THE BORDER REPORT

I’ve noticed something really curious this past week and I’m not yet sure what it means, maybe nothing. Maybe everything. The top law enforcement officers from the three largest border cities in the Sinaloa Federation’s turf, have resigned, all within the past three months. Two in the past week, alone. In December, Tijuana’s public safety director, Alberto Cappella, quit his job, was pushed out really, after absorbing nearly a year of blame for Tijuana’s cartel woes. Two weeks ago, the city council in Nogales, Sonora, started pushing at chief of police, Arturo Ramirez Camacho. Last Friday, he quietly presented his resignation. Then Juárez’s chief Roberto Orduña Cruz, a crusty retired army major who used to eye me up and down with a scowl, resigned. In some ways, his case was the easiest to understand. Somebody, and I don’t know if it was Juárez or Sinaloa, La Linea or Gente Nueva, vowed to kill a cop every 48 hours until Orduña quit. A bad, bad move with an evil precedent for the city of Juárez. Orduña’s predecessor had fled to El Paso, a year ago. Orduña came in with the full backing of Mexico’s army. He offered 9,800 pesos a month and room and board to former soldiers with the campaign “Aún tienes mucho por lograr.” Critics decried his heavy-handedness, the militarization of Juárez. But the reality is, there wasn’t one. The military never gained control of the city. This week, Mexico City is sending up reinforcements, 5,000 strong. They won’t have any effect either. But violence is easy to understand, killing is easy to understand. Killing lacks the nuance of the stories that are harder to understand. The political machinations that determine control in old Mexico. I don’t care who is the controlling party in Mexico City. Or Washington, D.C. for that matter. The border has its own politics and the metropolitan governments hours away are getting schooled. I wrote about Nogales a couple of weeks ago, when the whisperings began about Camacho’s resignation. Nogales’ case is far subtler than the open death threats in Juárez or the juvenile blame game in Tijuana. In many ways, Nogales’ case is far older. The man being considered for the job in Nogales now is Juan Manuel Portillo Guevara. Portillo was the operations chief for the Hermosillo police department in 2004. His officers stopped a car with four men inside after a gunfight. One of those four turned out to be a high level member of the Beltrán Leyva’s operations in Sonora, Los Güeritos. The man, Daniel Enriquez Parra, gave a false name to the arresting officers then paid out an unknown quantity of cash and walked out the door. The case came to be known as the Cuarto Pasajero. The resulting criticisms of the Hermosillo police department led to dismissals, firings, interrogations, and then silence. I’ve always enjoyed the case because it was the first time Los Güeritos and the Beltrán Leyvas were discussed in polite society. By the time the story finished everybody was left with a healthy suspicion that the low-end cops who were fired had been working under the orders of somebody higher than themselves. Portillo, let’s be clear, was never charged. That’s not a surprise. He disappears for a few years, then quietly resurfaces as the likeliest candidate for the job of border police chief. It’s these old stories, the stories of twists and turns and manipulations and quiet patronage that are fascinating to watch. And ultimately, far more deadly than murder. But for the moment, the job of security jefe in northwestern Mexico’s three largest border cities remains open.  Now we watch and see who fills in.

THE BORDER REPORT

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Para esta hora, todos han escuchado la noticia: Agentes de la DEA estadounidense detuvieron a 750 integrantes del Cártel de Sinaloa, La Federación.

Pero no es eso lo que los trae por acá, ¿verdad? Por supuesto que no. Entonces, echemos una miradita a lo que NO se está diciendo sobre el caso.

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THE BORDER REPORT

A lawyer's assistant is slain while working at the front desk in a  law office in Zone 9 in  Guatemala City.

GUATEMALA CITY, GUATEMALA – This photo essay comes from international photojournalist, Jon Lowenstein, an esteemed colleague and good friend who spends much of his time working in Latin America.

Recently, Lowenstein returned from Guatemala where he's documented the methodical takeover by the Gulf Cartel, a horror story you'll be hard pressed to find many others working on. I think you'll find his story engaging and illustrative of a situation that has gone beyond the ability of any state to control. To see more of Lowenstein's work, visit Noor Images.

IN COLD BLOOD: ULTRA-VIOLENCE IN GUATEMALA

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THE BORDER REPORT

NOGALES, SONORA – A group of city councilmembers in Nogales have been not so quietly spreading a rumor that the city’s police chief will soon be out a job. The rumor started about three weeks ago and has hit some of the local newspapers this week, saying that Chief Arturo Ramirez Camacho has been lax in his job and so the city’s voting him out. Some elements of the accusations are true; though if you ask me, I think it’s more a matter of logistics than reality. Nogales’ homicide rate nearly doubled last year from the year before. Last week, a 67-year-old business owner, Jaime Ostler was gunned down outside his store in downtown. Eleven men, all claiming to be Zetas, were arrested. Even if the police department were interested in wiping out crime, they’re certainly not equipped to do so. Tourism is virtually destroyed in Nogales these days, much like Juárez, maybe more so since the city is so much smaller. One businessowner even shut down his club and is moving it north to Southern Arizona in hopes of bringing the business back. So in many ways, it makes a lot of sense to blame the director of public security for the disastrous result that Nogales has become. My problem with this is that I have all the doubt in the world that anyone new who takes the job is going to improve the situation anymore than Ramirez was able to. Go back to Tijuana for a moment and look what happened there. In 2007, a chamber of commerce figure, Alberto Capella, was leading marches against a level of violence and ineptitude that left even the residents of bloody Tijuana cold. The response against the chamber’s main man was a bit bizarre. Capella, with no law enforcement experience whatsoever, was appointed the director of public safety and everyone sat back to watch the show. Murders and kidnappings and gunfights spun out of control even by Tijuana’s standards. The Arellanos grew messy, fracturing and splintering into factions like warring tribes and Capella survived one year before being thrown out the door. Capella was a bit different. If you recall, he was labeled Tijuana’s Rambo after an incredible gunfight where he managed to fight off twenty armed men with a single AR-15 from inside his home. Yeah, I had my doubts. Every national and international news program and magazine in the western hemisphere tripped over each other trying to get an interview in with Tijuana’s “Rambo. What I didn’t have doubts about was Capella’s usefulness as a public figure. People were skeptical that the city would calm down while he was in office but at least there was a vague expectation that he would do no worse. Then the city council of Tijuana fired him, blaming him for the city’s violence. And now, it appears the Nogales city council is preparing to do the same to its chief of police. These elected officials know perfectly well that Nogales’ problems go far beyond the abilities of one man. Like most chiefs of police of Mexican cities, Ramirez is little more than a figurehead, someone to put up before citizens to applaud or to throw tomatoes at or to abuse or to cheer. I accept that, that’s Mexico. Maybe, arguably, that’s everywhere. But it makes me wonder at these city councilmembers and the press that’s been giving them voice. What’s happened in Nogales did not happen because of one man. It happened because of a patronage system, because of old family ties that range south to Culiacán and north to Phoenix. It happened because there’s a lot of dollars involved and you cannot stand in the way of the system. I’m not particularly concerned for Ramirez, he never really disappointed or impressed me. But now we see who these councilmembers want to bring into office. Now we see whom they want, and that, is going to be very interesting to watch.

THE BORDER REPORT

U.S. Marshals are being called in to ramp up security at the U.S. District Courthouse in Tucson after a federal judge received "significant" threats this past week. Details are scanty on the particular case that sparked the threats against the federal judge – though I do have my suspicions. The Feds aren't saying anything publicly about the threats or the beefed up security at the courthouse, but federal agents tend to get a bit ... intense ... when someone starts talking about putting a hit out on a judge. I suspect the calls came in because of the high profile civil case against a Southern Arizona rancher accused of holding 16 illegal migrants against their will in 2004. There's been some outrage in southeastern Arizona (and beyond) that the case is even being heard and Judge John M. Roll has already refused to turn down the case one time. I expect this will end shortly. You've got to be crazed to make a threat on a federal judge and think there isn't going to be some repercussions. But we'll find out; the trial is supposed to end Friday.