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Nearly half of powerful .50-caliber ammo seized by Mexican government came from US Army plant, defense minister says 
The founder of one of Mexico’s most powerful criminal groups pleads guilty, US President Trump’s new regional anti-drug push aims to up military cooperation against organized crime in the region, and nearly 50 people are injured in a nightclub grenade attack in Peru, this and more in our latest On the Radar episode.
Transcript
| What happens when one of the founders of one of Mexico’s most powerful crime groups decides to cooperate with US prosecutors?
Can a new regional “anti-narcotics coalition” really change the fight against organized crime in Latin America? And what group was behind a grenade attack in a Peruvian nightclub that injured nearly 50 people? This is On the Radar, where we look at the stories shaping organized crime in the Americas each week. |
| First, to Mexico. Erick Valencia Salazar, better known as “El 85,” one of the founders of the Jalisco Cartel New Generation is expected to plead guilty after reaching a deal with US prosecutors after he was transferred from Mexico in February along with 28 other drug traffickers. |
| These plea deals, which are an integral and common part of the US justice process, determine what comes next. Cooperation agreements often help bring in bigger criminal leaders, depending on what information defendants share. What El 85 is willing to give prosecutors could determine not only his fate, but that of the criminal organization he created, which just lost its most prominent leader, El Mencho. |
| In Miami, US President Donald Trump announced an “anti-narcotics coalition” during the Shield of the Americas Summit, which brought together a number of Latin American heads of state. More military cooperation and intelligence sharing to combat organized crime in the region look likely. |
| But it’s worth pointing out that countries in this region have been using their military against organized crime groups for decades, with scant regard for transparency and human rights, and with questionable results. What this latest agreement promises is more of the same, but nothing new. |
| And finally, in Peru, the Pulpos criminal gang was allegedly behind a grenade attack in a nightclub in Lima that injured almost 50 people. |
| The Pulpos group was born in the 1990s and has used extreme violence against business owners. The latest incident shows how explosives have become a central weapon for extortion gangs like them looking to inflict widespread damage on civilians. |
| InSightCrime.org holds an in-depth profile of the Pulpos, as well as deep reporting on the Jalisco Cartel and the militarization of the drug war in Mexico, Colombia, Ecuador, and beyond.
That’s it for this week’s On the Radar. See you next week. |
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