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UNCLASSIFIED//FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY
INSTITUTE FOR THE STUDY OF VIOLENT GROUPS (www.isvg.org)
DAILY BORDER NEWS REPORT FOR 6 DECEMBER 2011
COMPILER, INSTITUTE FOR THE STUDY OF VIOLENT GROUPS (www.isvg.org)
EDITOR, JOINT TASK FORCE NORTH (www.facebook.com/USA.JTFN)
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Compiled By: Mr. Tom Davidson, Institute for the Study of Violent Groups
Edited by: Mr. Jonathan Kaupp
Approved for Release by: Dr. Rodler Morris
CONTENTS: (Note: All active EXTERNAL hyperlinks have been removed)
Table of Contents
CONTENTS 1
1. CANADA AND NORTHERN BORDER STATES 2
A. Calgary Restaurant Search Leads to Drug Charges (AB) 2
B. Cops: Boy, 10 Hid Cocaine for Aunt (ME) 3
2. INNER UNITED STATES 4
A. Administration Claims 60 Percent Drop in U. S. Drug Distribution (DC) 4
B. The Week Ahead: Historic homeland Security Hearing on Capitol Hill (DC) 5
C. Shootings by Maine Police on the Rise (ME) 6
3. MEXICO AND SOUTHERN BORDER STATES 7
A. Grenades: The Weapon of Choice in the Drug Wars 7
B. Tucson Woman Carrying Pot Crashes Car While Fleeing Checkpoint (AZ) 10
C. Major Arrests Expected to Shake Up Gulf Cartel (TAMPS) 11
D. Norma Andrade Shot: Women’s Activist Hit Twice in Juarez, Mexico (CHIH) 12
E. Barrio Azteca Gang Associates Plead Guilty to Racketeering Conspiracy (TX) 13
F. Migrants Say They’re Unwilling Mules For Cartels (MX/US) 15
G. Hidalgo County Sheriff Says Vallucos Gang is a Growing Problem (TX) 17
H. Banks Fuel Cartel-Money Problem (MX/US) 18
I. Attacks in Sinaloa Herald Entrance of Zetas (SIN) 20
J. Mexican Drug Cartels Profiting from High Local Cocaine Prices: Police (AU/MX) 22
K. Mexico: Drug Cartel Targets Woman Journalist Through Online Social Media (TAMPS) 24
L. ‘Los Zetas’ Gain Growing Control on Mexico-Guatemala Border (MX/GT) 27
M. Customs Agents Seize 11 Kilograms of Cocaine in Hidalgo (TX) 29
N. Military Personnel Dismantle Clandestine Radio Communication Networks (COAH/TAMPS/NL/SLP) 29
4. CARRIBEAN, CENTRAL, AND SOUTH AMERICA 31
A. How Trinidad is Tackling its Crime Crisis (TT) 31
B. Guatemalan Police Rescue Kidnapped Mexican Boy (GT) 34
5. OPINION AND ANALYSIS 35
A. Mexicos Président Calederon says Drug Cartels Threaten Democracy (DF) 35
B. Snipping the Bud: Prep Work is a Payday in the Marijuana Business (CA) 35
C. Democratic Rep from IL: Undocumented Immigrants Should Carry Document Proving Ties to US (DC) 38
D. What Does ‘Illegal immigration’ Really Mean? 40
1. CANADA AND NORTHERN BORDER STATES
A. Calgary Restaurant Search Leads to Drug Charges (AB)
1 DECEMBER 2011
CBC News
Several people face drug charges Thursday following an investigation at a southeast restaurant.
Police say they focused on the restaurant because it's close to St. Mary's High School.
Last Thursday, a search warrant was issued for Raja Foods and Pizza on First Street S.E.
Police said they found cocaine, a taser and more than $8,500 in cash.
Officers also searched a vehicle, where they found a 14-inch machete concealed beside the driver’s seat, as well as a “blackjack” club.
Three men and a teenager have been charged.
The City of Calgary’s chief license inspector suspended the Raja Foods and Pizza business license until there is an official license review hearing and Alberta Health Services ordered the restaurant closed because of Public Health Act Food Regulation violations.
Source: [www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/story/2011/12/01/calgary-drug-charges-southeast-restaurant]
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B. Cops: Boy, 10 Hid Cocaine for Aunt (ME)
5 December 2011
Boston Herald
Two people busted Saturday on cocaine trafficking and gun possession charges in Lowell made matters worse when one of them handed off drugs to her 10-year-old nephew, police said yesterday.
Lowell police, who were investigating a drug dealing operation, stopped a man, 30, of Haverhill on Plain Street and found nearly 472 grams of cocaine and a loaded 9 mm handgun inside his blue Mitsubishi Endeavor, Lowell police said in a statement.
He was charged with cocaine trafficking within a school zone and gun and ammo possession, cops said.
A short time later, detectives saw a 10-year-old boy leave a Barclay Street home carrying a bag, which contained a small amount of cocaine, $3,000 in cash and other “items consistent in the illegal sale of narcotics,” police said. Cops said the boy’s, 30 year old aunt, sent her nephew with the items in the bag across the street to hide the evidence from police.
She was arrested and charged with cocaine distribution to a minor. A search of her home turned up a .357 caliber handgun, cash, cocaine, ammo and other illegal items, cops said. The state’s Department of Children and Families will investigate the involvement of the 10-year-old boy, cops said.
Source: [www.bostonherald.com/news/regional/view/2011_1205cops_boy_10_hid_cocaine_for_aunt]
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2. INNER UNITED STATES
A. Administration Claims 60 Percent Drop in U. S. Drug Distribution (DC)
5 December 2011
Examiner
According to the latest Department of Justice (DOJ) data, the number of U.S. cities in which Mexican drug cartels distribute illegal drugs through street gangs has been reduced by no less than 1,500 cities.
In 2010, the DOJ’s National Drug Threat Assessment stated that drugs were being sold on behalf of the cartels in "more than 2,500 cities."
The 2011 National Drug Threat Assessment claims that the cartels are only operating in "a thousand U.S. cities." So, in one year’s time the Obama administration managed to eradicate all of the cartel operatives and street-level dealers from 1,500 cities? A 60 percent reduction?
Where were the press releases?
….
The 2010 report:
"Drug Trafficking by Criminal Gangs"
"The influence of Hispanic and African American street gangs is expanding as these gangs gain greater control over drug distribution in rural and suburban areas and acquire drugs directly from DTOs in Mexico or along the Southwest Border.
In 2009, midlevel and retail drug distribution in the United States was dominated by more than 900,000 criminally active gang members representing approximately 20,000 domestic street gangs in more than 2,500 cities."
The 2011 report:
"Transnational Criminal Organizations"
"Mexican-based TCOs were operating in more than a thousand U.S. cities during 2009 and 2010, spanning all nine OCDETF (Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces) regions."
….
Source: [www.examiner.com/drug-cartel-in-national/obama-administration-claims-60-percent-drop-u-s-drug-distribution]
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B. The Week Ahead: Historic homeland Security Hearing on Capitol Hill (DC)
4 December 2011
Examiner
December 4, 2011 All eyes will be on Washington, D.C. this Wednesday, for ajoint hearing of the House Committee on Homeland Security and the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs on "Homegrown Terrorism:The threat to military communities inside the United States."
NY U.S. Rep .Chairman of the Committee on Homeland Security, and the Independent Senator from CT, Chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee announced plans to hold the historic, first of its kind joint investigative hearing to examine the homegrown terror threat to military communities in late November.
The Rep. has taken a lot of heat over a series of hearings his Committee has held on the radicalization within the Muslim-American community, some frommembersof his own Committee.King's efforts have even been compared to those of SenatorJoseph McCarthyto expose communists in the United States in the 1950s.
….
OnFriday, Committee Chair's Rep. and Senator from CT announced the names of the witnesses that they intend to call at the December 7 hearing. TheWhite Houseagreed to supply two official witnesses.Also scheduled to testify isan officer with the U.S. Army. The Director of the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point Military Academy and career intelligence officer, has served in a variety of special operations assignments in Afghanistan, Iraq, Africa, and South America and actively advises a number of federal, state and local governmental agencies regarding the threat of terrorism.
In addition, a parent is scheduled to testify in front of the committee, he will reportedly tell the panel how his son, a Pvt.was shot and killed outside a Little Rock, Arkansas recruiting center in 2009. The Pvt. and another soldier who survived the attack were targeted by a Muslim who said he shot the two soldiers in retaliation for U.S. military action in the Middle East.
On March 10, 2011, the defendant’s father testified at the first House Homeland Security Committee hearing in a full show of support for the Rep.’s efforts.The father said his son grew up a Baptist in Memphis, and then converted to Islam and became radicalized when he left home to attend college in Nashville, Tennessee.
In 2007, his son traveled to Yemen where he was arrested and deported by Yemeni authorities in 2008. Following his deportation from Yemen in 2009, in retaliation, he attacked the Little Rock recruiting center, killing one soldier and wounding another. The defendant pleaded guilty in July, 2011 in exchange forlife in prison.
During his testimony in March, the defendant’s father said that Americans are "in denial" about a "big elephant in the room" -radical extremists. Immediately following the hearing, the father of the defendant questioned "why is there so much fear of talking about what is real?"
He, emotionally warned other Americans and the world that "what came into his house was at the door of their houses too, and we need to talk about it, the American people."
Source: [www.examiner.com/homeland-security-in-chicago/the-week-ahead-historic-homeland-security-hearing-on-capitol-hil]
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C. Shootings by Maine Police on the Rise (ME)
2 DECEMBER 2011
Kennebec Journal
PORTLAND— Maine law enforcement officers are firing their weapons more frequently in the line of duty.
In November alone, there were four officer-involved shootings in Maine, including Tuesday's fatal shooting of a sheriff's department dispatcher who had gunned down a maintenance man in Dover-Foxcroft.
For the year, police have been involved in nine shootings. That compares to an average of three a year during the 1990s and an average of five a year in the 2000s. This year's shootings ended in six deaths and three injuries.
Officer-involved shootings have been on the rise because police are facing more threats than ever, said Robert Schwartz, executive director of the Maine Chiefs of Police Association. There are more guns and knives, more drugs, more people with mental illness on the street and more people acting aggressively toward police, he said.
"I think law enforcement more than anyone would like to find a way so this doesn't happen," said Schwartz, who served 30 years on Maine police departments. "No one wants to shoot at anybody, and no one wants to get shot themselves. That's the bottom line."
The uptick in police shootings comes even as Maine crime rates are low. Maine had the lowest violent crime rate nationally in 2010, FBI statistics show.
Statistics from the Office of the Attorney General show there were 30 police-involved shooting in the 1990s and not a single police shooting in 1995. There were 51 shootings from 2000-2009. And in the first two years of this decade, there have been a total of 14 shootings. The Attorney General's Office declined to comment on the increase.
This year's shootings have taken place across much of the state, involving the York County and Androscoggin County sheriff's departments, Maine State Police, the Maine Warden Service and police departments in Kennebunk, Portland, Belfast, Lewiston and Farmington.
Being a police officer is inherently a dangerous job, said Portland Police Chief Michael Sauschuck. Nationally, 56 law enforcement officers were killed and nearly 54,000 officers were assaulted last year in the line of duty. Maine has not had any officers killed in the line of duty this year.
In recent years, Portland police have gotten more calls for service overall and have been arresting more people for weapons violations, Sauschuck said. Criminals are also more likely now than years ago to be antagonistic and come at officers aggressively, he said.
"There's undoubtedly been an increase in the disrespect level overall," he said.
There's no national database on the numbers of officer-involved shootings where police fire their weapons at somebody, said Charles Miller, who heads the Law Enforcement Officers Killed and Assaulted program for the FBI. But it wouldn't surprise him if the numbers were rising. The number of unprovoked attacks on police has risen 150 percent since 1980, he said, and it stands to reason that police would defend themselves.
Source: [www.kjonline.com/news/Maine-police-shootings-on-the-rise-]
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3. MEXICO AND SOUTHERN BORDER STATES
A. Grenades: The Weapon of Choice in the Drug Wars
30 November 2011
Political Animal
Fragmentation Grenades
The weapon of choice between the Mexican drug cartels has become the fragmentation grenade which has a blast radius of up to 200 meters.
The first registered grenade attack occurred in Tonala, Jalisco in August 2005. Since then, there have been 159 attacks using grenades which resulted in 118 deaths and 588 wounded.
Between January and September 2011, there have been 88 grenade attacks; a 2,000% increase from 2005. The total number of attacks during this period is double the number registered in 2010.
In the past five years, authorities have seized over 10,000 grenades. They have also begun to recover toy grenades filled with explosive powder.
According to Alejandro Hope, former consultant with the Center for Investigation and National Security and expert on Mexico security, it is logical that there is an increase in grenade usage due to the ease of use and the fact that no special military training is required to use this weapon. Additionally, they cause mass confusion and daze their rivals, which allows an easy escape for the perpetrator.