The Sinaloa Cartel (Spanish: Cártel de Sinaloa, CDS, after the indigenous region of Sinaloa), also known as the Guzmán-Zambada Organization, the Federation, the Blood Alliance, or the Pacific Cartel, is a major, internationally organized crime syndicate based in the city of Culiacán, Sinaloa, Mexico, which specializes in illegal drug trafficking and money laundering.
The cartel’s history is marked by its evolution from humble beginnings to one of the most powerful and violent drug trafficking organizations in the world. The cartel was founded by Pedro Avilés Pérez in Sinaloa in the late 1960s and initially focused on smuggling marijuana into the US. Pérez is credited with pioneering the use of aircraft for drug smuggling, laying the foundation for large-scale smuggling operations. His organization was a training ground for the second generation of Sinaloan human traffickers. The Guadalajara Cartel was co-founded by Félix Gallardo between 1978 and 1980 and marked the next phase in the cartel’s history. Under Gallardo’s leadership, the cartel controlled much of the Mexican drug trafficking corridors along the U.S. border throughout the 1980s. After Gallardo’s arrest in 1989, the cartel disintegrated into smaller organizations, including the Sinaloa Cartel.
Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, the Sinaloa Cartel, led by figures such as Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán and Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, expanded its activities significantly, becoming involved in brutal conflicts with rival cartels and the Mexican government . The cartel diversified its drug portfolio to include cocaine, methamphetamine and heroin, further cementing its position as the dominant force in the drug trade. Despite numerous arrests and seizures by law enforcement, the cartel has continued to operate, often using sophisticated smuggling techniques, including tunnels under the U.S.-Mexico border. It has operations in many regions of the world, but mainly in the Mexican states of Sinaloa, Baja California, Durango, Sonora and Chihuahua. and presence in other regions in Latin America, as well as in US cities. The U.S. intelligence community considers the cartel to be the largest and most powerful drug trafficking organization in the world, perhaps more influential than Pablo Escobar’s Medellín Cartel in Colombia during its existence. fine. According to the National Drug Intelligence Center and other US sources, the Sinaloa Cartel is primarily involved in the distribution of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, fentanyl, cannabis and MDMA.
As of 2023, the cartel remains Mexico’s most dominant drug cartel. Following the arrests of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán and his son Ovidio Guzmán López in 2016 and 2023 respectively, the cartel is led by old-school leader Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada and Guzmán’s other sons, Jesús Alfredo Guzmán and Ivan Archivaldo Guzmán Salazar. . The cartel has had a significant impact on the War on Drugs, on international and local politics as well as on popular culture. Its influence extends beyond Mexico, with operations in the United States, Latin America and even as far as the Philippines. Despite the arrest of key leaders, the cartel remains a major player in the international drug trade, driven by demand for narcotics in the US and around the world.
The criminal organization of Avilés
Pedro Avilés Pérez pioneered drugs in the Mexican state of Sinaloa in the late 1960s. He is considered the first generation of major Mexican drug smugglers of marijuana that marked the birth of the large-scale Mexican drug trade. He also pioneered the use of airplanes to smuggle drugs into the United States.
Second-generation Sinaloan traffickers such as Rafael Caro Quintero, Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo, Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, Ismael Zambada García, and Avilés Pérez’s cousin Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán would claim to have learned everything they knew about “narcotraficantes” while they served in the Avilés organization. Pedro Avilés would ultimately die in a shootout with federal police in September 1978 in Sinaloa.
Guadalajara Cartel
Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, who from then on co-founded the Guadalajara Cartel between 1978 and 1980; controlled much of Mexico’s drug trafficking corridors along the border with the United States in the 1980s, but was rivaled by the Gulf Cartel in controlling some of the drug trade in eastern Mexico. Félix Gallardo divided his “Federation” in 1987, just two years after the arrest and murder of DEA agent Enrique Camarena Salazar, when the threat from American law enforcement became much more urgent. This division of the organization in the late 1980s led to the cartel essentially being made up of several smaller cartels that controlled their own territories and smuggled trade corridors with their own bosses. This would make it less likely that the entire organization would be brought down at once. One of these cartels (called plazas at the time) was Sinaloa, with the city of Culiacán as its headquarters. In the late 1980s, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) believed that the Sinaloa Cartel was the largest drug trafficking organization in Mexico.
Gallardo was eventually arrested in 1989 and while in prison he remained one of Mexico’s biggest human traffickers. He maintained contact with his organization via mobile phone until he was transferred to a new high-security prison in the early 1990s. At this time, his cousins, the Arellano Félix brothers, left and further strengthened the organization that became known as the Tijuana Cartel, while the Sinaloa Cartel remained led by former lieutenants Héctor Luis Palma Salazar, Ismael Zambada García and Joaquín Guzmán Loera. .
El Mayo and the Tijuana Cartel War
During this time, Sinaloa was considered a major disadvantage as they were forced to move much of their drug products through the Tijuana corridor, often bringing them into direct conflict with the Arellanos. This eventually led to Ramón Arellano Félix killing two of Guzmán’s associates, leading to a full-fledged war between the two organizations. It was around this period, in the early 1990s, when Guzmán gave greater control of the cartel to freelance trafficker Ismael Zambada García (also known as El Mayo), mainly because of his exceptional ability to collaborate and coordinate with other traffickers. For much of the 1990s, Ismael Zambada was also the sole person responsible for the cartel’s massive growth and expansion, while Guzmán and Palma were imprisoned. Before co-founding the Sinaloa Cartel, Ismael Zambada García was a farmer, freelancer, and small-time drug trafficker who sold mere kilos of marijuana and heroin before eventually becoming acquainted with Mexico’s more elite human trafficking rings. According to a court opinion, by the mid-1990s the Sinaloa Organization was believed to have the size of the Medellín Cartel during its prime.
Zambada also helped Amado Carrillo Fuentes expand the Juárez Cartel in the state of Chihuahua and helped incorporate some remnants of the Juárez Cartel into the Sinaloa Cartel after Carrillo’s death in 1997. Therefore, it was believed that the Sinaloa cartel was linked to the Juárez Cartel in 1997. a strategic alliance following the partnership of their rivals, the Gulf Cartel and the Tijuana Cartel. Following the discovery of a tunnel system used to smuggle drugs across the Mexican-American border, the group has been linked to such trafficking. The war between the Sinaloa and Tijuana cartels was believed to be at its worst from 1992 to 2000, with relatives of some of the cartel’s leaders living in fear or “every day as if it were their last,” as Zambada’s wife said at the time declared. However, Zambada also used this conflict to his advantage, as the Mexican government began to crack down on the Tijuana Cartel in particular. Mayo used this weakening of its rivals as an opportunity for Sinaloa to make an appearance in the human trafficking world. By the year 2000, Zambada was recognized as one of the largest and most powerful drug lords in Mexico, with strong distribution networks from Colombia to the United States. Mayo’s traditional major distribution centers were reportedly in Chicago, Phoenix, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Denver. El Mayo was also reportedly the one who sent a private helicopter to El Chapo after he escaped from Puente Grande prison in 2001. The Sinaloa Cartel partially collapsed in 2008 when the Beltrán-Leyva brothers broke away from the cartel.
The Sinaloa Cartel wages war against the Tijuana Cartel (Arellano-Félix Organization) over the Tijuana smuggling route to the border city of San Diego, California. The rivalry between the two cartels dates back to the setup of Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo in Palma’s family. After his imprisonment, Félix Gallardo gave the Guadalajara Cartel to his cousins in the Tijuana Cartel. On November 8, 1992, Palma struck against the Tijuana Cartel at a disco club in Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco, where eight members of the Tijuana Cartel were killed during the shootout, with the Arellano-Félix brothers successfully escaping from the venue with the help of David Barron Corona . , a member of the Logan Heights gang.
In retaliation, the Tijuana Cartel attempted to incarcerate Guzmán at Guadalajara Airport on May 24, 1993. In the gunfight that followed, six civilians were killed by Logan Heights’ hired gunmen. The dead included Roman Catholic Cardinal Juan Jesús Posadas Ocampo. The church hierarchy originally believed that Posadas was targeted for revenge because of his strong stance against drug trafficking. Mexican officials, however, believe Posadas just happened to be caught in crossfire. The cardinal arrived at the airport in a white Mercury Grand Marquis city car, which was known to be popular among drug lords. Barron had received information that Guzmán would arrive in a white Mercury Grand Marquis town car. Evidence contradicting the error theory is that Posadas looked nothing like Guzmán; he wore a long black cassock and a large pectoral cross, and he was shot from just two feet away.
As of 2014, the Tijuana Cartel, or at least a significant majority of it, is believed to have been absorbed or forced into an alliance with the Sinaloa Federation, thanks in part to a former high-ranking Tijuana member named Eduardo Teodoro Garcia Simental. , alias “El Teo” or “Tres Letras”, ally of the Federation.
Dominance and Interfactional Conflict
By 2005, the Beltrán-Leyva brothers, formerly associated with the Sinaloa Cartel, had come to dominate the drug trade across the Arizona border. By 2006, the Sinaloa Cartel had eliminated all competition across the 528 km (328 mi) of the Arizona border. The cartels Milenio (Michoacán), Jalisco (Guadalajara), Sonora (Sonora) and Colima were now branches of the Sinaloa Cartel. At that time, the organization was laundering money on a global scale, mainly through the British bank HSBC.
In January 2008, the cartel reportedly split into a number of warring factions, causing a major increase in drug violence in Mexico. Cartel killings often involve beheadings or bodies dissolved in vats of alkali, and are sometimes filmed and posted on the Internet as a warning to rival gangs.
Before his arrest, Vicente Zambada Niebla (“El Vicentillo”), son of Ismael Zambada García (“El Mayo”), played a key role in the Sinaloa cartel. Vicente Zambada was responsible for coordinating multi-ton cocaine shipments from Central and South American countries, through Mexico and to the United States for the Sinaloa Cartel. To accomplish this task, he used all available resources: Boeing 747 cargo planes, narco-submarines, container ships, fast boats, fishing vessels, buses, rail cars, tractors and cars. He was arrested by the Mexican military on March 18, 2009, and extradited to Chicago on February 18, 2010 to face federal charges. He entered a guilty plea and agreed to cooperate with the government on November 8, 2018.
As of 2013, the Sinaloa Cartel continued to dominate the Sonora-Arizona corridor, which stretches nearly 370 miles (604 km). It relies on eight “plaza” bosses, leaders of a specific geographic region along the corridor, to coordinate, direct and support the flow of narcotics north into the United States. Major cities along the corridor include Mexicali Square, San Luis Rio Colorado Square, Sonoyta Square, Nogales Square, and Agua Prieta Square.
The metropolitan areas of Tucson and Phoenix, Arizona are major transshipment and distribution points for the cartel in the US. To coordinate operations in the southeastern US, Atlanta has become a major distribution and accounting center, and the Sinaloa Cartel’s presence there has brought brutal violence to that area. Chicago remains a key Sinaloa distribution point for the Midwest, benefiting from a strong local demand market and the convergence of several major interstate systems that enable distribution throughout the US. For a long time, the cartel also benefited from the relative ease of cash transactions and money laundering through banks with a presence in both the US and Mexico, such as HSBC.
In 2013, the Chicago Crime Commission named Joaquin “Chapo” Guzmán “Public Enemy No. 1” of a city where Guzmán has never set foot. He is the only person to receive the title since Al Capone. The focal point for Sinaloa in Chicago is the city’s “Little Village” neighborhood. From this strategic point, the cartel distributes their products wholesale to dozens of local street gangs, up to 2 tons per month, in a city with more than 117,000 documented gang members. The Gangster Disciples are one of the local gangs that most actively work with the cartel. The cartel’s attempts to control the Chicago drug market have brought them into direct conflict with other Chicago gangs, including the Black P. Stones, Vice Lords and Black Disciples, leading to an increase in violence in the city.
The Sinaloa Cartel operates in the Philippines as a transshipment point for drugs smuggled into the United States. According to a statement by Arthur Cacdac, director general of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency (PDEA), the cartel has been operating in the Philippines since 2013 following a raid on a farm in Lipa, Batangas, and entered the country without prior notice . President Rodrigo Duterte further confirmed the presence of the Sinaloa Cartel in the Philippines, saying the cartel uses the country as a transshipment point for drugs smuggled into the United States. The cartel’s presence in the Philippines has exacerbated the ongoing war between drug lords, drug cartels and the government in that country.
On July 4, 2019, Juan Ulises Galván Carmona, alias “El Buda,” was killed by two assassins in a supermarket in Chetumal, the capital of the state of Quintana Roo along Mexico’s Caribbean coast. El Buda was the leader of the Sinaloa Cartel’s drug trafficking activities and shipments from Central and South America.
Edgar Valdez Villarréal
Los Negros is known to employ gangs such as the Mara Salvatrucha to carry out murders and other illegal activities. The group is involved in the struggle in the Nuevo Laredo region for control of the drug trafficking corridor. Following the 2003 arrest of Gulf Cartel leader Osiel Cárdenas Guillén, the Sinaloa Cartel is believed to have moved 200 men to the region to battle the Gulf Cartel for control. The Nuevo Laredo region is a major drug trafficking corridor to Laredo, Texas, where as much as 40% of all Mexican exports go to the US.
After the 2004 murder of journalist Roberto Javier Mora García of the newspaper El Mañana, many local media have been cautious in their coverage of the fighting. The cartels have pressured reporters to report and wage a media war. The drug war has spread to several regions of Mexico such as Guerrero, Mexico City, Michoacán and Tamaulipas.
On August 30, 2010, Villarreal was captured by Mexican Federal Police.
Arrests and Seizures
On February 25, 2009, the US government announced the arrest of 750 members of the Sinaloa Cartel in the US during Operation Xcellerator. They also announced the seizure of more than $59 million in cash and numerous vehicles, aircraft and boats.
In March 2009, the Mexican government announced the deployment of 1,000 federal police officers and 5,000 Mexican army soldiers to restore order in Ciudad Juárez, which has suffered the highest number of casualties in the country.
On August 20, 2009, the DEA broke up a major Mexican drug operation in Chicago, uncovering a vast distribution network operated by the Flores crew led by twin brothers Margarito and Pedro Flores operating there. The drug operation allegedly brought 3,000 to 4,000 pounds (1,400 to 1,800 kg) of cocaine from Mexico to Chicago each month and shipped millions of dollars south of the border. The shipments were purchased largely from the Sinaloa Cartel and sometimes from the Beltrán-Leyva Cartel, and it is believed that both cartels threatened Flores’ crew with violence if they bought from other rival drug organizations.
On May 11, 2010, Alfonso Gutiérrez Loera, cousin of Joaquín Guzmán Loera, and five other drug traffickers were arrested after a shootout with federal police officers in Culiacan, Sinaloa. Along with the captured suspects, 16 assault rifles, 3 grenades, 102 magazines and 3,543 rounds of ammunition were seized.
Mexico’s Minister of National Defense (Sedena) reported the arrest of Jesús Alfredo Salazar Ramírez, alias “El Muñeco” or “El Pelos,” who was identified as the current lieutenant of the South Pacific Cartel in the state of Sonora. As Sedena says, “El Muñeco” worked as an administrator under Joaquín Guzmán Loera and is believed to be responsible for the death of activist Nepomuceno Moreno. Jesús Alfredo Salazar Ramírez was arrested on November 1, 2012 in the municipality of Huixquilucan by military personnel working for the Mexican Attorney General’s Office (PGR).
“El Muñeco” is considered one of Joaquín Guzmán Loera’s main lieutenants, evidenced by his control over the planting, production and trafficking of drugs in Sonora and in the mountains of Chihuahua, which were mainly sent to the US. He is linked to several murders, including the lawyer Rubén Alejandro Cepeda Leos, who was murdered on December 20, 2011 in the city of Chihuahua, Chihuahua. According to de Sedena, he is the alleged murderer of activist Nepomuceno Moreno Núñez, which took place on November 28, 2011. Nepomuceno Moreno was an activist who sought justice for the disappearance of his son and joined the Mexican Indignados movement, led by poet Javier Sicily.
José Rodrigo Aréchiga Gamboa (alias “Chino Antrax”) was a high-ranking member of the Sinaloa Cartel. He was a leader and co-founder of Los Ántrax, an armed squadron created to protect Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada García, one of the founders of the Sinaloa Cartel. He was arrested on December 30, 2013 at Amsterdam Schiphol Airport in the Netherlands, at the request of the United States of America and with the assistance of Interpol, on charges of drug trafficking.
The cartel’s loss of partners in Mexico does not appear to have affected the cartel’s ability to smuggle drugs from South America to the US. On the contrary, based on seizure reports, the Sinaloa Cartel appears to be the most active cocaine smuggler. The reports also showed that the cartels have the ability to operate in previously unknown areas such as Central America and South America, and as far south as Peru, Paraguay and Argentina. It also appears to be the most active in diversifying its export markets; rather than relying solely on American drug consumption, it has made efforts to supply drug distributors in Latin American and European countries.
On December 19, 2013, Mexico’s federal police killed Gonzalo “El Macho Prieto” Inzunza in a shootout in Puerto Penasco, Sonora. Inzunza is said to be one of Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzman’s top cartel leaders.
In December 2013, three suspected cartel members were arrested in Lipa, Batangas Province, Philippines with 84 kg of methamphetamine.
In February 2014, “El Chapo” Guzmán was arrested. The capture of “El Chapo” Guzmán of the Sinaloa Cartel led to a fight over the location of the trial. Calls for his extradition to the United States began just hours after his arrest. Guzmán also faces federal charges in several locations, including San Diego, New York and Texas, among others.
On July 11, 2015, “El Chapo” escaped from a maximum security prison, marking his second successful escape from a maximum security prison in 14 years.
On January 8, 2016, Guzman was arrested again during a raid on a house in the town of Los Mochis, in Guzman’s home state of Sinaloa.
The Sinaloa Cartel was formerly known as La Alianza de Sangre (“Blood Alliance”). The Sinaloa Cartel is “a confederation of criminal organizations based on regional culture and deep, shared blood ties developed over decades of endogenous practices.”
Structure
The Cipher Brief found that the CDS’s international success was largely due to a horizontal organizational system, as opposed to the top-down hierarchy employed by many of its rivals. After decentralizing to expand abroad, and to allow itself to “[survive] brutal attacks from rival cartels and the arrest of its most prominent leader, Chapo Guzman,” the use of this strategy by the cartel compared to the semi-autonomous cartels. networks of grants and local chapters used by many legitimate franchises; “Authority for decision-making flows across components, rather than moving down a formal chain of command.”
Leadership
When Héctor Luis Palma Salazar was arrested by the Mexican army on June 23, 1995, his partner Joaquín Guzmán Loera took over leadership of the cartel. Guzmán was captured in Guatemala on June 9, 1993 and extradited to Mexico, where he was imprisoned in a maximum security prison, but on January 19, 2001, Guzmán escaped and resumed his command of the Sinaloa Cartel.
Guzmán has one close associate, Ismael Zambada García. Guzman and Zambada became Mexico’s top drug lords in 2003 after the arrest of their rival Osiel Cárdenas Guillén of the Gulf Cartel. Another close associate, Javier Torres Félix, was arrested and extradited to the US in December 2006. On July 29, 2010, Ignacio Coronel was killed during a firefight with the Mexican army in Zapopan, Jalisco.
Guzmán was captured overnight by U.S. and Mexican authorities on February 22, 2014. On July 11, 2015, he escaped from the Federal Social Readaption Center No. 1, a maximum security prison in the state of Mexico, through a tunnel in his prison cell. Guzmán resumed his command of the Sinaloa Cartel, but on January 8, 2016, Guzmán was captured again during a raid on a house in the town of Los Mochis, in Guzmán’s home state of Sinaloa. With the arrest of Joaquín Guzmán Loera, Ismael Zambada has taken full control of the Sinaloa Cartel.
On June 24, 2020, it was revealed that Zambada was “sick with diabetes,” and that Zambada had allegedly given El Chapo’s sons more influence over the Sinaloa Cartel. This also ended an attempt to recruit former high-ranking Mexican drug lords Rafael and Miguel Caro Quintero as members of the Sinaloa Cartel, due to El Chapo’s sons’ refusal to grant them leadership status. Under Zambada’s leadership, the Sinaloa Cartel had been willing to negotiate potential leadership for the Caro Quintero brothers due to their history as bosses in the predecessor organization.
Today it is believed that while Guzmán’s relatives and friends vie for marginal leadership positions in the organization, the real top leader is still Ismael Zambada, who mediates power between them and gives them an organizational umbrella to work under his rule with apparent, relative autonomy.[81] Rumor has it that as of November 2022, Chapitos and Zambada factions have reconciled their recent differences to come together in the fight against the Jalisco New Generation Cartel.
At the time of his arrest on January 5, 2023, El Chapo son Ovidio Guzmán was believed to be the leader of the cartel’s Chapitos faction.
Activities
In the late 1980s, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) believed that the Sinaloa Cartel was the largest drug trafficking organization in Mexico. According to a court ruling, it was believed to be as big as the Medellín Cartel during its prime in the mid-1990s and has continued to grow into one of the world’s largest criminal syndicates with widely diverse international connections. Following the discovery of several tunnel systems used to smuggle drugs under and across the Mexico-US border since 1990; the group (mainly due to the past activities of Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzmán) has thus also been linked to such forms of human trafficking, with more tunnels continuing to be discovered and linked to the Sinaloa Cartel. According to the DEA, CDS drug tunnels are mostly located in California and Arizona.
The Sinaloa Cartel has a presence in at least 22 of Mexico’s 31 states, with major centers in Mexico City, Tepic, Toluca, Zacatecas, Guadalajara, and most of Sinaloa state. The Sinaloa Cartel was historically active in the “Golden Triangle”, the states of Sinaloa, Durango and Chihuahua. The region is a major producer of Mexican opium and marijuana. In this region, black tar heroin is often referred to as the “black goat.” Despite trafficking in various types of illegal substances, the cartel’s activities appear to primarily promote the trafficking of cocaine and opioids, especially in a distribution center like Chicago, where demand for methamphetamine is relatively low. According to the U.S. Attorney General, the Sinaloa Cartel was responsible for the importation into the United States and distribution of nearly 200 short tons (180 metric tons) of cocaine and large quantities of heroin between 1990 and 2008. During the second wave of the US opioid epidemic in the mid-2010s, which was largely caused by heroin; the prevalence and trafficking of fentanyl began to increase exponentially, leading to the third wave and eventually becoming the deadliest drug epidemic in U.S. history. Furthermore, a measurable increase in Colombian cocaine production and global consumption began to increase annually around 2014 until today, currently marking a new high for global cocaine use. The cartel still appears to have major methamphetamine operations in US cities such as San Diego and Atlanta. The CDS and other major Mexican cartels have established large marijuana growing operations in the remote forests and deserts of California.
Territory and presence
According to the Secretariat of Finance and Public Credit in Mexico City, as of 2020 the cartel has a tangible territory within the Mexican regions of Sinaloa, Baja California, Baja California Sur, Durango, Sonora, Chihuahua, Coahuila, Edomex, Mexico City, Jalisco , Zacatecas, Colima, Aguascalientes, Querétaro, Guerrero, Oaxaca, Chiapas, Tabasco, Campeche, Yucatán and Quintana Roo.
Sinaloa
Because the organization’s leadership is essentially divided between the cartel’s Mayo Zambada and Los Chapitos factions, much of the state of Sinaloa is also divided territorially. Within Sinaloa, the municipalities of El Fuerte, Badiraguato, Mocorito, Angostura, Navolato, Concordia, Rosario, Escuinapa and half of Culiacán are controlled by Los Chapitos, while San Ignacio, Elota and the other half of the municipality of Culiacán are reportedly controlled. by Mayo. The municipalities of Cosala and Mazatlán are said to have more than one group controlling the territory, as well as some of the northern regions of the state, which are said to be partially controlled by the Beltrán-Leyva organization.
International
Despite its measured and challenging presence in Mexico, however, the Federation is also known for its large and widespread international presence and its many transnational criminal operations and partners. Locations outside Mexico include Latin America (Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina), the Anglo-Caribbean region (Belize, Guyana), Canada (British Columbia, Eastern Canada) and the United States (mainly the Southwest, the South and parts of the Mid-Atlantic).
Tijuana Airport/Drug Super Tunnels
In 1989, the Sinaloa Cartel dug its first drug tunnel between a house in Agua Prieta, Sonora and a warehouse in Douglas, Arizona. The 300-foot (91-meter) tunnel was discovered in May 1990. After its discovery by U.S. Customs and Mexican Federal Police, the Sinaloa Cartel began concentrating its smuggling operations on Tijuana and Otay Mesa, San Diego, where it acquired a warehouse in 1992. After the assassination of Cardinal Juan Jesús Posadas Ocampo and six others at Guadalajara airport on May 24, 1993, the gunmen boarded a commercial airliner. When the plane landed at Tijuana airport, both police and military units failed to cordon off the plane and the gunmen escaped. On May 31, 1993, Mexican federal agents searching for the gunmen found a partially completed 1,500-foot tunnel adjacent to the Tijuana airport and under the U.S.-Mexico border to a warehouse on Otay Mesa in San Diego. It was discovered when Mexican and San Diego officials discussed the creation of a cross-border airport between Tijuana and Otay Mesa, which would have undermined drug tunnel operations in the area (see History of the Cross Border Xpress). The tunnel was described by the DEA in San Diego as the “Taj Mahal” of drug tunnels along the US-Mexico border and was linked to Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán. It was five times longer than the Agua Prieta-Douglas Tunnel and became the first of a series of drug “super tunnels” in Otay Mesa, originating from and around Tijuana Airport through the former Ejido Tampico. The “super tunnels” were equipped with power, ventilation, and rail lines to allow the efficient movement of large shipments of narcotics across the U.S.-Mexico border. As seen in Figure 1. Drug Tunnel Corridors, the former Ejido Tampico’s proximity to Tijuana Airport and the U.S.-Mexico border made it an ideal staging area for smuggling operations into the United States.
The Mexican government’s conflict with the former Ejido Tampico dates back to 1970, when they expropriated 320 hectares of the Ejido Tampico to build a new runway and passenger terminal at the Tijuana airport and agreed to pay the displaced ejidatarios (the communal farmers) . ) $1.4 million pesos ($112,000 US dollars in 1970). When the Mexican government failed to compensate the ejidatarios for their lost agricultural land, they reoccupied a 79-hectare portion of the Tijuana airport and threatened armed conflict. As shown in Figure 2 Ejido Tampico, the occupied area at Tijuana Airport remained relatively undeveloped between 1970 and 2000. In 1999, Tijuana Airport was privatized and became part of a network of twelve airports known as Grupo Aeroportuario del Pacífico (Pacific Airport Group). In an effort to resolve the dispute and remove the ejidatarios from the privatized Tijuana airport, the Mexican government set a value of the expropriated 320 hectares (790 acres) at $1.2 million pesos ($125,560 US dollars in 1999 ), while the ejidatarios of the former Ejido Tampico, taking into account the increase in real estate values between 1970 and 1999 and the privatization of the Tijuana airport, established a commercial value of their lost land at $2.8 billion pesos ($ 294 million US dollars). In 2002, Mexican President Vicente Fox, who had promised to resolve the issue, also failed.[113] As shown in Figure 2 Ejido Tampico comparison between 2000 and 2006, the ejidatarios then turned to commercial development of the 79-hectare area at the Tijuana airport by leasing buildings and plots to trucking and warehousing companies. As shown in Figure 3 Drug Trafficking Tunnel, the unauthorized development in 2006 enabled the construction of a 730-meter-long drug “super tunnel,” originating from the former Ejido Tampico and adjacent to the Tijuana Airport runway. Like previous drug tunnels, it went under the U.S.-Mexico border to a warehouse on San Diego’s Otay Mesa with the capacity to transport multi-ton shipments of narcotics.
Similar to the “Taj Mahal” of drug tunnels discovered on Otay Mesa in 1993, the 2006 “super tunnel” traced back to the Sinaloa cartel. With unregulated freight and warehouse operations, the former Ejido Tampico became a major distribution point for narcotics shipped into the United States. In the following years, drug tunnels transporting tons of narcotics were discovered in and around the Tijuana airport. The former Ejido Tampico also continued to expand its illegal development and more drug tunnels were discovered operating within the boundary of warehouses on Otay Mesa in San Diego, California. In 2011, a 550-meter-long drug “super tunnel” was discovered on the west side of Tijuana airport, dug under the airport’s 10/28 runway from a warehouse 300 meters from Mexico’s 12th Military Air Force. Base and 100 meters from a Mexican federal police station. As with previous “super tunnels,” it was equipped with an elevator and electric rail cars to efficiently transport narcotics across the U.S.-Mexico border. In December 2016, a month before the extradition of Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán Loera to the US, two ‘super tunnels’, one in use while the other was under construction, were discovered by Mexican agents next to Tijuana/Ejido Tampico Airport and the Otay Mesa border crossing. Both were associated with the Sinaloa Cartel. On June 21, 2017, Lucero Guadalupe Sánchez López, Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán’s “girlfriend” and former Sinaloa state lawmaker, was arrested at the Tijuana Airport Cross Border Protection) when she crossed the border. to the US. She was charged with drug conspiracy and money laundering, and had been with Joaquín Guzmán when he escaped capture in 2014.
Allies of the Cartel
In the late 2000s and early 2010s, the Sinaloa Cartel and the Gulf Cartel were traditionally considered allies, but as of 2021 this alliance has reportedly fizzled out as the two groups now battle each other in the state of Zacatecas, while the Jalisco New Generation cartel is now taking sides. with the Gulf to fight Sinaloa. The CDS is also fighting La Linea together with the CJNG in Ciudad Juarez.
The Sinaloa Cartel has also formed alliances with other gangs in the regions in which they operate. Domestically, the cartel’s sub-groups and allies are known to consist of Los Ántrax (enforcement unit), Grupo Flechas, Los Cabrera (armed wing), Los Rusos (Zambada faction), Los Chapitos (Guzmán faction), Los Mexicles, Los Salazares (human trafficking cell in Sonora), Sonora Cartel, Colima Cartel, Gente Nueva (armed wing) and La Barredora, while international alliances are believed to include Crips, Cártel del Noreste (in Zacatecas), La Nueva Familia Michoacana, Cárteles Unidos, La Familia Michoacana, Los Dámasos (armed wing), Independent Cartel of Nuevo León, Los Rastrojos, Paraguaná Cartel, Cachiros, Choneros, National Liberation Army, Herrera Organization, Fernando Pineda-Jimenez Organization, Mexican Mafia, Moroccan Mafia, Serbian Mafia, Kinahan Organized Crime Group, Independent Soldiers, Irish Mafia, Hells Angels (denied by HAMC), Chechen Mafia, Albanian Mafia, Romanian Mafia and the ‘Ndrangheta
The Sinaloa Federation has also formed alliances with two powerful Chinese Triads, Sun Yee On and the 14K Triad, to acquire the precursor chemicals needed to create highly addictive synthetic drugs such as methamphetamine and now likely fentanyl. Agents such as local gangs collect the chemicals from delivery points and ship them to hidden laboratories. The resulting products are shipped to the United States and many South American countries. The Sinaloa Cartel also reportedly has a large presence in Colombia, working with several paramilitary drug cartels such as the Clan del Golfo.
Alleged Collusion with Mexican Federal Armed Forces
In May 2009, U.S. National Public Radio (NPR) aired multiple reports alleging that Mexican Federal Police and Military were colluding with the Sinaloa Cartel. In particular, the report alleged that the government helped the Sinaloa Cartel take control of the Juarez Valley area and destroy other cartels, especially the Juarez Cartel. NPR’s reporters interviewed dozens of officials and ordinary people for the journalistic investigation. One report quotes a former Juarez police commander who claimed the entire department worked for the Sinaloa Cartel and helped it fight other groups. He also claimed that the Sinaloa Cartel had bribed the military. A Mexican reporter was also quoted as claiming to have heard several times from the public that the military was involved in killings. Another source in the story was the US trial of Manuel Fierro-Mendez, an ex-Juarez police captain who admitted to working for the Sinaloa cartel. He claimed that the Sinaloa Cartel influenced the Mexican government and military to gain control of the region. A DEA agent in the same lawsuit alleged that Fierro-Mendez had contacts with a Mexican military officer. The report also claimed, with support from an anthropologist who studies drug trafficking, that data on the low arrest rate of Sinaloa Cartel members (compared to other groups) was evidence of favoritism on the part of authorities. A Mexican official denied the allegation of favoritism, and a DEA agent and a political scientist also offered alternative explanations for the arrest details. Another report contained numerous indications of corruption and influence the cartel has within the Mexican government.
There have also been several reports of leading members of the Sinaloa Cartel handing out bribes to high-ranking Mexican government officials. A witness testified during the 2019 US trial of Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman that Mexico’s former president Enrique Peña Nieto took a $100 million bribe from El Chapo. In early 2023, Mexico’s former Minister of Public Security from 2006 to 2012, Genaro Garcia Luna, was convicted of accepting millions of dollars in cash bribes from the Sinaloa Cartel in exchange for his resources as a public official. The Sinaloa Cartel often had access to the Mexican Federal Police and also accessed sensitive information to throw off law enforcement.
Alleged collusion with U.S. federal forces
In 2012, Newsweek reported on allegations from an anonymous former Sinaloa member turned informant and former DEA agents who alleged that Joaquín Guzmán’s legal advisor, Humberto Loya-Castro, had become a key informant for the DEA . Loya-Castro had become an official informant for the DEA in 2005, but had been providing crucial information on rival cartels since the 1990s; Such information played a major role in the elimination of the Tijuana Cartel, the Sinaloa Cartel’s main rival, as well as the death of Arturo Beltrán Leyva, who led a splinter group of the Sinaloa Cartel. Such information left Loya-Castro immune from prosecution, while also focusing the DEA on Sinaloa’s rivals and away from their leadership. Such allegations were corroborated by court documents obtained by El Universal during their investigation into its collaboration with top officials of the Sinaloa Cartel. According to court documents, the DEA had entered into agreements with the cartel’s leadership that would ensure that they would be immune from extradition and prosecution in the US and prevent the cartel’s drug operations from being disrupted in exchange for intelligence against other drug cartels could be used.
Statements by a Mexican diplomat, revealed from leaked emails from the 2012 Stratfor leak, appeared to imply a belief among Mexican officials that U.S. officials aided the Sinaloa Cartel’s drug smuggling into the U.S. and protected the cartel while attacked his rivals. in an effort to reduce violence between Mexican drug cartels; this was supported by information from a Mexican foreign agent, codenamed MX1. The claim that US officials controlled drug trafficking through Mexico was confirmed by former Chihuahua state spokesman Guillermo Terrazas Villanueva.
In March 2015, the BBC TV program This World broadcast an episode entitled “Secrets of Mexico’s Drug War”, which reported on the US government’s Operation Fast and Furious, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, allowing licensed firearms dealers to sell weapons to illegal buyers acting on behalf of the leaders of the Mexican drug cartel, specifically the Sinaloa Cartel. The BBC also reported on Vicente Zambada Niebla’s claims of immunity from prosecution under a deal between the Mexican and US governments, and on his claims that Sinaloa Cartel leaders had provided US federal agents with information about rival Mexican drug gangs . The same documentary shows the US Department of Justice citing national security reasons to prevent Sinaloa Syndicate lawyer Humberto Loya Castro from being called as a witness in the trial of Vicente Zambada Niebla.
In the late 1980s, former DEA agent Hector Berrellez conducted an investigation into the murder of DEA agent Kiki Camarena, who was kidnapped, tortured and murdered in 1985. Through his investigation, dubbed Operation Leyenda, Berrellez is said to have discovered that a previous CIA agent participated in the interrogation and torture of Camarena with the aim of obtaining information about the agent’s awareness of the US government’s ties to drug cartels. A key informant, Guillermo González Calderoni, the deputy director of the Federal Judicial Police in Mexico, provided Berrellez with information suggesting CIA involvement in Camarena’s murder. Berrellez’s investigation into Camarena’s murder resulted in four convictions in U.S. federal court in 1992, but not long afterward Berrellez was transferred from Operation Leyenda. Berrellez remained silent until 2013, the release of drug lord Rafael Caro Quintero led Berrellez to publicly accuse the CIA’s role in Camarena’s death. The CIA has since denied any involvement in Camarena’s murder. In 2020, Amazon released a documentary titled “The Last Narc,” which explored the Berrellez and Operation Leyenda allegations.
Market
The cartel is primarily involved in the smuggling and distribution of South American (primarily Colombian) cocaine, Mexican marijuana, methamphetamine and fentanyl, as well as Mexican and Southeast Asian heroin into the United States. However, much of the marijuana now grown and traded by the cartel is grown illegally in remote areas of California, USA. Recently, the cartel has also moved away from smuggling MDMA and even heroin, while smuggling cocaine has increased. , fentanyl and methamphetamine. According to the DEA and various sources, the majority of high-value “hard drugs” are smuggled into the US through legal ports of entry (border crossings). They are known to often use U.S. citizens as mules, many of whom have planted drugs in passenger cars or tractor-trailers. Some of these are so-called “trap cars,” which are equipped with sophisticated mechanical designs that only reveal drug storage areas when certain functions of the vehicle are performed manually simultaneously or sequentially. The cartel has also recently expanded its migrant smuggling activities in the border regions.
Cocaine
It is believed that a group known as the Herrera Organization would transport multi-ton quantities of cocaine from South America to Guatemala on behalf of the Sinaloa Cartel in the 2000s and possibly still today. From there it is smuggled north to Mexico and later to the US. A very large percentage of the cocaine trafficked through Mexico is believed to first pass through Guatemala, with the most common estimate being around 600,000 to 800,000 pounds (300 to 400 short tons) per year. arrived in Guatemala years ago. Other shipments of South American cocaine are believed to come directly from drug trafficking groups based in Cali and Medellín, Colombia, from where the Sinaloa Cartel then arranges transportation across the US border to distribution cells in Arizona, California, Illinois, Texas, New York City, and Washington state. Since Colombia remains the largest cocaine producer in the world, the Sinaloa Cartel is currently the most active Mexican cartel operating in Colombia and helps finance and support several local paramilitary drug trafficking groups in Colombia, such as the left-wing National Liberation Army. , dissidents from the FARC and Colombia’s current largest drug cartel and right-wing paramilitary group; the Clan del Golfo. The Sinaloa organization now also participates directly in coca cultivation and production in Colombia. Nearly 85% of Colombia’s coca is grown in just five departments in the country. These are likely the same five departments in Colombia where the CDS and CJNG rivalry was discovered, reportedly leading to the displacement of thousands of Colombian citizens in early 2021. The presence of Mexican cartel groups in Colombia directly coincides with places where they are more abundant with coca crops, or with strategic drug trafficking routes: the Pacific coast of Nariño, Catatumbo, Bajo Cauca in Antioquia, Norte del Cauca and Magdalena.
Although Colombia, Bolivia and Peru have traditionally been the most notable South American countries in the cocaine trade in recent times; Both Venezuela and Ecuador have increased their involvement in the trade, with the Venezuelan organization Cartel of the Suns raising concerns among authorities abroad, as well as the increasing scale of recent cocaine seizures in Ecuador. In August 2021, a single multi-ton shipment of cocaine was seized off the coast of Ecuador, sparking a series of murders in the aftermath. The CDS is said to have a long-standing partnership with one of Ecuador’s largest and most powerful criminal groups; The Choneros, based in the Pacific coast resort of Manta, although they take their name from the western city of Chone. Since 2011, they have become one of Ecuador’s fiercest prison gangs, as the leader was imprisoned for almost eight years. This ensured that most of the organization’s activities were controlled and influenced directly from prison, where the gang continued to recruit new members. They are reportedly engaged in micro-trafficking, contract killing, extortion and smuggling of contraband. Recently, however, smaller gangs have begun to target the Choneros and the organization has also fallen victim to the phenomenon of infighting within the gang and its derivative groups. According to the Washington Post, the Choneros allegedly used their connections to quickly transport cocaine from the Colombian border to the Ecuadorian port of Guayaquil. Ecuador’s alleged ‘spiral’ in 2021 towards higher crime and drug violence could be traced back to December 28, 2020, when Jorge Luis Zambrano González (alias Rasquiña), leader of the gang, was murdered in a cafeteria of a shopping center in Manta . The country’s overcrowded prison system and the COVID-19 pandemic have apparently dominated much of the government’s attention and focus of late, making it easier for the gang to grow and consolidate power. This growth of the organization, the murder of Rasquiña and Ecuador’s increasing importance in the illegal cocaine trade have given way to recent crime waves in the region.
Opioids (heroin and fentanyl)
The company is also currently heavily involved in fentanyl trafficking, distributing both raw fentanyl powder and counterfeit “M30” pills that are designed to look like authentic oxycodone, but which in fact are only are pressed with fentanyl or other chemicals. Like methamphetamine, the production and distribution of crude fentanyl is incredibly profitable. Fentanyl is cheap to produce because it is completely synthetic and can be manufactured clandestinely because, unlike marijuana, opium/heroin and coca, it does not require agriculture, cultivation, sunlight or irrigation.[85] Most of the precursors needed to synthesize fentanyl and its analogs come from China, where it is then processed into actual fentanyl by criminal organizations in Mexico. Fentanyl is chemically classified as a phenylpiperidine in its molecular structure, unlike the more traditional morphinan poppy-derived opiates such as codeine, morphine, and even the closely related hydrocodone and heroin (diacetylmorphine). In the coastal city of Mazatlán, it reportedly takes just eight days for precursor chemicals from a delivery in the Pacific Ocean to hidden cartel labs and then north across the U.S. border.
According to a 2019 DEA report, “Each fentanyl pill is estimated to cost just $1 to produce. It can be resold in the US for at least ten times as much.” The cartel also produces and traffics heroin, a semi-synthetic morphinan compound made from the poppy (Papaver somniferum), which is now commonly mixed with fentanyl to increase its strength very cheaply. Much of the heroin smuggled, especially by the Sinaloa Cartel, is made in “The Golden Triangle,” a region of Mexico that overlaps parts of the states of Sinaloa, Durango and Chihuahua, where opium and marijuana are traditionally grown . However, local state and government crackdowns on these farms have pushed much of the opioid market toward synthetics like fentanyl, which can be made much more stealthily. Lately, fentanyl in Mexico has sometimes been indiscriminately referred to as “Mexican oxy” or even “synthetic heroin.”
The northern regions of Baja California, Sinaloa, and Sonora have been referred to by some media as the “Golden Triangle of Fentanyl Production and Transfer,” as both a distinction and a comparison to the classic opium farming region further south. In this northern regional area of illicit production, several major cities in its production and trafficking, such as Culiacán, Tijuana, Ensenada and San Luis Río Colorado, consistently see the highest number of seizures for fentanyl by law enforcement, usually in kilograms (powder) or pressed. pills. This, in turn, also led to the border city of San Diego reportedly becoming the “epicenter of fentanyl trafficking in America” in mid-2022 due to its proximity to the border, according to local news reports. In San Diego County, the amount of fentanyl seized by U.S. Customs and Border Protection increased from 1,599 pounds (725 kg) in 2019 to more than 6,700 pounds (3,000 kg) in 2021. The cartel is also known to be running ‘blind mules ‘ used. , especially for the smuggling and transportation of fentanyl into and through the US, where the mules often don’t even know what they are trafficking. Many of these mules are U.S. citizens, which helps facilitate the smuggling process, usually through U.S. ports of entry. Mules are typically paid several thousand dollars to transport what usually amounts to millions of dollars worth of narcotics at a time. Tijuana is now also beginning to develop its own problems with fentanyl use and addiction, despite this being a primarily American and Canadian phenomenon.
Multicolored Rainbow Fentanyl
Due to the Cartel’s past and current activities pushing fentanyl into blue counterfeit “oxycodone pills (lookalike),” which have led to tens of thousands of accidental overdose deaths annually in the U.S., the Federation has reportedly responded by creating multicolored fentanyl pills . that customers know it’s counterfeit and likely fentanyl, rather than a controlled dose of the more sought-after drug oxycodone. They have also started coloring the fentanyl powder in different colors so that dealers in the US do not accidentally or intentionally mix fentanyl powder with other white powdered substances such as cocaine. Although the DEA originally claimed that these multi-colored pills and powders were specifically designed to be marketed to children, these claims have been denied by cartel agents, according to Business Insider and other sources. Cartel associates have reportedly claimed that their intention was “the opposite of that” and that it was actually intended to distinguish them from genuine pharmaceutical products.
Marijuana
Although the Sinaloa Cartel historically grew and cultivated marijuana locally in the original “Golden Triangle” region of Mexico, the cartel and other modern Mexican cartels have recently established large marijuana cultivation operations in Mexico’s remote forests and deserts. California, where they allegedly stole millions of gallons of water for this illegal cultivation. In the summer of 2021, this apparently led to Los Angeles County’s largest marijuana bust in its history. They discovered and dismantled 70 to 80 greenhouses in the open desert and recovered thousands of pounds of marijuana that used water diverted or “sucked” from nearby alfalfa, carrot and potato farms. These varieties can reportedly produce three to five harvests per year.
According to the RAND Corporation in 2010, it was not unrealistic to assume that “at least 50 percent” of the marijuana consumed in the United States was produced in Mexico. In the years that followed, however, gradual U.S. moves toward recreational legalization in many states, as well as the superior quality of American-grown marijuana, began to significantly reduce cartels’ profits in Mexico. Despite this, groups that produce marijuana in Mexico are still moving products to states on the U.S. side that have still not been legalized.
The legitimate, cash-rich operations of local, fully legal marijuana shops could also prove beneficial to the cartel’s money laundering activities. Factions like the Chapitos have already started “branding” marijuana products, investing in production and lobbying certain politicians for legalization. Currently, Culiacán’s best-known brand is called “Star Kush”. The logo shows an astronaut eating a piece of pizza; the pizza that the cartel used as a reference to “La Chapisa”, the people who worked for Guzmán and his sons. The astronaut sits atop a huge tomato due to Culiacán’s role as Mexico’s largest tomato exporter. Local cannabis producers are funded by the Sinaloa Organization to “make the best product” but are only allowed to sell it back to the cartel for their pharmacies.
Methamphetamine
While the Sinaloa Cartel is probably not as prolific in cooking methamphetamine as the CJNG [according to who?], the Sinaloa Cartel still has major methamphetamine operations throughout North America, including currently Mexico itself, due to now ubiquitous meth use in the country; regions like Guanajuato reportedly saw a 2,400% increase in meth between 2010 and 2020. Reportedly, in 2010, only about two (2%) of every hundred people who used drugs in Guanajuato used crystal meth. While at the end of 2020; this figure increased to almost 50%, with the use of drugs such as marijuana among users even decreasing. The current rate of production and sales of methamphetamine in Mexico is now also a result of the so-called ‘new era’ of production and trafficking of fully synthetic drugs. Methamphetamine, another fully synthetic compound (like fentanyl), also means it does not require agriculture, cultivation, and other related resources such as those needed to produce marijuana, cocaine, and heroin. It also “packs tighter” (see: Iron Law of Prohibition) than certain other drugs when smuggled due to its high potency relative to its weight.
According to a 2019 RAND Corporation study, 50% of the world’s record seizures of the drug in 2018 occurred in North America. The US market for the drug (as of 2021) could be worth well over $50 billion; four times the reported US$13 billion market for methamphetamine in 2010. Besides North America, the other major regions of the world where methamphetamine is consumed are Southeast Asia and Oceania; mainly Australia and to a lesser extent New Zealand. Initially when Mexican cartels such as Sinaloa first moved to the Netherlands to establish themselves around 2015 for their new drug production activities. However, the cartel eventually convinced many of these groups to move away from MDMA synthesis and instead attempt to produce methamphetamine due to the potential for much higher profits.
Like fentanyl, many of the industrial precursors from China, India and Germany are arriving in Mexico at ports like Manzanillo, which has led to a notable increase in violence in the small coastal state of Colima, as well as in strategic areas. Synthetic drug trafficking regions further north, such as Baja California and Zacatecas. Along with the Pacific State’s chemical shipments to major ports, Federal Highway 15 acts as a south-north artery, running from the port city of Mazatlán, through Sinaloa. This transit system allows the Sinaloa Cartel to transport precursor chemicals and finished product across the northern border using passenger vehicles, which is by far the most common method of smuggling through ports of entry. This has led to the state of Sinaloa essentially dominating the production of synthetic illegal drugs in Mexico.
It was initially in the 1980s that Mexican drug manufacturers began bringing methamphetamine across the border north, and then newer forms were introduced that could be smoked. In 2019, the Center for Disease Control (CDC) recorded 16,167 deaths from methamphetamine overdoses in the US, compared to 3,627 overdoses related to the drug in 2013. Of the fatal meth overdoses recorded in 2019, 52 of them occurred in New Hampshire , which is what caught the DEA’s attention regarding counterfeit ‘Adderall’ pills. The greatest use of the drug has traditionally been seen in the American Southwest, West, Interior Northwest, and rural Midwest. It was around 2005 when Mexican cartels like the CDS began to take almost complete control of the methamphetamine market in the US; largely due to U.S. lawmakers passing the Combat Methamphetamine Epidemic Act, which severely limited access to over-the-counter cold medications containing ephedrine and pseudoephedrine.
A greater percentage of Mexican methamphetamine is now reportedly made from fully synthetic precursors rather than the natural compound ephedrine, or even the closely related pseudoephedrine, due to the country’s restrictions on these precursor chemicals that began around 2007 (two years after the US restrictions). . Much of the modern methamphetamine circulating in North America through Mexican cartels like Sinaloa is therefore now mostly half and half (racemic) or sometimes; uneven mixture of both the L-methamphetamine isomer (which is less dopaminergic and has more physical side effects) and the more desirable and potent D-methamphetamine (dextrorotatory) isomer. This is because methods of synthesizing methamphetamine without the use of ephedrine or pseudoephedrine, such as the alternative P2P reduction method; tends to yield a racemic (50:50) mixture of both isomers (specifically called enantiomers), rather than just pure d-methamphetamine as observed in pseudoephedrine-based syntheses.
P2P (phenyl-2-propanone) is usually obtained from phenylacetic acid and acetic anhydride, with phenylacetic acid possibly arising from benzaldehyde, benzyl cyanide or benzyl chloride. Methylamine is crucial to all such methods and is produced from the model jet fuel nitromethane, or formaldehyde and ammonium chloride, or methyl iodide with hexamine. This was once the preferred production method of American motorcycle gangs in California, until DEA restrictions on the precursor chemicals made the process difficult. This method may involve the use of mercuric chloride and leaves mercury and lead waste in the environment.
Influence : Mexico and Latin America
The cartel is accused of infiltrating and corrupting various levels of government. There have been allegations of collusion between cartel members and politicians, law enforcement officials and even elements of the military. Political corruption and the influence of drug cartels have been major challenges for Mexico, eroding the credibility of its institutions. Cartel activities lead to the decline of communities, with cities like Ciudad Juárez experiencing high levels of violence, kidnappings and public beheadings.
The Sinaloa Cartel’s activities extend beyond Mexico, with the organization involved in drug trafficking throughout Latin America. The evolution of trade routes from Colombian cartels to Mexican drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) changed the dynamics and affected Latin American areas. In particular, competition between Colombian cartels and Mexican DTOs, as well as internal competition between Mexican groups, have contributed to an increase in violence in recent decades. Historically, Colombian cartels dominated the cocaine trade, especially in the 1970s and 1980s. However, changes in the global cocaine market, including increased demand in the United States, shifted production to Colombia. As a result, Mexican DTOs became crucial players in the transportation of cocaine from South America to the United States. The struggle for control of strategic trafficking routes and drug-producing regions led to territorial disputes, resulting in an increase in violence, including clashes with law enforcement and rival cartels.
The demise of the Colombian cartels, due in part to law enforcement efforts and internal conflict, created a power vacuum in the drug trade. Mexican DTOs took advantage of this vacuum and expanded their activities, leading to increased competition not only with Colombian cartels but also among themselves
International
The flow of drugs, especially narcotics, from Mexican cartels into the United States is contributing to the rising drug epidemic, addiction rates, and related public health concerns. The 1990s and 2000s saw the emergence of the opioid epidemic, initially caused by overprescribing of opioid painkillers, creating a lucrative market that was exploited by Mexican cartels.
The violence committed by drug cartels in Mexico is spreading directly to the U.S. borderlands. Incidents such as gun battles, kidnappings and wars between rival cartels could extend beyond the Mexican side of the border, causing an escalation of violence in American communities. U.S. law enforcement agencies in border states face increasing pressure to combat drug trafficking and related criminal activities as police and other authorities face the challenges posed by transnational criminal organizations operating on both sides of the border and their resources and capabilities stretch.
