Family massacre underlines surge in drug violence
COATZACOALCOS, Mexico — The bullet-riddled bodies of the Martinez children were found on a bloody floor, huddled next to the corpses of their parents in a rented shack.
The family of six was massacred, authorities believe, because the Zetas cartel suspected the father, an unemployed taxi driver, had played some part in a rival gang’s attack that killed a Zeta gunman.
The response underlines the no-holds-barred tactics of drug gangs that are splintering and battling one another for control in much of Mexico, which recently recorded its highest monthly murder total in at least 20 years.
Despite President Enrique Peña Nieto’s promises of a safer nation when he came to office five years ago, the violence is outpacing even the darkest days of the drug war launched by his predecessor.
“It has taken on the proportions of a ring of hell that would be described in Dante’s ‘Inferno,’ ” said Mike Vigil, former chief of international operations for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and author of the book “Deal.”
“Their strategy was strictly going after the kingpin . ... That was pretty much not the way to go because, you know, you cut off a head and others take its place,” Vigil added. “You have weak institutions, weak rule of law, weak judiciary, massive corruption, particularly within the state and municipal police forces, and all of that contributes to the escalating violence.”
In the first five months of 2017, there were 9,916 killings nationwide — an increase of about 30 percent over the 7,638 slain during the same period last year. In 2011, the bloodiest year of the drug war, the figure for the same January-May period was 9,466.
In some places the bloodshed has accompanied the rise of the upstart Jalisco New Generation cartel and the breakup of the once-dominant Sinaloa cartel into warring factions following the arrest of drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who was extradited to the United States in January.
At least 19 people died in turf battles pitting Guzman’s son, brother and former allies against each other last month in the western state of Sinaloa, according to investigators.
In the northern border state of Chihuahua, shootouts last week between Sinaloa gunmen and the gang known as La Linea killed at least 14.
In the Gulf Coast oil city of Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz Gov. Miguel Angel Yunes said the slaying of a top gunman in late June prompted the Zetas to kill the entire Martinez family: Clemente; his wife Martimana; 10-year-old Jocelin; Victor Daniel, 8; Angel, 6; and Nahomi, 5.
All died in the house where they washed cars for $1 each.
“They didn’t have anything, not even furniture. They slept on the floor,” grandmother Flora Martinez said, sobbing. “I don’t understand why they did this, why they did this to my little ones. They were innocent, they didn’t know anything.”
For years it was understood that the Zetas were untouchable in this part of the state. Just ask Sonia Cruz, whose son was killed in Coatzacoalcos in July 2016 in a case that remains unsolved.
“They (police) told me that when la mana (drug cartels) are involved, that’s where they stop investigating,” Cruz said.
But last year’s election of Yunes, the first opposition candidate to win the governorship from the long-ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party, may have broken old alliances between criminals and corrupt officials.
The new governor has shown some willingness to go after the Zetas: The local cartel leader who allegedly ordered the Martinez killings, known as “Comandante H,” was arrested a few days afterward.
The wave of violence has also touched regions that were long seen as peaceful.
The Jalisco cartel is believed to have allied with a faction of the Sinaloa gang in a war for the Baja California Sur state cities of Los Cabos and the nearby port of La Paz. Dismembered bodies, severed heads and clandestine graves have now become almost routine in the once-placid resorts.