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United States to turn over “El Güero” Palma to Mexican authorities Posted: 09 Jun 2016 09:37 PM PDT  Hector Luis “El Güero” Palma Salazar is scheduled to be released from the United States Bureau of Prisons in the coming days. Palma will be turned over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which is coordinating with Mexican officials his direct return to Mexican authorities. Palma was arrested by Mexican authorities in 2002 on a U.S.-issued Provisional Arrest Warrant, and served five years in a Mexican prison under that warrant while his extradition to the United States was being processed, in accordance with the 1978 Mexico-U.S. Extradition Treaty. After extradition, Palma pleaded guilty before a United States court and was sentenced to 16 years for transporting 50 kilos of cocaine. Under U.S. Federal sentencing practices, the five years Palma spent in a Mexican prison counted as time served under the U.S. sentence. As part of the U.S. Bureau of Prisons system-wide incentive scheme for good behavior, Palma was scheduled for release after having served 85% of his sentence. The United States and Mexico enjoy strong cooperation in security, including a healthy extradition relationship under our robust bilateral extradition treaty. The U.S. government is committed to continuing to strengthen this relationship. For further questions regarding Palma’s sentence or release, we refer you to the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington, D.C. or to the Bureau of Prisons. The Yucatan Times | ||
Mexico’s lost guns: 13,000 over 10 years; reported lost or stolen by police and other officials Posted: 09 Jun 2016 05:40 PM PDT Posted by DD republished from Mexico News Daily Mexico News Daily | Wednesday, June 8, 2016
Police are having a hard time hanging on to their guns: at both state and federal levels police officers and officials in prosecutors’ and attorney generals’ offices have lost nearly 13,000 firearms since 2006. The federal Attorney General’s office reported the disappearance of 1,171 arms, the Federal Police 1,054, and 102 by the Center for Investigation and National Security (Cisen). Members of the Federal Protection Service, responsible for the security of public officials, were best at hanging on to their weapons. They lost only 15. The rest of the 12,878 missing guns, both handguns and rifles, were lost or stolen in all 32 states, but the majority disappeared in Mexico City, the State of México, Chihuahua, Guerrero and Jalisco. The last three represent regions of the country with strong a presence of established drug cartels and splinter groups. The largest number of lost or stolen weapons was reported in Mexico City in 2009, when 800 arms went missing from local police stations. That was also the year in which the most guns vanished nationwide, a total of 2,081. The data was obtained by the newspaper Milenio from the National Defense Secretariat through a freedom-of-information request. Coincidentally, the Mexican government increased its imports of firearms by more than threefold in the first half of this decade. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri) reports that Mexico’s arms imports grew by 331% between 2011 and 2015 when compared with the period 2006 to 2010. Sipri attributed the sharp increase in imports to the war against drug cartels. InSight Crime suggests the missing weapons were likely destined for the domestic black market and bought up by organized criminal networks. They might also have found their way into the hands of the armed vigilante groups operating in many parts of the country. The crime research organization concluded that “the demand for guns has shot up parallel with the militarization of Mexico’s so-called ‘drug war,’” adding that the increase in weapons imports “shows that the Mexican government is arming up, not dialing it down.” Source: Milenio (sp) |
