At least 11 people were killed in a shootout between criminal groups in Nayarit on Thursday, state authorities said.
The violence occurred in the municipality of Huajicori, located on Nayarit’s border with Sinaloa and Durango, and was reportedly between members of the Sinaloa Cartel and the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG).
The Nayarit Security Ministry said in a statement that 11 bodies were found in an area known as “Las Antenas” after “a confrontation between criminal groups” allegedly occurred.
It didn’t say which criminal group, or groups, the victims belonged to.
The newspaper Milenio reported that the discovery of the 11 bullet-ridden bodies was made around 9 a.m. on Thursday while security forces were carrying out patrols in the Sierra de Nayarit, a mountainous area in the northern part of the Pacific coast state.
Authorities also found spent bullet casings and high-caliber weapons.
The Nayarit Security Ministry said that state police, soldiers, National Guard personnel and state investigative agents have “intensified” joint operations in the area to protect the safety of residents.
Milenio reported that the Sierra de Nayarit is known as a “point of conflict between criminal groups.”
Nayarit is located between Sinaloa, the base of the Sinaloa Cartel, and Jalisco, the home of the CJNG. Those criminal organizations are Mexico’s two most powerful and are major exporters of narcotics to the United States.
The newspaper El Financiero reported that there have been frequent confrontations between the Sinaloa Cartel and the CJNG in Huajicori in recent months. Some families have relocated to other parts of the state, El Financiero said, adding that the violence has also affected the local economy and forced schools to close.
Violence related to turf wars between the Sinaloa Cartel and the CJNG has also displaced people in other parts of Mexico, including in the border region of the southern state of Chiapas.
Members of the Sinaloa Cartel are not just fighting operatives of other criminal organizations, but also each other.
A long-running battle between the “Los Mayos” and “Los Chapitos” factions of the Sinaloa Cartel has intensified in Sinaloa in recent weeks after cartel leader Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada was arrested in the United States.
Zambada, a co-founder of the Sinaloa Cartel along with convicted drug lord Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera, alleges that he was kidnapped by Joaquín Guzmán López, one of El Chapo’s sons, and forced onto a private plane that delivered him into the hands of U.S. law enforcement authorities.
With reports from Milenio and El Financiero
High caliber weapon is a term with no meaning. It would be more informative if you indicated something about the weapons found.
Yes, or just omit that adjectival phrase: “They also found guns and spent casings on site.”
[For anyone reading not familiar, the M-16/AR-15 essentially shoots a .22 caliber round, for example. Caliber in-and-of-itself has no relevance to anything in a news story.]
Or omit that entirely. It stands to reason that there were shell casings there or at any shooting, that’s not noteworthy. Would that normally be mentioned in any other mass/massive shooting? It would be interesting if there WEREN’T shell casings.
I wouldn’t normally comment on an article about deaths about something so banal, but if it’s gang members killing each other…meh.
The presence of the shell casings indicates that the shootout took place where the bodies were found.
It is not uncommon in Mexico for murders to be committed in one location and bodies to be dumped in another.
Peter Davies
Why, WTF difference does it make other than to an anal retentive?
Where is the Federal government? How can the government stand by and let the cartels terrorize families living in their territory. .I recently read that the cartels control 1/3 of Mexico. Where is the outrage on the part of Mexican legislators? How can anyone honestly believe that Mexico can become a top tier nation without neutralizing the cartels. Ignoring them as AMLO has been doing for 6 years is a self defeating strategy. The problem will only grow worse.
I see you commenting this repeatedly. I would ask if you just got here but even if you’d never set foot in Mexico, have you never seen a movie or a show about drugs or crime in Latin America?
The cartels control the cops and they have massive influence over ALL federal law enforcement, as well as the military. Briefly they didn’t control the National Guard. Why? Because the National Guard was just being used for disaster relief, etc. But the instant that they became used to fight crime was the instant they became infiltrated (and threatened) by the cartels.
MORENA is in bed with the cartels, that’s a proven fact (vis a vis election donations). AMLO told the cartels he would end the drug war (hugs not bullets) and so they helped get him elected and agreed not to kill his candidates.
“Where is the outrage on the part of Mexican legislators? ” How naive can you be? Literally. That’s not a rhetorical question.
Do you think the cartel assassination of political candidates is the end of it? They threaten the ones who win and their family at all stages of their career.
Years ago the Supreme Court told the Congress that marijuana laws were unconstitutional and that they were required to legalize it. But they never did. Why not? It sounds simple enough and a majority of the population agree with it. Because the cartels want to control marijuana. No legislator wants to get them and their family killed over a marijuana vote.
“Ignoring them as AMLO has been doing for 6 years is a self defeating strategy. The problem will only grow worse.”
He didn’t create the problem he’s just a symptom of the problem. He’s an example of it. You can’t run for office in this country without the approval of the cartels.
You’re correct in that he is making it worse. And now we have another 6 years to look forward to of hands-off the cartels governance. Now that the judges can be put into office by rigged elections, the judiciary will be compromised within a generation. Even more compromised.
If you live in Mexico you already live in a cartel state. The real question is how long until it’s a failed state? AMLO wants to ensure that the next executive can set herself up as a dictator by controlling the judiciary (the only branch that fights AMLO) and he has tried to ensure that the National Guard come under his personal control (rather than the governors’). Why would he do that? He already has the Army and Navy and Marines and Air Force and Coast Guard?
The one branch that he doesn’t control. Why would that bother him?
Let’s think about that for a minute.
Have you ever stopped to think why cartels exist? It’s mainly to serve drug-addicted Americans. Also, I’d say there’s a good chance that the firearms used in this act of terror came from the United States. The US is hugely complicit in this travesty. America needs to start cleaning up its own messes.
It and often when it is not drugs it is something else to be controlled and profited from. Drugs are simply the most profitable commodity of the time. If all the drug using customers went away, the cartel’s would adjust their focus to another market. They are not in business to create business, they are in the business to stay in business, regardless of what it takes.
The cartels own the avocado industry, and I’m sure others. It’s not just drugs, though that’s a big, big part of it. As consumers, let’s just look the other way.