A British grandmother has been sentenced to death by firing squad for smuggling almost 5kg of cocaine into Bali.Lindsay Sandiford was arrested in May last year after she tried to enter the Indonesian holiday island with illegal drugs worth £1.6 million hidden in her suitcase.Local prosecutors had called for the 56-year-old housewife to be jailed for 15 years. But today there were gasps in the Bali courtroom when a panel of judges announced Ms Sandiford would be executed for drug trafficking.As the shock verdict was announced, Ms Sandiford, from...
Tuesday, 22 January 2013
Monday, 27 August 2012
Bikie gang suspects in brawl arrests at Penrith shopping centre
FOUR men with alleged links to outlaw motorcycle gangs were arrested last week after a brawl at a Penrith shopping centre. Police officers from the gangs squad and Penrith local area command had been investigating the brawl, which forced shoppers to flee for their safety about 2.45pm last Monday. Police will allege a man was leaving the shopping centre when he was confronted by a group of nine men and fighting began. A number of people tried to intervene, including an unknown male who was assaulted. All involved in the brawl then left the scene....
27 charged in California-Mexico methamphetamine ring
Local and federal authorities moved Thursday to break up an alleged drug trafficking ring connecting a major Mexican cartel and San Gabriel Valley street gangs, arresting 17 people in a pre-dawn sweep. A federal indictment unsealed Thursday charges 27 defendants with making, possessing and dealing methamphetamine imported by La Familia Michoacana, one of Mexico’s most violent cartels, to two Pomona gangs: Los Amables and Westside Pomona Malditos. Seven law enforcement agencies, including the Pasadena and Pomona police, the Los Angeles County...
Police think Ogden drive-bys are tied to gang's power struggle
Police believe drive-by shootings at an Ogden home Tuesday night and Wednesday morning may be related to a violent power struggle within a street gang over control of leadership, drugs and money. Ogden Police Lt. Scott Conley declined to identify the gang, but said members are not affiliated with the Ogden Trece. On Monday, 2nd District Judge Ernie Jones issued a permanent injunction against Trece members, banning them from associating with each other in public and being in the presence of guns, drugs and alcohol. The injunction also places Treces...
Wednesday, 13 June 2012
Arrest of Zetas leader's brother prompts Mexico travel warning
American officials are issuing an alert following the arrest in the United States of the brother of a high-ranking member of the Zetas drug cartel.According to the New York Times, federal officials arrested Jose Treviño-Morales on Tuesday morning as part of a money laundering investigation.The newspaper reported that Treviño-Morales is accused of using champion race horse ranches in New Mexico and Oklahoma to launder millions of dollars...
Monday, 21 May 2012
Thursday, 10 May 2012
US blacklists sons of Mexico drug lord Joaquin Guzman
The US treasury department has put two sons of Mexico's most wanted man Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman on its drugs kingpin blacklist. The move bars all people in the US from doing business with Ivan Archivaldo Guzman Salazar and Ovidio Guzman Lopez, and freezes any US assets they have. Joaquin Guzman, on the list since 2001, runs the powerful Sinaloa drug cartel. Mexico has seen an explosion of violence in recent years as gangs fight for control of trafficking routes. The US administration "will aggressively target those individuals who facilitate...
Monday, 7 May 2012
FBI offers up to $100,000 for info leading to capture of Eduardo Ravelo
Eduardo Ravelo, born on October 13, 1968 was added as the 493rd fugitive to the FBI 10 most wanted list on October 20, 2009. He is originally from Mexico, however he holds permanent residency status in the United States which gives him free movement across the border. An FBI informant and former lieutenant in the Barrio Azteca, a prison gang active in the U.S. and Mexico, testified that Ravelo told him to help find fellow gang members who had stolen from the cartel. In March 2008, he became the leader of the gang shortly after betraying his predecessor,...
Saturday, 14 April 2012
Brazilian Cannibals Make Empanadas With Human Meat
Brazilian Cannibals Make Empanadas With Human Meat Three people in Brazil killed and ate at least three women as a ritual of their religious sect. The cannibals, who have confessed to the crime, say that a voice told them to kill evil women. It's unclear if the voice also told them to use the extra human meat to stuff empanadas, which they then sold to their unwitting neighbors. One of the murderers, Jorge Beltrao Negromonte da Silveira, wrote a book on his sect's activities, Revelations of a Schizophrenic. (That title makes him sound remarkably...
Tuesday, 10 April 2012
The arrest and extradition of cartel boss Diego Murillo created a power vacuum in the Colombian underworld.
Photograph: AFP/Getty ImagesA team of bodyguards fans out through the three-storey building in central Medellín, calling out "clear" after each room is checked. One gunman remains stationed on each floor; another three guard the building's entrance.With the area secured, a young man in a designer T-shirt and baseball cap emerges on to the roof terrace, followed by his lieutenant. Javier is a trafficker with Colombia's longest-surviving drug...
Saturday, 31 March 2012
Eight people from 'Holy Death' cult arrested in Mexico over ritual sacrifices of woman and two 10-year-old boys
Eight people have been arrested in northern Mexico have over the killing of two 10-year-old boys and a woman in what appears to be ritual sacrifices. Prosecutors in Sonora, in the north-west of the country have accused the suspects of belonging to the La Santa Muerte (Holy Death) cult. The victims' blood has been poured round an altar to the idol, which is portrayed as a skeleton holding a scythe and clothed in flowing robes. The cult, which celebrates death, has been growing rapidly in Mexico in the last 20 years, and now has up to two million...
Gang dispute sparked funeral home shooting that left 2 dead, 12 injured
Dispute among gang members at a North Miami-area funeral home sparked a mass shooting that injured 12 people and killed two men, according to Miami-Dade police and law enforcement. The gunmen, who fired a barrage of bullets at a crowd of mourners Friday night, remained on the loose. Investigators have not released information about the shooters, only that a white car may have been involved. One of the victims, a 43-year-old man, died outside the Funeraria Latina Emanuel funeral home, authorities said. The other, a 27-year-old man, died...
Sunday, 25 March 2012
Drugs gang’s banners declare truce for Pope’s visit to Mexico
Banners purportedly signed by one of Mexico’s drug cartels have promised there will be no violence during next weekend’s visit by Pope Benedict XVI. At least 11 banners signed by the Knights Templar gang were found in five towns across Guanajuato state, including the city of Leon, where the Pope begins his trip on Friday, the state attorney general’s office said. A spokesman said the banners were found over the weekend hanging from pedestrian bridges and carried messages about “a sort of truce for peace and said they are going to keep the peace...
Saturday, 24 March 2012
Pimps Arrested in Spain for 'Barcoding' Women
In this photo released by the Spanish Police on Saturday March 24, 2012 a tattoo in the form of a bar code is seen on the wrist of a woman in this hand out photo. Spain´s Interior Ministry says police have arrested 22 persons of Romanian nationality on suspicion of using violence to force women into prostitution and tattooing them with bar codes as a sign of ownership. Officers freed one 19-year-old woman who had been beaten, held against her will...
Friday, 23 March 2012
Mexican police found seven dismembered bodies hidden in barrels and a sack inside a burnt-out SUV in the central city of Metepec
Mexican police found seven dismembered bodies hidden in barrels and a sack inside a burnt-out SUV in the central city of Metepec, officials said.Mexico state Attorney General Alfredo Castillo Cervantes confirmed the grisly discovery Wednesday morning, although he said authorities have not identified the victims and did not provide more information.He also did not confirm press reports that a message left alongside the bodies indicated they were members of a police force in that state.“They haven’t been examined yet; we don’t have anyone unaccounted...
Which cartel will prevail? The Sinaloa cartel and the upstart Los Zetas are locked in a vicious fight to be the top dog.
I discussed this with a good friend of mine, Mexican journalist Jose Carreño, over dinner the other day in Mexico City. He said: “The most remarkable thing about Los Zetas is how quickly they have grown and expanded since they broke with the Gulf Cartel and they have done so by sheer barbaric violence but what allowed them to expand so quickly is what will result in their downfall. The Sinaloa Federation is confrontational too but it is willing to form alliances and to compromise and to deal. Los Zetas isn’t and no one can afford...
Saturday, 22 January 2011
Mexican police rape allegations need outside investigation
Mexican police rape allegations need outside investigation: "allegations made by an Ontario woman that she was raped by Mexican police are so serious, and the details so disturbing, that Mexican authorities should bring in a credible third party to assist in the investigation.
It is in their own best interests to do so. In an area that relies exclusively on tourism, they have little choice. The confidence of the travelling public is at stake.
Rebecca Rutland, 41, says police in the Mexican resort town of Playa del Carmen took her and her fiance...
Flavio Mendez Santiago, known as 'El Amarillo', was arrested on Monday
Flavio Mendez Santiago, known as 'El Amarillo', was arrested on Monday near Oxaca City in the south of the country.
The 35 year-old is said by police to have been one of the founders of Los Zetas, and was responsible for co-ordinating the trafficking of drugs and migrants throught the south.
Thousands of migrants from Central America hoping to travel through Mexico to to the US border are believed to fall victim to criminal organisations like Los...
Saturday, 20 November 2010
Heavy fighting in and around Cd. Mier – Mexican military – It’s payback time
Heavy fighting in and around Cd. Mier – Mexican military – It’s payback time: "Heavy fighting between drug cartel gunmen and the Mexican military broke out in the Tamaulipas towns of Nuevo Guerrero and Miguel Aleman this week, prompting the two international bridges linking both towns to Starr County,Texas to go on high alert to guard against spillover violence crossing into Texas.Two international crossings in Starr County, the Falcon Dam crossing...
Mexican army kills 11 in drug clash
PressTV - Mexican army kills 11 in drug clash: "Mexican troops have clashed with gunmen believed to belong to the 'Los Zetas' drug cartel, killing 11 of them, according to the Defense Ministry. The ministry said the clashes took place in the state of Tamaulipas, near Nueva Ciudad Guerrero, a city that faces the US state of Texas across the Rio Grande, when a patrol responding to reports of armed men came to blows with them, AFP reported on Friday....
