cartels had been found killed. Hector "El Negro" Saldana would no longer menace the people of San Pedro Garza Garcia, Mexico.

Trouble was, Saldana's body hadn't yet been discovered when Mayor Mauricio Fernandez made the announcement with a flourish at his swearing-in ceremony in October.

How did Fernandez know about Saldana's demise hours before investigators found the body stuffed in a car hundreds of miles away in Mexico City?

Without explicitly admitting that he had ordered the killing, Fernandez eventually acknowledged forming "intelligence squads" to "cleanse" his jurisdiction of undesirables such as "El Negro," who by all accounts kidnapped and extorted with impunity and flaunted his untouchable status by driving around in a yellow Lamborghini.

The top judicial official in the region praised Fernandez's crime-busting initiative as "fabulous." Days passed before any senior government figure criticized the mayor.

The hit on "El Negro" raised a nightmarish prospect for the nation: Had the government's war on the cartels brought Mexico to the point where vigilantism was sanctioned? And were ordinary Mexicans somehow complicit?

"We've all paid off a cop, bribed our way to a degree, been afraid to denounce the pusher at the taxi stand," said Marcos Fastlicht, a prominent Mexico City businessman who is trying to rally citizens into collective action against crime.

"We are all born into this environment and we have not been strong, or courageous, enough. We've all helped this country fall apart."

But many Mexicans would argue that it doesn't pay to get involved. Governments have long discouraged or even punished those who speak out. Given that legions of police officers and politicians have been bought off by the drug capos, it's safer to stay on the sidelines.

And a lot of people benefit from narcotics trafficking. The cartels "have offered work and opportunities and a sense of identity that we as society were not able to offer them," Luis Cardenas Palomino, head of an intelligence branch of the federal police, said at a recent conference on citizen participation.

"They have offered them something that is the most serious of all: the chance for a social payback."

Last year, when a 14-year-old boy from an affluent family in Mexico City was killed and crammed into a car trunk after his parents paid a ransom, an aggrieved public staged protest marches in many cities. But since then, there has been little sustained public action against organized crime.

In this drug offensive launched three years ago by President Felipe Calderon, more than 15,000 people have been killed. But that is not the only measure of the damage, or of the difficulty Calderon faces. The Mexican people have been reluctant allies in the struggle, key institutions of society have been silent or ineffectual, and democratic values that had been struggling to take root, such as independence of the press and the rule of law, have been eroded.

Dripping with money, some of it even legal, San Pedro Garza Garcia is the kind of place where residents put a high premium on safety and can demand it.

Fernandez, the mayor, says he is meeting those demands. He says he was forced to create "intelligence units" because of public anger and the ineffectiveness of authorities.

By acknowledging the use of vigilantes, Fernandez uttered aloud what had swirled as whispers in many parts of the country. From blood-soaked border states such as Chihuahua to drug-producing centers such as Sinaloa to the capital, Mexico City, a number of mysterious killings point to the settling of scores or removal of undesirables.

San Pedro, a suburb of Monterrey, Mexico's industrial capital, boasts multinational corporate headquarters, Ferrari dealerships, pristine streets and parks, the top luxury hotels. At one typically orderly intersection rises a copy of Michelangelo's David larger than the original.

In an interview in a City Hall office decorated with paintings by Mexico's top contemporary artists, Fernandez dismissed comparisons of the intelligence units to death squads or Colombia-style paramilitaries, saying his units are "more like detectives," albeit answerable only to him. He refused to provide any details as to who serves on the squads or how they operate.

"The important thing to know is that here in San Pedro we will do whatever it takes," he said. "We are not willing to accept organized crime."

Fernandez, scion of one of his city's oldest families, said he enjoyed broad support and would pay for his special units with donations from rich businessmen, like himself.

And he said he was talking to Israeli firms about purchasing top-of-the line surveillance and security equipment.

"The important thing is to have the information," he said. "How did we come by the information? Doesn't matter to me. . . . Just bring me the information."

He said that those who worried that the squads would run amok could relax because they would be under his control.

"It is not within the law, but it's not against the law either," he said.

Consuelo Morales, a nun who stands not quite 5 feet tall, was one of the people condemning Fernandez. No one wanted to hear her.

Not unusual, she says.

"Citizens are sick and tired of corruption and impunity and tempted to take justice into their own hands," she said. "But if we permit citizens to form groups to settle scores, because the authorities don't function at any level, then you create a monster."

As head of a human rights organization, Morales for years has been trying to shine light on the misdeeds of officials, police and others, with little success.

On her laptop computer, the nun stores videos of vicious beatings of suspects in jails. In one, a young man sinks to the floor yelping and writhing in pain as uniformed police officers pummel him with a long, flat board.

The video was aired on television. The reaction? Zilch, Morales said. "If this doesn't mobilize people, then I hate to say we are paralyzed."

In Catholic countries torn by strife, the church has often served as a catalyst for change. But in Mexico, the Roman Catholic Church has failed in that mission, top clerics say.

Much like the broader society, the church is caught between fear and complicity, between the impulse to take a stand and the desire to avoid conflict.

"The church has been content to follow its same rhythm of always, when it should be revving its engines," said Hector Gonzalez Martinez, archbishop of the tense, rough state of Durango.

Gonzalez made a splash this year when he said that Mexico's top fugitive drug lord, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, was living in a Durango mountain village and that "everyone knows" it, including authorities who had failed to capture him.

Four days later, two army officers were found slain in the area the cleric had singled out, with a sign attached to their bodies: "Neither officials nor priests will ever be able to handle El Chapo."

This year, a priest and two seminary students were killed in the state of Guerrero, presumably by traffickers; in Durango, a region where gunmen "own the night" in village after village, "every priest has been threatened," Gonzalez says.

Gonzalez continued to visit remote parishes up and down the Sierra Madre foothills that march through western and northern Durango.

Until August.

A village mayor ran to the visiting Gonzalez to report that gunmen in several SUVs were gathering nearby. Then Gonzalez's cellphone rang. A state official in the Durango capital said U.S. drug agents had learned of a plot to kill the archbishop.

The official dispatched a helicopter to whisk him to safety.

Gonzalez now travels with bodyguards and is awaiting delivery of an armored car.

He laments that Mexican society lacks a sense of solidarity when it comes to facing drug violence.

"Every time there's another murder, another headless corpse, another kidnapped person, the immediate family members are very concerned, but it doesn't move society as a whole," said Gonzalez, 70, who moves and speaks with grave deliberateness, as if he had a great weight on his shoulders.

"We have too rapidly become accustomed to having these evils in the middle of our society."

In some parts of the country, priests have used money from traffickers to pay for church repairs, special chapels or other community projects. One senior priest was quoted a few years ago praising the drug lords' propensity to tithe.

"They make us accomplices," said an outspoken bishop, Raul Vera of Saltillo. "A steeple built with drug money has blood gushing from its rafters."

Nuevo Laredo was once the most violent city in the country. It is an exhaust-choked trucking hub on the border across from Laredo, Texas, where four years ago spectacular gunfights between rival drug gangs left residents afraid to leave their homes. A police chief was assassinated hours after taking the oath of office.

The shootouts have largely ebbed, replaced by a calm that most residents attribute to a pact between the warring groups that left the city under the control of the Zetas, the armed wing of the Gulf cartel that often operates on its own.

But the quiet in Nuevo Laredo is thick with fear and a feeling of helplessness.

The Zetas have proved to be ruthless overlords. They have kidnapped businessmen, demanded protection money from merchants, taken over sales of pirated CDs and DVDs and muscled into the liquor trade by forcing restaurant and bar owners to buy from them.

"Imagine this is 1920s Chicago and Al Capone is the boss," said one longtime resident, who like others in town voiced his belief that the gang is protected by local law enforcement.

Jittery residents hesitate to say "Zeta" in public. A joke making the rounds has it that the gang, whose name is the Spanish for "Z," left Nuevo Laredo with one less letter in the alphabet.

Many residents say they don't trust the authorities enough to report crime or suspicious activity. Threats and attacks have cowed journalists into slanting their reports.

In October, local news outlets received ominous calls from a purported representative of the group after a rolling shootout that involved Mexican soldiers, according to a newspaper editor who declined to be named out of concern for his safety.

The gist of the message: Make the army look bad.

The news media obliged, reporting that soldiers had ignited the shootout, in which an elementary school filled with children was sprayed with gunfire.

"Soldiers Provoke the Clash," read one headline. The accompanying article said troops had fired in an "indiscriminate" manner.

"Everyone published stories criticizing the army . . . because of pressure," the editor said.

"It wasn't necessarily false. It was manipulated, inaccurate, because of what the bad guys wanted known."

Residents mobilized briefly during the carnage of 2005. Civic leaders held meetings and issued a decal bearing the image of a white dove and a plea for "Peace in Both Laredos." Many residents stuck them on their cars.

Activists planned a peace march from the international border to a statue of 19th century Mexican President Benito Juarez two miles away. A few days before the march, gunmen opened fire in front of City Hall, where a group was protesting the arrest of police officers who were suspected of having criminal links. A man was killed.

Organizers called off the peace march.

"We considered the consequences," said Carlos Martinez, who runs a secondary school called Nuevo Laredo City College. "It was the last serious effort by people to take action."

Some residents call the atmosphere in Nuevo Laredo a calma chicha -- a fishy quiet.

Martinez said the drug trade will never end, so the best border residents can hope for is not to be bothered by the traffickers.

"We don't care what deals they make," Martinez said. "What we want in the city is peace. At least leave us alone."

wilkinson@latimes.com

ken.ellingwood@latimes.com

Wilkinson reported from San Pedro Garza Garcia, Durango and Mexico City. Ellingwood reported from Nuevo Laredo, San Luis Potosi and Mexico City.
Copyright © 2009, The Los Angeles Times

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