Millán Gómez was cut down shortly before 1 a.m. outside his apartment building in the Colonia Guerrero neighborhood, a poor section of Mexico City that associates say he chose because it is close to law enforcement offices. He died after being rushed to a hospital. Two bodyguards were injured in the attack but are expected to survive. One suspect was captured. Millán Gómez's family was under police protection, a law enforcement source said.Source : Washington Post
Suspicion immediately centered on the Sinaloa cartel, a violent drug gang that has waged full-scale battles with federal police and the Mexican military. Mexican law enforcement officials believe the cartel has recently sought to cripple rivals and broaden its control of drug trafficking here -- a business that U.S. authorities estimate generates as much as $23 billion a year.
The English-language forum for all things Latin American, covering business, politics, and culture.
Friday, May 9, 2008
Mexico's National Police Chief Killed
Edgar Eusebio Millán Gómez, the head of the National Mexican Police, was killed yesterday outside his home. He is the highest ranking Mexican police official to be killed since the country launched a campaign against the drug cartels a little over a year ago. The fingers seem to be pointed at the drug cartels for this latest incidence of violence, that has claimed at least 6,000 people in the past 2 1/2 years.
This is totally sad and totally predictable. I applaud the Mexican effort to decrease the power of the drug cartels and I find it absolutely tragic that the toll on the good guys has been so high. America could really be helping out a lot more on this--primarily by ending the so-called "war on drugs" that made the cartels so rich and powerful to begin with.
ReplyDeleteThe violence here in Mexico and the prosperity of the Mexican mafia will continue to increase in power as long as they can make huge profits in the US, Mexico and elsewhere. The war on drugs and the cartels has been going on for so long, wasting so much money. Didn't we learn from prohibition of alcohol in the US? That was what gave the Sicilian mafia the profits and power they needed to spread terror, and the prohibition of drugs just continues that trend for them and the other mafias that participate.
ReplyDeleteAs long as there is a demand for the product and it is prohibited, though you may jail mafia members and attack the cartels, someone will take their place and make huge profits to supply the demand. The mafia doesn't fear either the US DEA or Mexican army very much, or any government's drug war. They do fear legalization, regulation and control much more, and legalization in the US and Mexico (and the rest of the world) is the only thing that will put an end to their party and end this rain of murder and terror here.
I am not an alcohol or drug user, don't favor drug use and see the damage it inflicts on lives; it has devastated the lives of a few close family members, just as has alcohol. I am quite conservative on almost every other issue, but I must agree with William F. Buckley that legalization is the only long term solution. Prohibition does not work. It'a time the stupidity stops, and lives will be saved. When will anybody have the balls to do it?
I hate when people bash the mexican president over stuff like this, not that anyone was doing it here... but with the stuff over illegals and immigration there's a lot of hate for mexicans recently, one person in other blog wanted the US to raise the threat level higher so the US people don't even enter mexico, what does that say about forcing people back into a country which is dangerous for americans to go to? shouldn't they at the very least make reforms to make it easier for them to stay rather than forcing them out as criminals? And then they say the president isn't doing anything to make the country a better place, he's got the US on lockdown to the N descriminating and not helping a bit, and around him he's got places filled with crime south america, cuba.... and in his own country, countless gangs, just look at the US in Iraq and even in our country, our efforts to remove gangs and terrorists it's nearly impossible to remove a growing guerilla group in hiding, it just won't happen it grows faster than it dies... and then imagine it's a country where you can get weapons easily, their gangs in mexico are probably armed as well as our army in Iraq, try putting up the police in the US armed with their handguns and tazers against the gangs in mexico and see what happens...
ReplyDeleteI hope one of the new presidential candidates actually starts doing something about this issue, or else things will just keep getting worse and worse...
One simple thing that might help... though I doubt much, make immigration reforms to the system, easier on people already in the country and to people outside... I've recently been looking at all the visas out there and it looked near impossible to get into this country from another from my viewpoint as an average middle class citizen, taking up to a year or two to get notification on the visa, and it also costs several thousands of dollars(which you have to give them before they even start verifying it) which I wonder if someone in the countries that need to get to the US the most can even afford? and then even/if after you get there, you have to wait like 3 years+ before you're completely done dealing with the immigration...
All I really have to say is, that country needs help, bad... Rather than trying to help third world countries thousands of miles away across the ocean, the US should be sending some more serious help to make the third world countries which have the highest potential impact to itself, right off it's borders better....