Borderland Beat |  |
- Omar Espejo from CJNG Detained
- Chiquillo Antrax gunned down in Culiacán
- stopping by sending you the best holiday wishes....
- Merry Chrismas but Lest We Forget, MEXICO STILL MOURNS
- Attacks on Priest Continues
- Happy Christmas to all Borderland Beat Readers
Omar Espejo from CJNG Detained Posted: 26 Dec 2014 03:51 AM PST Tanslated from a Milenio article by Spike for Borderland Beat  The Attorney General of the Republic (PGR) , in coordination with the Marines , arrested Omar Espejo Flores , " El Toro", an alleged operator for Cartel Jalisco Neuvo Generacion, he is presumably responsible for the disappearance of two members of the Agencies criminal investigation department (AIC) , in Vista Hermosa Michoacán in November 2013. Tomás Zerón, director of the AIC of the PGR, reported that Espejo Flores was coordinating the Halcones and groups of Hitmen in the Jalisco municipalities of Ocotlán and La Barca, Briseñas; He also did it in the michoacana town of Vista Hermosa. Other criminal activities in which El Toro was involved, was the collection of piso ( extortion ), oil theft and drugs.The official said that the detainee was involved in the kidnapping and disappearance of agents René Rojas Marquez and Gabriel JAWS Santiago, on November 3, 2013, in Vista Hermosa. To date the whereabouts of these two personnel of the Agency is unknown, they were searched for in clandestine graves that were discovered at La Barca. Last year, the Office of the Attorney-General found 64 corpses in 35 clandestine graves in the municipality of La Barca, as part of the search for the Federal Police,the work concluded almost a month later. Zeron said the arrest was made possible by the coordinated actions with the attorney specializing in research on organized crime (Seido) and the Mexican Marina, which led to intelligence placing Espejo Flores in Zapopan, Jalisco. El Toro was surprised when captured without a shot fired whilst driving down an avenue inside a luxury sedan on 18 December. "This person had an arrest warrant arising from the disappearance of the two members of the Agency's Criminal investigation team Rene Rojas Marquez and Gabriel Quijada Santiago, on November 3, 2013, this was in Michoacan, and those who were detained, unarmed and deprived of freedom by municipal police of Vista Hermosa, they then delivered them to members of organized crime", Zeron said. He said that because of these facts, the PGR stopped almost in its entirety the municipal police of Vista Hermosa, linked to these facts, and those who are today held in two federal prisons, where they face charges of organized crime and illegal deprivation of liberty, among other crimes. From the statements of some of the soldiers, Omar Flores took an active part in the disappearance of federal troops. "His arrest was achieved without a single shot. It is known that he constantly changed his place of residence; However, we identified that he continued performing as a manager of the criminal group in the above-mentioned municipalities. "As an important part in this criminal organization, his specialization was the coordinating of groups of Halcones, hitmen and cartel members, in addition to kidnappings, fuel theft, collection of piso ( extortion) and the transfer of drugs". El Toro was consigned by the agent of the public prosecutor's Office to prison number 4, El Rincón, in Tepic, Nayarit, where will be processed for the crimes of kidnapping and organized crime. Original article in Spanish courtesy of http://www.milenio.com  | ||||||
Chiquillo Antrax gunned down in Culiacán Posted: 25 Dec 2014 10:02 PM PST Lucio Borderland Beat Information from Noroeste and YouTube  Antonio Avendaño, "El Chiquillo Ántrax", of the Sinaloa Cartel,enforcer group Antrax was gunned down in the Sinaloa city of Culiacan in Colinas de San Miguel. It was just before the midnight hour that Avendaño was gunned down, while driving on Cerro del Vigía Street, in a 2015 MiniCooper yellow orange color, without plates. He was pinned in between two cars that open fire, causing Avendaño tostrike and carom off of three vehicles in front of a home in full Christmas celebration.  | ||||||
stopping by sending you the best holiday wishes.... Posted: 25 Dec 2014 03:54 PM PST chivis  Two of my all time favorite posada photos. Santa always arrives on a firetruck, and the foto below is a shot of a lil guy in a wheelchair when he spots Santa and the firetruck....PRICELESS!!! This year I was able to provide over 1000 children with posada fun. For most it is one of the few highlights of the year. We also provided gifts for impoverished children, we requested that schools provide a wish list for children who more than likely would not receive a special gift at Christmas. many asked for things such as shoes and jackets. and we did not forget the migrants in the casa migrante shelters. We sent gifts of clothing, candy and phone cards, and provided Christmas dinners. My project continues, that honors the 72 migrants slaughtered in San Fernando Tamps. Anyone wishing to become involved or begin their own project, just email me, I will help you get started. I encourage you to get involved next year, donate, find a charity, ask me if you want a recommendation. It's a wonderful thing, and for one day we can feel good that we were able to do something and bring a little happiness to the children and the forgotten of Mexico. Merry Christmas to all and to all a fantastic night...............................cheers, Chivis   | ||||||
Merry Chrismas but Lest We Forget, MEXICO STILL MOURNS Posted: 25 Dec 2014 03:33 PM PST Borderland Beat by DD with material from Mexico Voices I join Spike in wishing everyone A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS and WONDERFUL NEW YEAR. But in this time of celebration and brotherly love for our fellow man, let us not forget Mexico Still Mourns By Guadalupe Loaeza I am wondering if Peña Nieto’s government is aware to what degree the disappearance of the 43 teachers college students has permeated Mexican society. I imagine that many of them no longer have the head, right now, to think about such traumatic things; others will follow the advice of their boss. That’s to say, get over the Ayotzinapa tragedy. And I won't fault anyone whose only concern these days is to watch his back. Many will be without a job in 2015. As I do every year, last Sunday I took my grandchildren to see “The Nutcracker” at the National Theater. Once seated, I gave myself a task: to watch all the people filled with holiday cheer as they entered the theater to admire the last performance of Tchaikovsky’s famous ballet, the music of which is so familiar to us that even the most ignorant can recall a fragment. Most of the attendees were children and adolescents, bundled up and accompanied by their families. The atmosphere inside the enormous auditorium, with space for 10,000 people, was festive and Christmassy. For my part, I was a deeply gratified grandmother surrounded by my six grandchildren, two of my sons, my daughter-in-law and Paloma Figueroa, the young professional dancer. With that same festive mindset, I watched young grandmothers wearing 100 percent wool coats with furs and carrying Coach or Marc Jacob purses. Many greeted and waved to each other from afar. The show was only minutes away from beginning. Suddenly, the lights went down and at the stage’s illuminated center appeared a group of young people holding two banners, one with the hashtag #Yamecansé [Enough, I'm tired]** written on it and on the other could be read the words, “Stop impunity.” Daniel Castillo, in evening wear, spoke on behalf of his fellow members of the National Dance Company: "Mexico is mourning the unsustainable and heartbreaking impunity that has become a daily story and that violates our citizenry." With perfect diction, his words echoed all across the auditorium. A profound silence fell over us. No one moved in their seats, not the children and especially not the adults. The power of Castillo’s words and the audience’s silence united all of us. Castillo, whose image was projected in color on two enormous screens placed on either side of the stage, continued, "Mexico, we are no longer just mourning the disappeared teacher college students, but those of Aguas Blancas, San Fernando and the children at the ABC nursery***," "I want to read a poem written by one of our company members, the ballerina Sonia Jiménez." At that moment, and despite my wearing a red sweater, I felt dressed in black from head to toe. We are mourning, We are the cry of our dead, We are the blood shed on fertile land, We are the silence on the verge of exploding. Today we do not recognize the ground on which we stand, The falling rain does not erase the mistakes, Our eyes don't wipe away the truth, We live blindfolded, we have sold-out, We speak with the breath of our bodies. Turn off the lights. Mexico is mourning. As if moved by an gigantic, invisible spring, the public rose to its feet, “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine…,” until it reached number 43, which they memorialized with their fists raised. The applause was an enormous and deep expression of our condolences. Everyone was mourning. Everyone felt even more tired than Murillo Karam for all the corruption and impunity. And all of us represented “the cry of our dead.” I envisioned backstage: 170 dancers of the National Dance Company and the students of the National School of Classical and Contemporary Dance, elegantly dressed as the characters of the ballet’s epoch, applauding. I was imagining the company’s five principal dancers—Agustina Galizzi, Ana Elisa Mena, Mayuko Nihei, Blanca Ríos and Erick Rodríguez—mourning. Those who appeared particularly sad were José Luis González, Mariana Garce and Sofía Villarreal, who that night were saying goodbye to the company, which was celebrating 50 years of putting on the Christmas ballet. Also, I imagined “Clara,” the protagonist of Hoffmann’s tale, the little rodents, the tin soldiers, and the Nutcracker himself mourning, applauding in honor of the 43 disappeared. "Why did you get so sad all of a sudden, Mamá Lú?, one of my granddaughters asked me. "Because Mexico continues to mourn," I replied. I have the impression that my granddaughter did not understand me. Then, the curtains opened and the show began. **Reference to offhand remark of Attorney General Murillo Karam at the end of the press conferece at which he announced that arrested members of the Warrriors United cartel confessed they had murdered the 43 Ayotzinapa students and burned their bodies. The remark was immediately turned against him on the social media and in the press.  | ||||||
Posted: 25 Dec 2014 01:35 PM PST
Borderland Beat posted by DD from AP, and ABC News and Sin Embargo Dozens of Roman Catholic priests and hundreds of parishioners marched through the southern Mexico city of Ciudad Altamirano on Wednesday to demand the release of a kidnapped priest and protest a series of kidnappings, killings and robberies of priests. The marchers were led by Bishop Maximino Martinez and about 30 white-robed priests. They called for the release of the Rev. Gregorio Lopez Gorostieta, who apparently was kidnapped from a local seminary early Monday morning by a group of four armed persons who entered the Catholic seminary that morning.
On Monday when the Bishop issued the call for the Wednesday march, the church also used social media to spread the message; “To the whole people of God on pilgrimage to the diocese of Ciudad Altamirano, they are told of the disappearance of the father Gregorio Lopez Gorostieta, on the night of Sunday December 21, so at this time what is important is to unite us all in prayer with the confidence that he is okay. If anyone has information that can help locate him please call the seminar”. In his call for the faithful to join the march, he also said called for an end to the violence in Tierra Caliente and for the release of Father Gregorio. He also said he does not think that there is any direct problem against the priests, in spite of the cases that have happened in last years, “ because we devote ourselves to serve the people either God, to preach the gospel, we do not do anything more, our work is the redemption of the person ”. He added that "on the occasion of Christmas, it is very important that we manifest in the march that we call for peace for our country, and to set aside all this atmosphere of violence". "Enough Already!" and "Return Father Gregorio!" read banners carried by the marchers, who sang hymns as they marched to the city's cathedral. "Enough, is the cry of all the bishops of Mexico and the diocese. Enough of those who provoke lawlessness, corruption, impunity of complicity and indifference while all they have done to provoke violence, fear and disappearance, 'the document says.
Lopez Gorostieta's pickup truck was found abandoned and locked near the main plaza which is also near the seminary, but no blood stains were found inside. The church has filed a crime report with police, but the motive remains unclear. "We haven't received any demand for ransom," said Martinez, who noted his diocese "has suffered a lot" from the drug cartel violence that has made the hotlands region of southern Guerrero state one of the most dangerous in all of Mexico. At least two priests have been killed in Guerrero state this year and several others have been abducted, robbed or wounded in robbery attempts. In September, 2009 the father Habacuc was murdered, in Arcelia, when he was travelling with two young people who were for students training to be seminarians and who were also killed by gun shots. That mobilized the church to demonstrate. On that occasion the church in a document condemned 'the violence that is plaguing our country' and demanded 'to the corresponding authorities, at all levels of Government, carry out a prompt investigation and find those responsible for this cowardly crime'. From our faith, we express the certainty that the father Habacuc Hernández, and seminarians Eduardo Oregón Benitez and Silvestre González, who were with him are already in the presence of the heavenly father', added the document In September of this year, the battered body of the Rev. Ascension Acuna Osorio was found floating in the Balsas river near his parish of San Miguel Totolapan, near Ciudad Altamirano. Guerrero state prosecutors said the priest's body had head wounds, but it was unclear whether they were caused by the body being dragged by the current, or whether he had been killed before being dumped in the river. Prosecutors have offered the diocese no further explanation of his death. Residents of San Miguel Totolapan told reporters that Acuna Osorio was well-liked in the town, but they were afraid to speak any further about him. The town is an area dominated by the Guerreros Unidos drug cartel, which has been implicated in the mass killing of 43 students in September in the nearby city of Iguala. The area is so dangerous that Bishop Martinez said one priest had been briefly kidnapped in the mountains above San Miguel Totolapan by cartel gunmen who complained the priest had been speaking in favor of "La Familia" — the name of a rival drug cartel. The priest had to quickly explain he had been preaching in favor of family values, and keeping the family together as a social nucleus, and was not talking about the rival cartel. He was then released. Earlier this year, another priest was injured when gunmen sprayed his truck with bullets on a local road; the priest's driver was killed in that attack. The Rev. Oscar Prudenciano, a parish priest in the city of Iguala, said he survived a similar attack on a highway in May 2013, when he was headed to a baptism. Cartel gunmen pulled him over, apparently because they wanted to steal his truck. They dragged him off and were apparently going to kill him; the priest was only saved because a rival group of gunmen showed up and a gunfight broke out, allowing Prudenciano time to escape. "I thought they were going to kill me," he said. "I ran for my life." While everyone is vulnerable to robberies on the region's roads, some attacks appear more specifically directed at the church, especially priests who refuse to perform quickie marriages or baptisms for drug gang members. "At times, if they ask for a baptism and you don't do it, they start to threaten you," Martinez said. "They want a marriage, or a blessing" for a car or a home, he said, and won't take 'no' for an answer.” About the precautionary measures he is recommending the bishop told the priests, make sure that "all their vehicles are labeled. Do not leave late at night on the roads. That take great care and tell someone where you are going. That not you refuse the services of the Church such as baptism or marriage, because finally the grace of God will come if those people are with God, beyond what they do to the priest'. Some deaths remain a mystery. Ugandan priest Rev. John Ssenyondo, 55, had been kidnapped earlier this year after saying Mass, when a group of people in an SUV intercepted his car. His body was later identified as one of 13 found in a clandestine grave discovered Nov. 2 in the town of Ocotitlan. Church officials believe some attacks, in fact, may be intended to discourage priests from protesting the rampant violence. Monsignor Ramon Castro, the bishop of the diocese of Cuernavaca, just to the north of Guerrero, said that after the church organized a march against violence in which thousands took part in March, armed men kidnapped workers from three separate parishes in nearly simultaneous attacks the next day. They were released hours later. "We think that was a kind of warning, to tell us to keep quiet," Bishop Castro said.  | ||||||
Happy Christmas to all Borderland Beat Readers Posted: 25 Dec 2014 01:14 PM PST Spike for Borderland Beat Just wishing all readers , forum posters , and BB reporters , happy holidays and a wonderful Christmas with a happy and prosperous new year. For Mexico and Mexicans in particular I also wish you , peace , tranquillity , security. Kindest Regards Spike   |
