Path of Destruction

The Zeta drug cartel has fueled violence, corruption and mayhem from South America all the way to North Texas. 
A series in the Dallas Morning News: http://dallasne.ws/hemQTr

Mexican officials capture much-wanted drug-trafficking suspect

La Barbie captured. Corchado and Villagran report:

MEXICO CITY – Texas-born suspected drug trafficker Edgar Valdez Villarreal, whose brutality belied his nickname "La Barbie," was captured Monday by Mexican federal authorities, the latest in a series of victories for the government in its fight against drug cartels. Valdez is considered the most wanted and highest-ranking U.S. drug trafficking suspect operating in Mexico. He also faces U.S. charges.
http://dallasne.ws/dC7TTC

Felipe Calderón's U.S. visit could shed light on joint fight against drug cartels

Gillman reports from DC:

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama shuns talk of a "war on drugs." But when he welcomes Mexican President Felipe Calderón to the White House today, that nation's bloody fight with drug cartels – and its implications for U.S. security and immigration policy – will be a top agenda item.

The meeting comes as U.S. policymakers reassess the long-standing fight against the drug trade. Last week, with the death toll from Calderón's 3-year-old crackdown surpassing 23,000, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said the brutality and barbarism in Mexico was "just beyond imagination."
http://tinyurl.com/2dk3u5v

Texas border towns fear violent spillover from Mexico

Alfredo Corchado in our Mexico City bureau reports:

EL PASO – Texas law enforcement officials are bracing for a bloody weekend along the border, advising farmers to arm themselves as signs across northern Mexico point to a new escalation of violence after coordinated drug cartel attacks against the military this week.


In the northern Mexican states of Nuevo León and Tamaulipas, both bordering Texas, drug cartel gunmen used trucks and buses Tuesday to block approaches to military bases in Reynosa and Matamoros, apparently in an attempt to trap the troops inside. In all, gunmen attacked military targets in a half-dozen towns in the two states.

At least 18 suspected attackers were reported killed. One soldier was reported wounded.
(note: other reports have it as a toe injuty -- jj)

Fear now a way of life in border towns

The AP's Paul Weber reports:

FORT HANCOCK, Texas (AP) – Fear has settled over this border town of 1,700, about 50 miles southeast of Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, epicenter of that country's bloody drug war.


School enrollment in Fort Hancock, Texas, which is about 50 miles from Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, has been growing as more people flee the drug gang violence. Mexican families fleeing the violence have moved here or just sent their children, and authorities and residents say gangsters have followed them across the Rio Grande to apply terrifying, though so far subtle, intimidation.

Mexico, U.S. working together to battle drug cartels

Murder of 3 with US consulate ties prompts heightened activity. Gillman reports:

WASHINGTON – Drug cartels have expanded their war for control of Mexico faster than the U.S. has been able to pump in aid.


In the time needed for roughly 18,000 Mexicans to die in the violence raging just south of the Rio Grande, the United States has delivered about a fifth of the $1.3 billion promised in late 2007 under a security pact known as the Mérida Initiative.

Texas senators invite Obama to US-Mexico border and urge action in drug-war violence

Texas Sens. John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison invited President Obama today to join them "soon" in a visit to the U.S.-Mexico border. "Such a visit would draw national attention to a national priority," they wrote, in a letter released by Cornyn's office. Gillman reports.

Fighting Cartels on the Camino Real Corridor/Merida II

See the original .pdf here. -- jj

Texas State Senator Shapleigh's letter on the volatile and violent border situation:
I write to update you on the situation in Juarez. Over the last few weeks, approximately 250 experts from Washington, D.C. and Mexico, D.F. representing a dozen agencies have been on the ground in Juarez, San Diego, Tijuana and other Border communities on a fact-finding mission to inform a policy review and assessment of the fundamental policy changes critical to US-Mexico bilateral relations.

Their basic plan is to frame Merida II around four key policy objectives: federal security, local/state security, jobs, and socioeconomic concerns. Key interest groups here and in Mexico want to broaden the policy discussion further to include the trillion-dollar annual (and growing) demand for drugs in the United States.

U.S. agencies join Mexico's inquiry into killings of 3 tied to American Consulate

Alfredo Corchado reports on heightened US involvement following slaying of consulate worker, 2 others in Ciudad Juárez:

MEXICO CITY – Teams of U.S. and Mexican agents on Monday poured into the grim streets of Ciudad Juárez, following leads in the murder of an American consulate worker, her husband and another Mexican acquaintance, amid vows that the killings will not go unpunished as so many thousands of others have in Mexico's widening drug war.

Cartels use intimidation campaign to stifle news coverage in Mexico

Another fascinating story from Corchado in our Mexico City bureau:

REYNOSA, Mexico – In the days since a long-simmering dispute erupted into open warfare between the Gulf drug cartel and its former enforcers, the Zetas, censorship of news developments has reached unprecedented dimensions along much of Mexico's border with Texas. A virtual news blackout has been imposed, several sources said, enforced by threats, abductions and attacks against journalists.

In the past 14 days, at least eight Mexican journalists have been abducted in the Reynosa area, which is across the border from McAllen. One died after a severe beating, according to reports that could not be independently verified. Two were released by their captors. The rest are missing.

Read on here.