Falling kingpins, rising violence

Mexico's drug war

Falling kingpins, rising violence

Taking out the leaders of drug gangs has not quelled the mayhem

MEXICO CITY | from PRINT EDITION

There’s more where he came from

IN A firefight that lasted more than two days and claimed three civilian lives, the leader of one of Mexico’s most feared mobs was shot dead. The victim was Nazario Moreno, nicknamed “The Craziest One”, who headed La Familia (“The Family”), a mafia outfit based in the state of Michoacán. Mr Moreno, author of a spiritual self-help book known as the Family Bible, was tracked down after organising a lavish party that the police got wind of.

His death on December 9th rounds off a year during which senior members of almost every big drug gang in Mexico have been locked up or killed. A year ago Arturo Beltrán Leyva, whose sprawling empire once infiltrated the American embassy, was shot dead by marines near Mexico City. A month later Víctor Mendoza, a senior member of the Zetas, was killed by hit men from the Gulf cartel. The Gulf’s co-leader, Antonio Cárdenas, was killed by the army and marines in November. In July Ignacio Coronel, who was third in command of the Sinaloa mob, suffered a similar fate.

Had Mexico stamped its most-wanted list on a deck of playing-cards like the one used in Iraq, the pack would now look a lot thinner. Several senior lieutenants have been captured, including the head of the Aztecas street gang (the enforcers for the Juárez mob) and two Beltrán Leyva heirs. Even Joaquín “Shorty” Guzmán, the supposedly untouchable Sinaloa leader and the ace of spades on Mexico’s hit list, may be at risk: unconfirmed reports suggest that he narrowly escaped arrest this month. Mexican officials put the successes down to better intelligence and co-operation with America, plus a fivefold increase in the size of the federal police force (counting officers seconded from the army).

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• Crime
• Crime and law
• Shootings
• Mexico

Yet despite these successes, 2010 is on course to be the bloodiest year so far in the war against the narcos. By early November Reforma, a newspaper, had counted over 10,000 gang-related killings—far more than the 6,587 it recorded in all of 2009.

Some of the violence has in fact been set off by removing mob bosses. Following Mr Beltrán Leyva’s death, a vicious succession struggle raged for months until two of the warring gangsters were arrested. The demise of Mr Coronel, who controlled part of Mexico’s Pacific coast, has sparked a battle for control of the port of Manzanillo. The ongoing fighting in Ciudad Juárez may have been triggered by the 2008 arrest of Mr Beltrán Leyva’s brother, Alfredo.

Analysts are now pondering the implications of Mr Moreno’s death. As the author of much of La Familia’s pseudo-religious philosophy, he may be hard to replace. But the gang is popular in some areas: a recent “march for peace” mutated into a rally in support of La Familia. The Zetas will probably launch new attacks to stop their rivals from regrouping.

A temporary increase in violence may be a price worth paying to dismantle powerful gangs. But Mexicans are tiring of the war. In October a plurality considered the campaign a “failure” for the first time, according to Mitofsky, a polling firm. Leaked cables from the American embassy report that a senior Mexican official cautioned that the fight would be hard to continue unless results were seen within 18 months. That was 14 months ago.