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Impact of Organized Crime on Murder of Law Enforcement Personnel at the U.S.-Mexican Border

Part of the book series: SpringerBriefs in Sociology ((BRIEFSSOCY))

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Abstract

Law-enforcement assassinations are targeted hits occurring over a series of municipalities across a range of Mexican states. They demonstrate a similar, consistent pattern by organized crime elements who employ surprise, deception, and high-powered assault weapons (AK-47s, AR-15s) killing off-guard police chiefs and commanders. The assassinations of top-level municipal officials are not random. They all take place along three distinctive North-bound drug-transit highways which traverse multiple Northern Tier municipalities. Their mapping shows a similarity of assassination weapons and method of attack across distinctive types and levels of organized crime organizations.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    In other instances, there can be towns with no or few persons or civil society institutions (schools, businesses, day-care centers) left open without any reported law-enforcement assassination. The example of the town of El Alamillo (Madera municipality) Chihuahua is instructive in this regard. In 2009, El Alamillo was practically deserted, termed a “ghost town” since all of the houses and the local daycare center were burned and thirty persons were kidnapped by cartel gunmen (XEPL 2009). Two hundred families fled the town because of constant harassment by criminal gangs; allegedly by members of La Línea (the Juárez cartel enforcer wing). Local residents speculated that the municipal police of Madera and its zone were collusive with organized crime elements or might even form part of such criminal groups (La Policiaca 2009).

  2. 2.

    The US President Budget Request (Executive Office 2012: 240) makes a formal commitment to supporting law enforcement along with counternarcotics, and demand reduction programs to “advance the goal of dismantling drug trafficking and other criminal organizations”. Nevertheless, funding support is for forensics laboratories and justice sector security, as well as prison reforms and prosecutorial capacity building. Investment in equipment is discussed as a priority of the Mexican government. In part, this is due to impunity concerns by US Senators about human rights violations by police and military forces (US Senate Bill 2012: 74).

  3. 3.

    In the specific state of Chihuahua, to use one example, those that argue that the policy of implementing the Unitary Police model has been a success point to several developments. These include: (1) increased levels of coordination between municipal, state and federal police forces which has led to a drop in crime in certain municipalities; (2) the rationalization of joint police operations in Chihuahua into four new territorial zones and (3) the increase in agents and investigatory police associated with the new model (La Policiaca 2011; Redacción 2013a, b; El Universal 2013; XEPL 2013). Those more opposed to the model and/or those who point to its failings make several arguments. These include: (1) that it has been significantly delayed in implementation (to 2013); (2) that is takes away the community policing aspect of control from municipal police; and (3) that both the assassination and corruption of State Unitary Police agents continue to occur under the new model (Moloeznik 2013; El Diario de Chihuahua 2013; Norte Digital 2013; Milenio 2013).

  4. 4.

    Moloeznik (2013: 11–16) notes that the idea of the Unitary Police model represents an effort to re-assert centralized control. Similarly, one could argue that Peña Nieto’s national Gendarmerie also represents the re-assertion of centralized control. The Gendarmerie would place roughly 10,000 federal forces largely drawn from the military under the control of the (federal) Interior Ministry. Its first funds are slated to commence in July 2013 (Seekle and Finklea 2013: 35; Informador 2013).

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  1. The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, USA

    Sara Schatz

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  1. Sara Schatz
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Schatz, S. (2014). Conclusion. In: Impact of Organized Crime on Murder of Law Enforcement Personnel at the U.S.-Mexican Border. SpringerBriefs in Sociology. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9249-3_4

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