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Drug Trade Tyranny on The Border
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Led by Heriberto Lazcano Lazcano, Los Zetas are a highly disciplined mercenary squad composed of former elite Mexican troops, including officers trained by the U.S. military before they deserted. The group has become an obsession of Calder¿n's administration, which has sent more than a thousand troops to Reynosa and neighboring cities.
Soldiers crowd the slender canal bridges that crisscross Reynosa, stopping drivers at random and staring across the cityscape with their fingers on the triggers of heavy weapons. The tense atmosphere has led to mistakes.
On Feb. 16, soldiers fatally shot Sergio Meza Varela, a 28-year-old with no apparent ties to the drug trade, when the car he was riding in didn't stop at a checkpoint. "You're scared to leave your house," Alejandra Salinas, Meza's cousin, said in an interview outside the family tire shop. "We're just in the way."
In Tijuana, Ciudad Juarez and Nuevo Laredo, the growing Sinaloa cartel is fighting rivals over smuggling routes. But in Reynosa, police say, only Mexican soldiers threaten the Gulf cartel's control.
To prepare for battle, Los Zetas have stocked safe houses with antitank weapons, assault rifles, grenades and other heavy weapons, including some that Mexican law enforcement authorities believe once belonged to the U.S. Army.
"How can I fight them?" said Juan Jos¿ Mu¿iz Salinas, Reynosa's police chief. "It's impossible."
On Feb. 7, soldiers stormed the dusty "El Mezquito" ranch outside Miguel Aleman, west of Reynosa, and found one of the largest illegal arsenals in recent memory: 89 assault rifles, 83,355 rounds of ammunition, and plastic explosives capable of demolishing buildings. Two days later in nearby Nuevo Laredo, soldiers found a weapons cache that included eight military uniforms to be used as disguises.
The mounting evidence that cartels have infiltrated many border police forces has prompted drastic action.
In Reynosa, soldiers disarmed the entire police force in January, leaving them without weapons for 19 days while ballistics tests were conducted. Police officers, who make $625 a month, were also forced to provide voice samples for comparison with recordings of threats made over police radios, Mayor Oscar Luebbert Guti¿rrez said in an interview.
"It wasn't worth it," said Mu¿iz Salinas, the police chief. "They come after us, but it's other authorities that are really involved. Look at the state police, the federal police and the military."
The Enemy Is in the House
It was New Year's Day in Tijuana, the hilly city at America's busiest border crossing. City workers prepped for celebrations, but Jes¿s Alberto Rodr¿guez Meraz and Sa¿l Ovalle Guerrero, both veteran police officers, had other plans.
They were going to get rich.
