It Could Happen Here - Who’s Burning Busses in Baja California?

Episode Date: August 22, 2022

James and Shereen are joined by Vicente Calderón @tijuanapress to discuss the narcobloqueos in Baja California and across Mexico and the broader context of the recent violence.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You should probably keep your lights on for Nocturnal Tales from the Shadowbride. Join me, Danny Trejo, and step into the flames of fright. An anthology podcast of modern-day horror stories inspired by the most terrifying legends and lore of Latin America. Listen to Nocturnal on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hello and welcome to It Could Happen Here, a podcast about how the world is falling apart and sometimes about how people are putting it back together. What it is today, it's me. I'm James, if you haven't worked that out yet,

and I'm joined by Shireen. Say hi, Shireen. Hi, this is Shireen. Thank you. And I'm joined today by Vicente Calderon. He's a freelance journalist and the proprietor publisher of TijuanaPress.com and he's covered the situation on the ground in tijuana for a very long time it's an excellent work and vicente what should people know about you nice to have you here thank you for the invitation and in advance i have to apologize for my english because this is a mixture of sesame street and the Tijuana streets. That's excellent. Take a picture in the world kind of English. I'm originally a psychologist.

I graduated from the School of Psychology here, but I only worked for a couple of years. And then I got stuck with journalism. And I have been here for more than 30 years by now. I've been doing journalism from radio, and then I moved to television, and then I went to the U.S. to work with Spanish language media twice in L.A., and then I came back,

and now I'm doing online or digital medium journalism, so to speak. So I'm a native here and again, I was just supposed to be working in this for a while until I got old enough to look like a psychologist. I just got caught on the addiction for journalism. Yeah, I understand. Yeah, yeah. addiction for journalism. Yeah, I understand. Yeah, yeah. That's fascinating. All right.

So the reason we're talking to you today is that we have seen a dramatic increase in violence in Tijuana since Friday, right? We're recording this on the Tuesday the 16th of August. So if people are listening to it later, they'll know. But can you explain a little bit of what happened over the weekend in Tijuana and then across Mexico as well? Well, the thing began on Friday here in Mexicali, and Tijuana, Mexicali is the capital of the state of Baja California, which is in the northwestern side of the U.S.-Mexico border.

So we began seeing people burning cars on the road they were just ordering people from public transportation to get off the vehicle not in a very so to speak threatening matter kind of way because they said well the problem is not with you but you have to get off because otherwise because when are we going to burn this bus. And nobody was really hurt intentionally. Just in Tijuana, we have about 15 cases like that. It was mainly public transportation vehicles or, in some cases, cargo trucks or private vehicles.

But most of it were public transportation vehicles. We're working and we're moving people from their homes to their works or to run one errand on the other side. limited space of time happening not only in Tijuana and in Mexicali, but also in five out of seven cities of Baja California. Nobody was claiming responsibility, but it looks like it was a coordinated effort in basically the main cities of the state. We were very surprised because even though we have been dealing with drug violence for many decades by now, we never seen something who looks like the narco blockades or blockades of the streets with drug traffickers, which are unfortunately very common in other cities

like Monterrey, for example, recently in Jalisco on the Pacific coast, very in the central part of Mexico, but not here in Tijuana. I mean, I know it sounds rare or strange for many people who know Tijuana for his bad reputation, but no, we never had cases like this before. That's why it was so surprising. At the end, that was on Friday, and then immediately the local authorities began to display not only police from different agencies, but also soldiers who were coincidentally, so to speak,

were here in big numbers, in large numbers, because there's a really big push to put out more soldiers to help with public safety in Mexico. Not everybody's pleased with that because they say that Mexico is becoming a militarized country, and it shouldn't be because we are trying to be a democracy, and in a democracy is not the military or the army in charge of so much responsibility but that's something that has been changing specifically with this new federal administration with the president andres manuel lopez so they sent out all of the soldiers and police officers and things basically diminished but by But by that time, in about less than two hours, people were already really scared.

Obviously, the news spread on social media, and people began worrying. Also, they began seeing that public transportation was not not enough because many were just into a halt. I mean, not just the public transportation, the officials of the city, but all the digital platforms like Uber, Didi, or other services were just worried that it might be the next one. So if I stay on the roads, am I going to be the target of these guys? We were not sure what was going on. I guess everyone has an idea that this was coming or linked to drug trafficking, but we were not sure at that time. So in a couple of hours, we didn't see more of these cases, but at that time, the city was really disrupted. So they began closing. I mean, the first thing that affected was public transportation.

So people were stranded with no ways to go back home. And some schools were canceled in classes. And since the students were not able to find transportation, some offered places to stay or spend the night on the schools. Also, that happened with other companies, with the maquiladora plants, the manufacturing plants that are very popular. There's thousands of people here in Tijuana who work there, also in Mexicali. But here also, they, in some cases cases have to open spaces so they can spend the night there and we went out and was a lot of people stranded with no place with no way to move

from where they were when this began yeah I saw even like Cali Max that the supermarket was closed right like they be close early and they announced that the next day they will hold their operation, that they will not open, so they will not put in jeopardy to the safety of their workers. I mean, during Friday, we didn't know really what was going on, how severe was this happening. And just keep in mind that on Friday, Friday was the end of a week of very violent scenes in different cities. It began in Guadalajara, where the army

was trying to capture a couple of drug lords or chief of sales from the Jalisco Nueva Generacion Cartel or the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, which is the quote-unquote newest and strongest and most rapidly expanding drug organization in Mexico. And the problem is there, the dynamic was very, very different. Again, in Tijuana, even after the weekend, nobody was killed. Just one person in Mexicali got injured due to burns while they were burning his truck, but apparently nothing major. So in the case of Guadalajara, it was completely different.

They were at gunpoint pulling people, families out of their private vehicles and also buses. And then there they were really actually blockading roads in an effort to disrupt the operation from the soldiers trying to capture their buses. And so the violence were way more strong, so to speak, there. And after that, it moved to Guanajuato, another state where there's high presence of Cartel Jalisco new generation. And two days later, we saw the worst case in Ciudad Juarez, across from El Paso, Texas. in Ciudad Juarez, across from El Paso, Texas. Ciudad Juarez is also another border town, or border city, I should say,

that has been dealing with a lot of drug trafficking. And the things were terribly worse there. I mean, they were there killing civilians randomly. They got to convenience stores. Like, think about your 7-Eleven. The counterpart is also a very big chain. In one of these cases, they just went in, opened fire to the cashier, and they killed him.

In other cases, a pregnant woman got killed. And another one, since they burned these places, there's two persons who died due to asphyxiation because they got caught up. They were not able to flee the place when these guys were showing up there. Many of these guys were also yelling or screaming, also yelling or screaming, hooray for the Jalisco Nueva Generación boss, who is called Oseguera. I can't remember his name.

Mencho, Mencho Oseguera. Mencho is his nickname. Mencho Oseguera is the leader of Cartel Jalisco New Generation. And they were just praising him and just saying that they were people from Mencho and they were just praising him and just saying that they were people from Mencho and they were just celebrating him as they were doing all this destruction and terrorizing people. So the worst part was in Ciudad Juarez, sadly. I'm not saying that this was not bad, but just we have to put it in perspective. And fortunately here, sadly for the people of Ciudad Juarez, fortunately for the people here, nobody was

injuring those activities on Friday. That diminished on Saturday, but we got more cases on Sunday night in Mexicali. And we actually have about four cases on the last hours of Monday in Ensenada. We are still seeing if all of these have been related to the same effort due to organized crime or are just copycats, because unfortunately, that also is happening. Some of the cases in Mexicali that happened on sunday night uh were according to the chief of police there just copycats were just taking advantage of the situation i see well that's that's interesting because until someone takes responsibility even if they do all the talks about like what cartels are what that's just like in theory right because there you don't

know who's doing what am i understanding correctly well yes because it's it's not like when a terrorist organization claimed responsibility for a bombing on in the middle east for example but here the the thing is now the authorities are saying that is what was not just one but different organizations they blame it mainly on Jalisco New Generation because it's one of the, along with the Sinaloa cartel, more broadly extended in different states. And in this particular case,

they can link it in the case of Jalisco and Guanajuato because they got information of these two bosses getting into a meeting, and that's why they reacted. And in the case of ciudad juarez was different because everything began there with a dispute within inmates of the local jail where there are clearly two factions from the the two main organizations who have been controlling turf in in the in Juarez. Here we were not sure because, unfortunately,

we have not just one or two, we have three drug cartels or trafficking organizations who have been acting or delinquent for several years right now, which is the Jalisco New Generation, the one we talk about, which is the relatively newest organization. The Sinaloa cartel, who has been from the cradle of drug traffic in Mexico, the state of Sinaloa, expanding the routes that I'm sure they know. El Chapo from the Narco series, very popular now, has been the public enemy number one,

according to Chicago, for about eight years ago, and now in a jail in New York. But their sons and their associates are still operating their trafficking organization along different routes in Mexico, and Baja California is one of those routes where they have a strong presence. And also the Arellano Felix Drug Organization, the so-called Tijuana cartel that is very popular, has its own series on Netflix as part of Narcos Mexico. This is the relevance of these kids who grow up as criminals at the border between Tijuana and San Diego. So nobody has claimed responsibility as in other cases,

but I think it's safe to know that these are the main suspects. In the case of Tijuana, it's also the possibility that the feud between these three organizations was an excuse for this level of violence. I mean, everybody's trying to be the strongest force. So they challenged themselves, not only in the streets, but on social media. And this was also a way to challenge the authorities, because even though the authorities reacted quickly,

kind of to do more or frustrated more events they were able to burn 15 cars at the end of the week and were 36 in different areas in different cities so that is not something that you can say another authority is the military uh chief of the country saying, well, in Tijuana, they attempted against the civilians. Well, they did. They didn't kill them, but they burned their property and they disrupted the whole operation. So we are also seeing very carefully the way the local and national authorities are reacting because we were lucky now. the local and national authorities are reacting because we were lucky now, but this is probably will happen again.

If there's not a really strong response from an intelligent response from the authorities. Yeah. Okay. I'm sorry. If I'm sorry, if this is silly, but is there any deeper meeting to it being specifically public transportation? Like it just seems so specific to like target how civilians are like transporting themselves. Is it just like a show of power to be like, we're going to make everyone freeze? Or is there any deeper meaning to like what they're targeting?

Not that I understand so far. I mean, for me right now is because as they did, they were successful in bringing the city to a halt. I mean, we went out and just think this was a Friday summer night in Avenida Revolucion, who has seen a renaissance for the last 10 years. There's a lot of people coming from the U.S. side and from Mexico to enjoy the gastronomy local, the bars, the party scene was dead. The only people we found there Friday night was workers that were not able to find an Uber or the Uber was, I talked to some of the Uber drivers, the DD drivers told me it Some of the Uber drivers, the DD drivers told me it went from one to seven.

I mean, something will cost you $10. The price was now $70 due to the high demand and poor offer. So, no, I don't find another explanation so far with the information that we have until now um that could explain but they did reach a big impact with these relatively easy actions uh after the all these coordinated attacks yeah it's probably worth mentioning the context of in one of Guzman's kids was arrested in I believe 2018 I'm not good at dates but around then and there was a huge huge increase in violence immediately following that right and eventually AMLO uh the president gave the order to release him and oh that was yeah that was more recent was Ovidio one of the main sons in in something that we call the Culiacanazo Culiacan is the name of the city is the capital

of the state of Sinaloa as we said I have family my mother is from Sinaloa and some people from Sinaloa get offended when we say that it's a cradle of drug trafficking in Mexico because most of the power the law the drug drug lords come from Sinaloa. But yeah, you're right. And that's something that has become a big recurring topic when people criticize, especially the political opposition, criticize the current president because they say this is the origin of these kind of demonstrations.

So when the government wants to act, now the criminals know that an effort, a coordinated effort to get out on the streets and to show their muscle could make the government to think twice, to hold their operation and to free, in some cases, these guys. Again, in the case of Jalisco, they were on the way, according to the official statement from the Mexican army, to try to capture these two leaders, but it didn't happen. The criminals get organized to blockade the actions of the authorities. In the case of Tijuana, criminals get organized to blockade the actions of the authorities. In the case of Tijuana, we didn't get to that point. There's also one theory that says that the local chapter, so to speak, of the Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generación,

was just trying to replicate what happened there just to show the force, to demonstrate the muscle as a criminal organization here in Tijuana. Yeah. That's basically the two theories. Right. A dispute between them

and the other one is that they were just replicating a little bit in a different dimension, so to speak,

what happened in Mexicali just to tell them, you do the same here, this is what you're going to be facing. And that was a message for the authorities. Yeah, I saw a resident compare it to what it was like

in the early stages of COVID, like how ghost town it was. And I mean, when you think about it, that's pretty powerful if a cartel can have the impact of a pandemic, if not more so. It's terrifying. I can't imagine. I think it was worse when we went out when COVID first began in the lockdown. And this will be too silly,

but there's the red light districts that never sleeps here. We went to that particular corridor. Nobody was in the main drag there. But it's a reality. We went out and we got video of these streets basically empty. Yeah, your video on your Twitter, we'll find a way to link to it, was incredible.

It was just like, it's normally like the strip in Las Vegas or something, and it was just a ghost town. A ghost town, yeah. Again, the only people we found there was people looking for transportation. Yeah, it's crazy. So there's been a massive, at least show of state power in Tijuana in the last, I don't know, four, five, six months, like they're constantly rotating new troops in they do the parades with the big flag uh and it's like to to looking from the outside from a less informed perspective it looks like there are these various actors right and each of them sort of flexes their muscles in a different way um and is that relevant here has the the army, they discovered a tunnel, if I remember correctly.

Have they done much else in Baja since they started these big deployments? No, that's one of the main complaints of the local organizations, civilian organizations here. Because even though we have, I'm going to make some notes, and we have 5,660 soldiers right now in the state of Baja California, most of them in Tijuana, who have been deployed since August last year, which is when the National Strategy of Peace, as the government called it, began. But unfortunately, I can give you another statistics. We have only just in Tijuana, in the municipality of Tijuana, so far this year, almost 1,200 homicides. I mean, we as a city, as a municipality, we have way more homicides than many Mexican states. This is the level of violence that we are dealing with in a daily basis. And this is when

you hear the authorities talking about a reduction on homicides, which is probably true in terms of the numbers of statistics. But still, we are a little bit past half the year. We already passed 1,000 homicides. When people get alarmed in Chicago, it's when you are hitting, I remember a couple of years ago, like 500 and the whole year. We have this in three months. This is the kind of problems that we're dealing with. You have to also keep in mind, last week, the DOJ of the US, the FBI, the DEA, Customs and Border Protection, have a gathering to announce that San Diego became the epicenter for smuggling of fentanyl.

60% of the seizures of fentanyl in all the nation occur between San Isidro, the main port of entry here in San Diego, to Calexico. There are six ports of entry in this stretch of land on the end of the border, on the western end of the border. Well, these places is where more than half

of the fentanyl that is being smuggled to the U.S. is going through. That will explain partly the level of violence that we've been dealing and how, even though there's good efforts by the local authorities, state and local authorities, I mean even given that there's cases of corruption as in any other agency, I always say that we have great, very capable detectives and police officers in Mexico, but in many cases, there's no political will from their bosses to really act on the benefit in the public. So this is the kind of problem that we're dealing with.

You know, fentanyl is now the most lucrative drug to transport or traffic between Mexico and the U.S., even with all the problems that is causing in the U.S. with more than 120,000 people dying in the last year or overdoses linked to opioids. But also now we have a problem that is growing with people dying with fentanyl overdose. Besides the methamphetamine problem that also has been increasing the traffic here. And now we are seeing the comeback of some drugs trafficking and new levels like heroin and cocaine, who came out of fashion for a while, but now is doing a kind of a resurgence, at least in this corridor. doing like kind of a resurgence at least in this corridor yeah that's fascinating like there's been an increase specifically coming through that that baja california area maybe then we should explain a little bit about these three actors right the uh cjng we'll call them the

cartel the sinaloa and the areano felix orijuana cartel. Can you explain a little bit about who they are and where they sort of fit into this, where they come from, maybe? Well, I basically all come from the people watching Netflix, Narcos and Netflix. They talk about this federation of cartels. Again, everything, the main power was from the state of Sinaloa. the main power was from the state of Sinaloa. And between mid-90s, 1994, mid-90s, when the arrest of Felix Gallardo,

they redistributed the routes, and one was the one of the Pacific, along the Pacific, from Sinaloa to along the Pacific. And they basically cut the country into different domain routes, and then you have different organizations. Those organizations who used to be together became a powerful house on their own, and that has increased the violence from the 90s

because now you have, from the beginning, the Arellano Felix, who used to be partners with El Chapo, ended up in disputes among them. So the main one and oldest is the Sinaloa cartel, led by El Chapo Guzman and now Ismael El Mayo Zambada, which is still a gentleman around probably getting to his 80s. I'm not quite sure, but who has been on the run for many years, but relatively calm and with big investments

and with the high presence here in Baja California, with that faction of the Sinaloa Cartel. And the Sinaloa Cartel also, when the, after the arrest of El Chapo is it's run and the other big faction for the sons of El Chapo Guzman, Ovidio and, and Los Chap, they call it Los Chapitos. Little chapos. Yeah. The little chapos.

Cause there's like three, three, Ivana Archivaldo and I can remember the name of the other one. So that's the Sinaloa cartel with wheat presence, but mainly in the northern part. And really, mainly, basically, their thing is to manufacturing methamphetamine and now fentanyl and send it to the U.S. Then the Arellano Felix Drug Organization,

who became, as a result of that division, that distribution, according to the most commonly known narrative about drug world, Felix Arellano distributed after his arrest, established themselves in Tijuana. They are from Sinaloa too, but they established themselves from Tijuana actually in the 80s, but in the 90s, they became powerful on its own.

And due to the proximity of San Diego and to the fact that they mix with many of the border lifestyle elite of Tijuana, they changed the image of the drug trafficker. They became more entrepreneurs and they wanted to become the main, the first Mexican cartel, Colombian Pablo Escobar style, according to the narrative, no?

And they did. They became, in the 90s, they were one of the most powerful drug organization in the world for the amount of not just marijuana, but cocaine that they were moving. I mean, they established relationships with Colombia. And after a while, Colombians were not trafficking in Mexico. They were just sending the drug to the Mexicans. At the beginning, Colombians were kind of leasing the routes in the Mexican territory to send the drugs into the U.S. But then when this division of newcomers and the drug trade in Mexico, they decided, and I think the Arellano Felix have something to do with that,

they want to go and get the drugs from Colombians in South America and bring in and just take care of the whole thing. So it becomes their own cartel. And then Jalisco Nueva Generación is another offshoot, is what you call it? Like a spin-off, kind of, would be another way of the Sinaloa Cartel because they used to have a presence in Guadalajara and the different factions were killing each other, changing loyalties, and they became a force on their own after a big division between the Beltran Leyva group

and the Ignacio Coronel organization, and they become their own cartel on its own. That's where according to the DEA and also Mexican authorities, it's expanding more rapidly in a very short period of time. Then unfortunately, they have been moving not only to drug trafficking, but there are many small groups that now are making their money and the old way of the mafia, the Cosa Nostra was doing their money in New York in the seventies or before,

not that they were just extorting money out of local businesses from a well-established chain of stores to a little tag of stand on the corner. There's also the trafficking of gasoline in Mexico and has been doubling. I mean, anything that they, once they get powerful, they began to move to other activities. For example, in the case of the Arellano Ferrys, heat tapping wasn't a thing, let's say, before the 90s in Baja California.

They were kidnapping people who used to be their associates. It's the, where's my money kind of thing, no? Like, you think about good fellows and they were killing each other, but it's everything among themselves. But later they began that they were acting with other. There is everything among themselves. But later they began that they were acting with a lot of impunity. They had a lot of cops and authorities on their payroll, so they began to move to other ways to earn money. And that's what we are seeing now. That this expanding, this little... In Colombia they used to call it baby cartels.

We now have like new chapters, smaller organization, not as powerful, but as violent as the original. Welcome, I'm Danny Trejo. Won't you join me at the fire and dare enter Nocturno, Tales from the Shadows, presented by iHeart and Sonorum. An anthology of modern day horror stories inspired by the legends of Latin America. From ghastly encounters with shapeshifters...

to bone-chilling brushes with supernatural creatures. I know you. Take a trip and experience the horrors that have haunted Latin America since the beginning of time. Listen to Nocturnal tales from the shadows as part of my cultura podcast network available on the iheart radio app apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast i wanted to ask because i saw a lot of these like supposedly like they come up on TikTok or Facebook, right? These little announcements from the different cartels. And they tend to say, at least in the context of Baja California, that like we don't want to disrupt ordinary people or good people, good citizens of Baja California, you know, but we need you to stay in your homes this weekend.

Right. Things like that but it obviously does have an impact on the people who are just sort of doing whatever they do just running their business um so i was wondering sort of how people get through these difficult times in t1 and baja california well times have become more difficult because many people believe this because the widespread possibility of disseminating these messages no and you never know which ones are real yes and which ones are not um i mean you guys have the same with the gangs remember like don't blink your your headlights because then the gang will start killing people left and right. So just take that on steroids now with social media and now everybody with a phone that can get those messages. That played a big role in what happened on Friday here in Tijuana. They were recycling a video of

three guys videotaping themselves in front of the attorney general's office in Tijuana says, oh, Mencho is here. We're going to kill everybody and just being very loud and with a lot of insults and trying to scare everybody, the rivals, but everybody else. So during the hours of Friday, somebody began retweeting that when it was at least a year old of them claiming that they were already here. So some people think,

well, all this commotion happening, all these cars burning, they didn't know exactly what was going on. Some people began to call it narco-bloqueos that just scare more people. And then you see this. So the level of anxiety increased significantly. You have to be very careful. And there's also, you have to also keep in mind the political feuds that we are seeing. What you are seeing between some people loyal to Trump and the Republican Party and some people that are against Trump is the

same here with morena and non-morena actors or people who like the morena which is the political party funded created by the current president andres manuel lopez obrador or the ones who are against them and are very unhappy or angry with all these social policies. And for example, we have here a television station run on by the former governor of Baja California, who is a very close friend of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, the current president, who became a very powerful figure. And due to his proximity withpez Obrador. Basically, the current president revived this gentleman, which, by the way, lives in San Diego, in Chula Vista, in a big mansion, because he exiled himself from about 30 years ago when he was associated with the last PRI government,

the pre-political party to run Mexico for the last 70 years in a row. He was a very close associate with Xicotenca de Leyva and Mortera, which was the current governor who didn't finish his term because the then president of Mexico, Carlos Salinas, accused him of corruption. So he just removed him. And this guy, Jaime Bonilla, became a pariah. So the PIN, the new power, basically marked him because also he had some previous suspicious relationships

through the baseball team here in Tijuana and from other endeavors that makes them look very close to the Arellano Felix Drug Organization. The Arellano Felix Drug Organization has been linked for many years with the last administration because they claim that that last PR administration is the one who basically opened the door for the Arellano Felix to establish here in Baja California. So this is what we are seeing, that this message is, well, now this guy who just left the office, Jaime Bonilla, just finished his governorship on December last year.

So there's a new governor. But he also owns a television station. So he, who is always criticizing the current governor, which is by the way the same political party, was using some of these messages with no proof or no validity or very suspicious. And he was saying in their newscasts, were saying, well, there's also this happening, there's this threat, and they know that this government is corrupt. And they were just adding to the fire.

I mean, as an analogy, not to the real fire, but to the concern of the people. Right. And it's like saying that, oh, we're going to start a lockdown and we'll be toque de queda what's the

word for toque the expression for toque de queda like the you cannot go out go out the street the martial law

martial law martial law will start at 6 if we see you on the streets we're going to kill you that was a message that

that television station was repeating once and again every day. So, I was just adding to it. So, all these new novelties, so to speak, with the digital era are also creating bigger fires in the political spectrum and in a place where you never know what exactly the line is between the criminals and the government. Yeah yeah i think that's

a very good uh thing to highlight actually this idea that there's like distinct blocks right like and then this applies in i don't want to say like this is a mexican thing because it's not this is a global thing but like that there's a distinct block between like crime and media that you consume and the government and the people that are working for the state. The idea that these are very separate and they're walled off doesn't apply here and I don't think we should see it elsewhere either. Yeah, it's a problem that is becoming worse and worse

because these factions now have this other arena. I mean, we are seeing it here also with the official statements from the authorities. I mean, I was telling you earlier that the military had, the secretary of the military says, well, in Tijuana, they didn't win against the civilians. And the governor also repeated that.

So, well, here, fortunately, they didn't affect the life of the people. Of course they did. I mean, we were lucky they didn't kill anybody, but no, they did. So, you have to also be fighting that propaganda from the government against the propaganda from the criminal groups and the different political legal factions in other, quote-unquote, non-state actors, just to put it in a different context so it's becoming very difficult no and yeah i always say excuse me if i repeat this but honestly believe i mean there's always great investigators detectives in mexico willing to put put their

lives on the line for the good of people but but it's not always in the best conditions. And this is like just the character of Traffic. Probably you guys were very young when Traffic came across, I mean, a very popular movie. She's about from the 90s, end of the 90s probably. Yeah. One of the three main characters is an honest Mexican cop.

Fortunately, I met several cases like that. But some of them have been healed due to their honesty, but also others that learned to survive and play along and try to do as much good as they can within the circumstances they are dealing with. Yeah, I think talking of good investigators who are trying to deal with difficult circumstances, maybe you should touch on the violence against the press that we've seen

in Baja California and in Mexico as a whole. Is that something you're comfortable talking about? Yes, unfortunately, and this is terribly sad, a couple of hours ago we just learned that one of the reporters who was reported missing in the neighbors in the state of Sonora was being found dead. So we have another killing of a reporter. We also saw the case of Ciudad Juarez. They killed four employees or four workers of a radio station. Yeah, that was terrible. A broadcaster.

Yeah. Apparently randomly. Apparently randomly. Okay. But I mean, depending on which toll you look to, because there's like the from the federal government, from the CPJ, the Committee to Protect Journalists, or Reporteros Sin Fronteras, other organizations, there's about 10 or 15, I would say 10 or 14 or 15 journalists or media workers killed so far this year. We have two of those killings happening here in Tijuana in January. One of them, I'm convinced by now that he was killed for the leader of a drug trafficking cell was operating in the east side of the city who wasn't pleased with some of the stories

that one of the media outlets, his name is Margarito Martinez. One of the media outlets that Margarito was working to as a freelancer was publishing very revealing stories about the operation of this drug trafficker. So he ordered and paid for some other people to kill Margarito because he, in my humble opinion, was the weakest link because he was living in the same neighborhood that these guys were operating,

working the night shift that is very common, that only a few of them are left to do that shift, that beat. He was easily identifiable for the crooks because Margarito will show up at the crime scenes. And in many of these cases, you have people who work for the same organization showing up to make sure that the guy was really killed and who showed up and and i mean even when the killing is done the criminals are still working the scene and in some cases we met with these guys guys without knowing i mean these guys were were um even willing to go to the funeral of Margarito.

The only reason they were not there is because when they approached, they saw a lot of military presence during the funeral. So I'm convinced that Margarito was killed due to his work as a photographer. In the other case of my friend, old co-worker Lourdes Sandoval, I'm not sure what was the motive. In both cases are three people in jail, but the procedure is still on the beginning stages. We are not proven. And the main thing is we don't know who ordered and paid for their killings. We don't know who ordered and paid for their killings. Well, we know, or I think I have a big suspicion about which one is the guy who killed them in the case of Margarito,

not in the case of Lourdes and the authorities. I'm not confident enough that they're going to be able to solve the crime in this particular case. There's two cases in Michoacán. There's other cases in Tamaulipas. I guess by now we have to count at least two or three in Sonora with the sad news that we got today. So it's difficult. I mean, not everybody is risking their life when they're doing journalism in Mexico.

But you never know when the danger will jump against you. I always tell this story about a photographer who was called to cover a traffic accident. Minor thing, no, not a problem. Well, the problem is that the guy who was involved in the traffic and in the accident was a drug lord, a very well-known operator, very dangerous operator.

And he kept taking pictures. Thanks to some of the officers, firefighters, and ladies who saw that he was being treated not very nicely and the ladies that intervened, he was able to get away. He had to leave town for a while. That's it. But that's the kind of environment that we are dealing with. It's not that every story

puts you in danger, but you never... I mean, you can do a lot of... You can be a reporter and not be in danger. You don't get into subjects that are tricky. You don't dig up too much

in political corruption and you don't dig up too much in political corruption and you don't dig up too much on drug trafficking, on killing and homicides, you're pretty much going to be able to do fine. But the problem is, sometimes if you are doing

a story non-related, there may be some link to put you in danger. And that's the situation. And unfortunately, the level of impunity on crimes against journalists is even worse than the level of impunity of general civilians in Mexico. I will say that generally it's about 90%, 98% for case of journalists, 90% on civilians.

So our case is worse. The possibility of somebody will be punished for killing you, it's very, very, very bad. Yeah, I'm sorry. That's terrible. Welcome. I'm Danny Trejo. Won't you join me at the fire and dare enter? Nocturnum, Tales from the Shadows, presented by iHeart and Sonora. An anthology of modern-day horror stories inspired by the legends of Latin America.

From ghastly encounters with shapeshifters to bone-chilling brushes with supernatural creatures. I know you. Take a trip and experience the horrors that have haunted Latin America since the beginning of time. Listen to Nocturnal Tales from the Shadows in Latin America since the beginning of time. Listen to Nocturnal Tales from the Shadows as part of my Cultura podcast network, available on the iHeartRadio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I don't know. Again, like you said, it's not just a Mexican problem. You see it in so many governments across the world where press are targeted specifically. But yeah, I appreciate your work even more, knowing that the percentage of cases or just violence against you as a journalist is so high it's very sad and it's very disencouraging but uh i always i mean i mean my

i have a family who is not happy because i'm still working on friday they call me they want they want me to stay at the office they don't want me to stay at the office. They don't want me to get out. And I understand. I understand perfectly. It's one of my main concerns. But also, on the other hand, this is important information. Even when we are dealing with an avalanche of information that is not necessarily well treated, we need to have good information so people will make good decisions. We are in a very small, young democracy. We just began to make inroads on electoral democracy. It's relatively recent. It began basically at the end of the 90s here in Baja California and has been moving to the 2000s.

And now we are unfortunately back in many ways. But now you can rely now on who is running the elections. To get that information was very important. Now we need to be also very, make a lot of big efforts to explain to people that you can make progress. Mexico is making progress even in these dire conditions, but you have to pay attention and also try to learn where the information is coming from, that not all the media is the same, that we come from a big tradition of government-controlled media. Now, media control also do trafficking organizations. In some cases, both are linked and working

to give you trouble. Also, there's a lot of press that has chosen to just go with the flow and just leave out of propaganda. And sometimes they do good things like they go and give voice to the people in the local community. So the water is reestablished or there's more there's a more need for to fix a park or to public transportation. And they do good. It's important. All the job of the reporters is good. But in the bigger dimension, in the bigger problem, they tend to be on the side of the government because the government found this way to give you

a lot of public advertisement and to have you under their control. And many reporters want to be good journalists, but their editors or the owners of the companies are not willing to risk that easy way to get a lot of money from the government more easily than to start putting themselves on the risk, which implies when you do heavily digging or criticizing the powers of being no yeah how

how would someone know that they're getting accurate information in that case this applies to like every country in the world you have to really be conscious and like seek out particular sources but like in this case what do you recommend for people i mean it's difficult you're right it's the same problem everywhere but I guess the same recipe works here. I mean, just double-check their sources. Try to compare several media outlets and to see where it's reporting, whether each of them is reporting. The same way that you find the way they are leaning in the U.S.

is what you find here. But the problem is the established media or the traditional media is becoming less relevant because most of the main good journalism is done by small rebels who Most of the main good journalism is done by small rebels who began their own entities, their own platforms. I mean, in some cases, there's good reporters working for good media outlets. Normally, those are not local. I mean, when you see the big media companies, they don't have, with some exceptions, but they don't have many people doing good journalism at the local level. You will find good local journalism

with these renegades or rebels that have people who have been fired from the big, larger organization. And you have to be looking for those options. I mean, that doesn't mean that it's a guarantee that they're going to be independent completely. But you also learn how to read them. For example, there's a good case of two reporters who just were, they resigned or were fired.

We don't know exactly, but they, from a well-prestigious publication locally, they began their own operation. They are good, proven reporters. You know what I'm trying to say? They have a good track record. Yeah, a good track record. I thought that was what it was. I was just like, I actually don't know. Do I don't know phrases either?

They made a name for themselves doing good journalism with other publications. They began their own media outlet. Some people were complaining that they were too close to some state agency with the new government. They have great information. They do good reporting. But you have to look carefully at which type and where they lean into. So, I always read them. I just take it with a grain of salt, as you will see, say, in English, to try to balance my intake of information from different sources. It's difficult to tell the

people because the general public is not as involved or interested in media on the newspaper or on the news as we are because we live out of it. But people are doing their life and making the will to move around for all of us in different fronts as a doctor, as a housewife, as a teacher. And they don't have enough time to analyze media the way we do. So I think we need to do a little bit of that. Try to tell them,

for this reason, we believe this media outlet is leaning in this direction. This is subsidized or is getting... We do that. This is getting this amount of money from the government and not this amount of money from the government. That will give you a hand to take it and to see who are they dealing with. I mean, there's guys who have been working for the government now are back to reporters.

I mean, there's cases like that in the US. Stephanopoulos used to work for one of the presidents. The guy of Harbaugh from MSNBC used to work for Nixon. We see this, but in this environment, it's more difficult to to leave out those connections. It's always tricky to be moving from government jobs jobs to journalism jobs because it's not I mean, you have to I mean, in my perspective, I never worked for the government. I hope I never have to do it, but I respect

the ones that they do, but we need to be more transparent in that sense to be able to be fair with the people. Yeah, that makes sense. There's this interesting development in Mexico that I've seen in some areas, like able to be fair with the people. Yeah, that makes sense. There's this interesting development in Mexico that I've seen in some areas, like if I want to learn about what's happening in the Yaqui Pueblos in Sonora or in Chiapas, like these people who will just be like citizen reporters on

Facebook doing very local reporting. That seems to get really popular, but they'll sort of blow up really quickly doing this like Facebook only reporting it's really interesting because there's a big need of information and they know many people in mexico have learned to be the strutful of the quote-unquote legacy media the expression i was looking for legacy media the big companies um and and the problem is there's this risk that many of those new media outlets, which is basically Facebook accounts or TikTok accounts now, people don't know how to deal with. I mean, they have good intentions, but they don't really know how journalism should work. don't really know how journalists should work. And in some cases, they think, for example, that they can take money for different actors and that will help them to grow.

And I guess you can, but you have to be very careful. And this has been a big problem that I'll try to emphasize every time I talk about our situation. For many years, the government was too close or the reporters were too close to the government. The government will make easy with a lot of privileges for the reporters. So they learn to work in this scenario. So if I was close to the government, they will expedite a lot of things for me, so to speak. I can get money. I can get probably a license for a bar way quicker than somebody who doesn't have that access to the government.

I can probably get taxi licenses, for example, because I'm a reporter. I can get close to the movies and shakers in the political arena. They did that. And when the drug trafficking, when the narcos became another power, many, many reporters began to see it in the same way. So they were cozy with the government who was empowered, and they were cozy with the businessmen, and they were cozy with the unions because they were giving them handouts or treating them preferably, or they were giving them handouts or treating them

preferentially or they were able to do some traffic of influence that would give them some benefits. When the narcos became a regional power on their own, some of the reporters didn't see the difference or getting too close to that power. That has put a lot of the reporters in danger. I think the reporters are learning a little bit more to stay away from those. But there's also, with the advent of social media, many people who are really crooks or that they were not very interested in doing things ethically from the beginning that now

see that with a Facebook account, with a TikTok account, or Instagram, or any other platform, you can pass by a reporter. So there's this need of information, but also it's filled with good and bad people as in any other case. I always tell them, I mean, it's just the old analogy of a gun. Is the gun bad or good? Well, it depends on the circumstances you are using it, no?

I would imagine. Yeah. I'm not a gun guy. I don't want to get into your political discourse about your First Amendment, but which one is this? Oh, that's a whole... Second Amendment. Yeah, that's a whole other episode.

Neither do we. Yeah, that's fine. All if you said shireen did you have anything else no that was awesome thank you so much for all the information yeah and talking of reliable media where can people find you online where can they find your work where can they find your social media the main thing is tijuana press.com That's our main platform is just an online native media outlet. It's not a newspaper. It's just that we have been changing our way of work because we began as a daily. We no longer do that because we don't have enough resources for that. But also, there's plenty of daily media outlets, digital media outlets for the daily stories. We want to

do a little bit more in-depth, more investigative, more give you context of what is going on. We are in Spanish, but you can follow us on Twitter on at Tijuana Press because we try to, with our poor English, try to do some tweets

on English with the help of Google Translator or other colleagues that will correct our spelling. But that's the main way to get a hold of us. Well, I think your English is great. You talked to us for an hour and I understood everything. But thank you so much. I really appreciate your time.

Yeah. Thank you, Vicente. No, thank you guys. You always help us to spread the word and to be able to put ourselves to be judged by the public. This is what is more important for us. But we're doing best in algorithms

from any social platform because we believe and that the people will be willing to find us if they are really interested. And you guys help us about that. Yeah. Thank you so much for giving us some of your time. We really appreciate it.

Thank you. We'll be here. If you would be of any help. Thank you. Thank you so much. It could happen here as a production of cool zone media or more podcasts from cool zone media, visit our website, coolzonemedia.com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

You can find sources for It Could Happen Here updated monthly at coolzonemedia.com slash sources. Thanks for listening. You should probably keep your lights on for Nocturnal Tales from the Shadow. Join me, Danny Trejo, and step into the flames of right. An anthology podcast of modern day horror stories inspired by the most terrifying legends and lore of Latin America. Listen to Nocturnal on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.