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Tijuana violence slows as one cartel takes control
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/05/us-mexico-drugs-ti...
By Lizbeth Diaz
TIJUANA, Mexico
Sep 5, 2011
(Reuters) - Mexico's famously seedy border city of Tijuana is enjoying a lull in drug murders as the country's most powerful cartel gains the upper
hand over its rivals.
While other parts of Mexico are hit by an increase in drugs violence, the beheadings and massacres familiar a few years ago are now rare in Tijuana, a
key battleground on one of the most lucrative drug smuggling corridors to the United States.
Nightclubs and restaurants that shut down during a peak in violence in 2008 have cautiously begun to reopen their doors over the last year and
officials say investment is picking up.
Long one of Mexico's most vibrant border cities, lying just across from San Diego, Tijuana is home not just to sleazy bars and brothels but also to a
cutting edge electronic music scene and internationally renowned contemporary artists.
Much of that changed, however, when battles between rival drug gangs sparked daytime shootouts and many brutal murders.
Residents remember how one day more than a dozen corpses were dumped opposite a school. Another day brought the capture of the "stew maker," who
dissolved hundreds of bodies in acid to hide evidence of murders committed by his gang.
"I'm still worried about the violence, but it's nothing like as horrible it was," said the elderly owner of an elegant Japanese cafe on a lively strip
of gourmet restaurants.
"Before you had to zigzag around the city to avoid getting kidnapped, which is what happened to several people I know," she said over the din of
teenagers enjoying a birthday party in downtown Tijuana. "It's a different Tijuana now."
So far in 2011, there have been 349 homicides in Tijuana, way down from the peaks of 820 in 2010 and 844 in 2008.
Mexico's government claims credit for the improvements after flooding the state of Baja California with police and soldiers in 2009 and helping to
dismantle the once-dominant Arellano Felix cartel by capturing several of its leaders.
"Until recently Tijuana suffered extreme violence, but commitment from the local police, the governor, has led to a drastic drop," President Felipe
Calderon said last week.
He says Tijuana is an example of the way forward, even as violence has mushroomed in other areas in the country, including the once-safe industrial
city of Monterrey, hit by a dramatic surge in killings over the past two years.
Suspected cartel members torched an up-market Monterrey casino in late August, killing 52 people in one of the worst atrocities of the drugs war.
SINALOA CARTEL IN CONTROL
Tijuana's recovery is a rare bright spot for the government but analysts say there is a more subtle reality -- the decline of the Arellano Felix gang
has allowed the Sinaloa cartel, Mexico's strongest, to move in and take control.
With a clear winner emerging from a turf war, violence has slowed, but the drugs trade is still flourishing here.
"The drugs continue flowing, without a doubt. What has diminished is violence between criminal groups," said Edgardo Buscaglia, an security expert at
Mexico's ITAM university.
"Organized crime continues, not only drug trafficking but extortion, kidnapping, human smuggling and gun running. But it's under a consolidated group
(Sinaloa)."
Calderon has staked his reputation on an army-led crackdown against the drug cartels but the conflict has claimed 42,000 lives since he took office in
late 2006 and the bloodshed is hitting support for his conservative National Action Party, or PAN, ahead of the next presidential election in July
2012.
His campaign upset the balance of power, triggering a series of turf wars. A troubling truth is that the violence tends to ease when one cartel
establishes control in an area.
Calderon insists, though, that all organized crime groups will be hit with the same force and has vowed to continue the squeeze on gangs until he
leaves office in late 2012.
Better security in Tijuana has given hope to investors like Juan Pablo Arroyuelo, who is spending $50 million building upscale villas next to wineries
in Ensenada south of the city.
"Right now the violence is under control. Baja California is not at all what it used to be like in recent years. That is giving us confidence to
invest," said Arroyuelo.
'ZOMBIES'
The head of the Sinaloa cartel is Mexico's most wanted man, Joaquin "Shorty" Guzman, and analysts say he has managed to keep the peace in Tijuana by
allying with local crime bosses, all the while keeping drugs streaming steadily north.
Several sophisticated tunnels used for moving drugs under the U.S. border were discovered here this year.
Security experts believe the Sinaloa gang was behind them, as well as one of the largest marijuana fields in Mexico's history found farther south in
Baja California in July.
For years, the Arellano Felix family ran Tijuana, using gruesome torture and executions to defend its territory.
Now most of the original leaders are dead or in jail, leaving just a nephew, Luis Fernando Sanchez Arellano, known as "The Engineer." He fought off a
challenge from the group's top enforcer, Teodoro "El Teo" Garcia Simental, that led to the bloody battle to dominate the city in recent years.
Sanchez Arellano finally engineered a truce with Guzman and his henchmen that gave him an advantage over his rival.
Garcia Simental was then arrested last year and the Sinaloa cartel's illegal drugs now pass through Arellano's territory for a fee, a U.S. official in
Mexico said.
"A deal was struck (that) allows both organizations to operate independently and includes a non-aggression pact, securing for the Sinaloa Federation
its long-awaited access to the lucrative port of entry into the United States," U.S. intelligence firm Stratfor said in a report earlier this year.
As drugs pass through Tijuana unabated, the number of local addicts is growing. They gather by the dozens in a rancid sewage canal called "El Bordo"
near the U.S. port of entry.
"There are a bunch like me," said local dealer Juan while shooting heroin into his neck. "We are all like zombies."
Addicts like Juan, and a series of violent attacks on rehab centers, remind officials the fight for Tijuana is not over.
"We are on the right path," Baja California state Governor Jose Osuna told business leaders and government officials in August. "(But) it's clear the
battle is not won."
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BajaNews
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Cartels Making Adjustments To Tactics
http://www.10news.com/news/29113003/detail.html
September 7, 2011
SAN DIEGO -- Many San Diegans have stopped making trips to Tijuana and Baja due to drug cartel-related violence in Mexico, but the 10News I-Team found
that some cartels have changed the way they operate in the streets, leading to less public violence.
The drug cartel violence has seemingly quieted down in Tijuana and Baja, as reports of murders and mayhem have gone off the front pages.
But in what seems to be a contradiction, 2010 was the worst yet in the Mexican drug wars, with 15,000 people murdered.
A former U.S. intelligence officer told 10News a winner has been declared in Baja and Tijuana drug wars
"The Sinaloa Cartel has pretty much won this area," the officer said.
The officer said the Sinaloa Cartel and others have come to the realization that, as American organized crime figured out years ago, bad publicity is
bad for business.
The officer made clear that the cartels have not reformed; they simply have reduced the high-profile elements of their crimes. Instead of murders and
beheadings in public, cartel business is quietly handled in more private places.
Another dramatic change for the cartels is a shift in their business strategy. The officer said cartels have seen there is money to be made not just
in transporting drugs into the U.S., but in selling drugs to the growing Mexican middle class.
"They weren't selling drugs in their own cities to their own people, now they are," said the officer.
According to the officer, regions, cities and towns are being divided up. Agreements are made to respect other cartels' turf.
In the case of Tijuana, it's the Sinaloa Cartel that controls the trafficking in and through the city.
Not all areas of Mexico have one cartel in complete control, which is why there are still news reports about the violence in other areas of the
country.
For example, a casino in Monterey was recently torched. Authorities said 53 customers trapped inside died.
Recent stories out of that area reported five members of the Zetas Cartel were responsible. The Zetas Cartel is not one of the cartels who want to
stay low-profile. The intelligence officer told 10News the "Zetas are screwing up the plan for everybody".
According to the officer, the Zetas are very much in pitched battles with several groups in an attempt to extend their control.
The officer said the gang was formed from Mexican special forces personnel hired as enforcers. They eventually set up their own organization and
remain unwilling or unable to form alliances with other cartels.
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