TUCSON – Three people are accused of trying to buy anti-tank weapons in Arizona for a drug cartel in Mexico. Federal indictments were recently unsealed  in Phoenix. Court documents show the three also tried to buy a Stinger missile. Click here to download the Indictment. The accused were trying to buy the military weaponry for the Sinaloa Cartel.  Court documents show they used pounds of crystal meth for a down payment on the weapons. The case started in 2009 in Phoenix. One of the accused, David Diaz, approached a confidential informant working for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. They delivered nearly five pounds of crystal meth and $139,000 in cash. Then they brought ten more pounds to finish the arms deal. Robbie Sherwood is the spokesman for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Arizona. “These are very serious charges, as the indictment that has been unsealed indicate. We will be proceeding to trial soon and we look forward to presenting our case at that time.” From the indictment: A Dragon Fire Anti-Tank Weapon, a Stinger Missile, (a surface-to-air missile like those used by Afghan fighters in the eighties to defeat the Soviets), two AT-4s, a shoulder-fired light anti-tank rocket, a variety of grenade launchers, two M-60 machine guns and three cases of hand grenades. Court records show that Diaz was trying to buy the weapons for the Yucatan Peninsula. They were destined for druglords Joaquín El Chapo Guzmán and Ismael El Mayo Zambada, the leaders of the Sinaloa Cartel. The cartel is battling not only every other cartel in Mexico, but also the Mexican Army. John Bailey, a Georgetown University professor who worked in Mexico most of his career, says this level of weaponry was likely designed to take on the Mexican government itself. “It’s the kind of weaponry that you’d expect to be used against the Army. These groups are willing to up the ante.” The trial begins in April in Arizona.

THE BORDER REPORT

The Mexican Army arrested nine suspects in the murder of an American federal agent working in that country. Officials are calling the shooting a case of mistaken identity. The Obama Administration has lauded the Mexican government for its fast work.  But some are suspicious of the arrests. Six of the nine suspects were paraded in front of the media early Thursday. In this photo from El Universal, Jesus Iván Quezada Peña, number three in the lineup, has both eyes swollen shut, his mouth bleeding and bruised. Another's face was splotched in purple and black.

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THE BORDER REPORT

This State Department cable out of Wikileaks caught my eye. 51 FBI informants and 10 DEA "liaison officers" were murdered in Mexico between 2007-09.

When we talk about American law enforcement in Mexico, we generally view the Americans as not being part of the game; for the most part, this has held true since the wars began.

But I wonder about these 61 informants and liaisons. Were the 51 also Mexican informants and therefore murdered for that connection or were they killed because of their ties to the Americans? Same for the 10 liaisons. Were they killed because they were Mexican intelligence officers or because they were working with the Americans?

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THE BORDER REPORT

With the finding of six bodies in a dirt lot yesterday afternoon, about twenty people have now been murdered along the Arizona-Sonora border since last Tuesday. The bodies were found in Nogales, Sonora, and were presumed to have been there some three to five days, a timeline that matches up nicely with the start of this current conflict. Still don't know who the man was that was killed in Agua Prieta last week; nobody's saying so you know it's good (regionally interesting, probably not national). But a source in the area says Mexican Feds were in a meeting with the gringos on the Arizona side when they got the call and went running back into Mexico to deal with this. The latest conflict appears to be a group of Nuevo Zetas moving against the powerhouses of the Arizona border (and it ain't DHS). Meanwhile, the Mexican Army exercised an extreme case of ineptitude when a soldier was shot in a crossfire in Agua Prieta last Thursday. Seems the Army had surrounded a stash house when two traffickers in a Pontiac Grand Am raced out. A desmadre ensued when the soldiers unloaded on the car, hitting the car but also shooting at each other. The narcos got away. I thought training was a big part of the Merida money ... pero bueno. In light of this latest ordeal, Sonora Gov. Guillermo Padrés is asking Mexico City for one thousand more federales to be brought up into Sonora (mas ratas pal pozo ... ) And, up north of me, one of Arturo Beltrán Leyva's people was indicted on cocaine trafficking and money laundering charges in Phoenix. Misael Beltrán Cital and seven other people were indicted on the charges after the State Department issued him a visa to come to the U.S. Total setup and he fell for it, oops. We'll see what happens next.