Opium Trade. Medical Marijuana. Fast and Furious. Drug Cartels and Gang violence. Mexico Turns to Twitter and Facebook for Information and Survival. “Avoid Plaza Las Américas,” several people wrote, giving the location.
“There are gunmen,” wrote others, adding, “they’re not soldiers or marines, their faces are masked.” These witness accounts have become common in over the past year, especially in violent cities where the news media have been compromised by corruption or killings. But the flurry of Twitter messages about the bodies arrived at a telling moment — on the same day that Veracruz’s State Assembly made it a crime to use Twitter and other social networks to undermine public order.
It is the first law of its kind in Mexico, but most likely not the last. Bodies hanging from bridge in Mexico are warning to social media users. Mexico hangings a warning?
Signs say two people were killed for denouncing cartel activities on the InternetTheir bodies show signs of tortureOnline posts have become some of the loudest voices reporting violence in MexicoSocial media users say they will stand strong (CNN) -- Social media users who denounce drug cartel activities along the Mexican border received a brutal warning this week: Two mangled bodies hanging like cuts of meat from a pedestrian bridge. A woman was hogtied and disemboweled, her intestines protruding from three deep cuts on her abdomen.
A guide to the escalating conflict in the South China Sea - By Robert Zeliger. China and its neighbors have been engaged in tit-for-tat muscle-flexing maneuvers in recent weeks over who controls areas of the strategically important and resource-rich South China Sea, causing headaches in the region and elsewhere, and raising fears of a more serious flare-up.
What's the fight about? It's a territorial dispute that goes back decades, but has grown more heated as China has become bolder on the world stage. China claims it has the right to just about the entire South China Sea. Its neighbors, not surprisingly, dispute that claim and say China is using its power to bully them. Woman's decapitation linked to web posts about Mexican drug cartel.
Mexican police are investigating whether the death of a woman found decapitated at the Texan border is the third killing made in retribution for posts about drug cartels on social networking websites.
The woman, identified by local officials as Marisol Macías Castañeda, a newsroom manager for the Primera Hora newspaper, was found in Nuevo Laredo next to a handwritten note claiming she was murdered for posts about the Zetas cartel, which is believed to dominate the area's drug trade to Laredo, Texas. Macías Castañeda held an administrative post at Primera Hora, not a reporting job, according to a colleague who wished to remain anonymous. But it was apparently what she posted on the social networking site Nuevo Laredo en Vivo (Nuevo Laredo Live), rather than her role at the newspaper, that prompted her murder. The message found next to her body on the side of a main road referred to the nickname Macías Castañeda purportedly used on the site, La Nena de Laredo (Laredo Girl). Mexican Teachers Push Back Against Gangs’ Extortion Attempt. Pedro Pardo/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images Teachers in Acapulco marched on Sept. 14 against an extortion attempt that has led scores of schools to close.
The demand is the same: teachers have until Oct. 1 to start handing over half of their pay. If they do not, they risk their lives. Bureau of Justice Statistics Jail Inmates at Midyear 2010 � Statistical Tables. WASHINGTON – During 2010, U.S. residents age 12 or older experienced a double-digit drop (down 13 percent) in the rate of violent victimization, the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) announced today.
Violent crime includes rape or sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault and simple assault. The rate of property victimization, which includes burglary, motor vehicle theft and household theft, also declined by six percent during the year. ONE DRUG ARREST EVERY 19 SECONDS IN THE U.S. New FBI Numbers Reveal Failure of "War on Drugs" WASHINGTON, D.C. -- A new FBI report released today shows that there is a drug arrest every 19 seconds in the U.S.
A group of police and judges who have been campaigning to legalize and regulate drugs pointed to the figures showing more than 1.6 million drug arrests in 2010 as evidence that the "war on drugs" is a failure that can never be won. "Since the declaration of the 'war on drugs' 40 years ago we've arrested tens of millions of people in an effort to reduce drug use. Drugs (And Hypocrisy) in America: Cops and TSA Agents Busted in Huge Oxycodone Trafficking Operation. Three TSA agents and at least two police officers have been arrested for alleged involvement in a large-scale oxycodone trafficking operation between Connecticut, New York and Florida.
A five-month investigation yielded the arrests of twenty people, including TSA officers Christopher Allen, 45, of Palm Beach Gardens, Fla.; John Best, 30, of Port St. Lucie, Fla.; and Brigitte Jones, 48, of the Bronx, N.Y., as well as The New York police officer, Michael Brady, 36, and the Florida trooper, Justin Kolves, 28, the Associated Press said. Former cops: The drug cartels are winning. By Stephen C.
WebsterFriday, September 16, 2011 11:11 EDT “[Look] at Phoenix, Arizona,” Neill Franklin, a former undercover police officer in Maryland, told Raw Story recently. Shoveling Water. Fallout from deadly Mexico casino fire sparks political brawl - latimes.com. Reporting from Mexico City — The mayor of Monterrey is feeling the squeeze.
His brother is in police custody. His own party wants him to step down. And the horrific fire that killed 52 people in a casino in his city last month has become fodder for some election-season mudslinging. Young Men's Initiative: The White Mayor's Burden. Shortly before he first ran for office, Michael Bloomberg was asked by New York magazine if he had ever smoked marijuana. "You bet I did. And I enjoyed it," he answered bluntly. The quote would become the basis of an ad campaign by the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, but it would never have any effect on Bloomberg's own practice of aggressively (and, some say, illegally) arresting people for the possession of even meager amounts of pot once he became mayor. Drug Policy Alliance and Harry Levine/marijuana-arrests.com. Florida ACLU Files Suit Against State's Welfare Drug Testing Law.
The Florida ACLU has filed suit against a state law requiring welfare applicants to first pass a drug test before receiving benefits. The suit claims the Florida law violates the Fourth Amendment by requiring welfare applicants to submit to "suspicionless drug testing. " It's filed on behalf of Luis Lebron, a 35 year-old Orlando resident and Navy veteran, who applied for the benefits but refused to take the drug test, according to an ACLU release. Arpaio: Medical marijuana will not be returned. Belize and El Salvador added to US drug blacklist. 16 September 2011Last updated at 02:53 The blacklisting came on the day El Salvador celebrates independence from Spain US President Barack Obama has added Belize and El Salvador to a blacklist of countries considered major producers or transit routes for illegal drugs. Officials said cartels were using the two Central American nations as routes for smuggling cocaine from South America north to Mexico and the US.
In total, 22 countries were included on the drugs blacklist. Drug Cartels Rapidly Gaining Ground In U.S.: Justice Department. A newly released report from the U.S. Department of Justice shows that Mexican drug cartels are rapidly gaining ground inside the United States, despite extensive efforts by the government to crack down on trafficking. In light of the findings, a group of Border Patrol agents, police officers and judges is saying it is time to legalize and regulate drugs in order to defund the cartels that make so much money from the illicit drug market. "As someone who has fought on the front lines of the failed 'war on drugs' for decades it is really no surprise to me that our prohibition policy isn't helping to achieve any reduction in drug trafficking," said Terry Nelson, a board member for Law Enforcement Against Prohibition (LEAP) and a retired U.S.
Customs and Border Protection agent. Question Is, Would You Rather it Be Cartels or Regulated Businesses? For decades, the United States has been embroiled in a debate over whether marijuana should be legalized. The battle has been waged on the state level, where 16 states and the District of Columbia have authorized the use of medical marijuana by qualifying patients. And it has been fought on the national level, with the federal government investing more than a billion dollars over the past decade on a media campaign designed to demonize marijuana. These political conflicts have one thing in common. 35 bodies found in Mexican roadway during rush hour. As cartels rapidly expand in U.S. cities, authorities confront futility of drug arrests. More Mexico youths die from violence than car wrecks, report says. Whistleblowers: Drug cartels throw fundraisers for U.S. officials.
Politifact. Petition to legalize pot is first to hit White House threshold; ET proposal close. Inside a clandestine Mexican meth lab (big photo gallery) Narco elite vs oligarchy: Guatemala votes - Features. Drug war cables: 'Burn poppies, burn' - Interactive. Border security: Crossing the line. Drug Cartel Strings Up Bodies to Warn 'Social Media Users' Marijuana blocks PTSD symptoms in rats: study. Rolling Stone Culture. OFAC Targets Colombian Drug Traffickers Linked To Sinaloa Cartel Leader - Corruption Currents. Calderon: Drug consumer countries 'morally obliged' to cut demand; consider 'market alternatives' Awesome Man Cannot Change His Name to 'NJWeedman.com' Big High Country.