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JUAREZ -- The Mexican Military dealt a blow to the "La Linea" criminal organization Wednesday as they arrested three of its alleged hitmen. La Linea has been known to be the "street enforcement" branch of the Juarez Cartel. The three suspects were presented to the media at once but were arrested in two separate incidents. Juan Gerardo Hernandez Del Real, 24, a.k.a. "El Moreno," was arrested Wednesday. At the time of his arrest, he was in possession of two firearms and crack cocaine, according to officials with "Operation Conjunta Chihuahua," a joint law enforcement operation involving Juarez Municipal Police, Chihuahua...

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico - Gunmen broke into a drug rehabilitation center, lined people against a wall and shot 17 dead in a particularly bloody day in Mexico's relentless drug war. The brazen attack followed the killing of the No. 2 security official in President Felipe Calderon's home state. The attackers on Wednesday broke down the door of El Aliviane center in Ciudad Juarez, lined up their victims against a wall and opened fire, said Arturo Sandoval, a spokesman for the regional prosecutors' office. At least five people were injured. Authorities had no immediate suspects or information on the victims. Ciudad...

Clinics in Violent Mexican City to Turn Away Gunshot Victims   CIUDAD JUAREZ – Private clinics in Ciudad Juarez, the scene of a bloody turf war between rival drug cartels, are refusing to treat victims of gunshot wounds due to the risk to their staff and other patients. Representatives of the clinics told authorities during a meeting that they could no longer receive this type of patients because cartel hit men have occasionally gone to hospitals to finish off a member of a rival drug mob who survived an attack. Luis Carlos Esquivel, coordinator of Mexico’s State Health Services,...

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico — At least eight people were killed early Monday when gunmen opened fire in a bar in drug-plagued Ciudad Juarez on the Mexico-Texas border. Chihuahua state official Arturo Sandoval said three others were hospitalized after the attack that killed seven men and one woman. Juarez is immediately across the border from El Paso, Texas, and is one of Mexico's deadliest cities with more than 1,300 killings so far this year. The federal government has sent thousands of soldiers to crack down on drug cartels, which have responded with unprecedented violence. In the northern city of Monterrey, four...

EL PASO, TX -- A Fort Bliss soldier was one of three men arrested in connection to the murder of a Juarez drug cartel member outside his Eastside home, El Paso police said Tuesday. Jose Daniel Gonzalez-Galeana was killed on May 15, shot as he walked up to his home in the 1300 block of Pony Trail Place. Police later told ABC-7 Gonzalez-Galeana was not only a lieutenant with the Juarez cartel, but also an informant for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Investigators believe Gonzalez-Galeana was targeted because he was leaking cartel information to the U.S. Thirty-year-old Ruben Rodriguez Dorado,...

The U.S. consulate in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, is warning Americans to be aware of a “new spike in cartel-related violence” around the border state of Chihuahua and recommended travelers avoid the northwestern portion in particular. “Drug cartels and associated criminal elements have retaliated violently against individuals who speak out against them or who they otherwise view to be a threat to their organization, regardless of the individuals' citizenship. The U.S. Consulate General urges all Americans to exercise a high degree of caution when traveling to Ciudad Juarez and within the state Chihuahua,” read the text of the message issued July...

JUAREZ -- Law enforcement agents in our sister city have arrested four alleged members of the paramilitary Zeta gang. XHIJ Channel 44 in Juarez is reporting the suspects were allegedly trying to kidnap a Mexican Coca-Cola executive. Late Monday, Mexican soldiers spotted the suspects inside a truck and ordered them to stop. Some of the suspects inside the truck then proceeded to shoot at the soldiers, according to XHIJ. The confrontation then led to a high-speed chase and another shootout ensued. The soldiers were able to stop the suspects and rescue the alleged victim. Police officials said no one was...

Note: The following text is a quote: Wife of Gang Leader Pleads Guilty to Narcotics Charges On the day her trial was to begin in U.S. District Court in Lubbock, Texas, Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation (ALKQN) member Marie Chavez, aka "Shorty," the wife of an alleged ALKQN leader Jose Nava, aka "Chino," pleaded guilty to a superseding indictment charging her and 16 co-defendants with various offenses related to alleged narcotics and weapons trafficking and violent activities. Specifically, Chavez, 28, of Lubbock, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to distribute and possession with intent to distribute five kilograms...

JUAREZ, Mexico -- An El Paso man is a suspect in the rapes of 19 Juarez women, Chihuahua state police announced at a news conference on Monday. Forty-three-year-old Jorge Alberto Mendez Navarro, of the 3200 block of Memphis, has been charged in only one of the rape cases, that of a 15-year-old girl. Mendez Navarro, a naturalized U.S. citizen, is an engineer in El Paso. He is accused of attacking mainly students between 13 and 20 years old. He allegedly raped his victims on Tuesdays and Fridays when he could justify being away from home, according to police. The suspect...

MEXICO CITY — As Mexico suffers from an onslaught of massacres, decapitations and execution-style hits, six major drug cartels have carved up the country into fiefdoms. Like the armies of authentic warlords, the cartels attempt to completely dominate their territories, controlling trafficking routes, local drug sales and other criminal enterprises. Clashing over disputed turf, the cartels all have carried out murders on an epic scale. Sinaloa Cartel City base: Culiacan (northwestern Mexico) Kingpins: Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, Juan Jose Esparragoza (El Azul) States in sphere of influence: Sinaloa, Sonora, Durango, Morelos, Chihuahua, Baja California, Mexico City,...

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico - The police chief of the Mexican state hit hardest by drug violence has resigned after a group of armed men rescued a suspected cocaine smuggler from police custody, officials said on Saturday. Javier Torres, the top officer in the northern border state of Chihuahua, said in his resignation letter he did not want to be a burden to the police force. "The head of this department should not have any baggage," Torres wrote. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton travelled to Mexico this week to underscore Washington's seriousness about helping defeat drug gangs as President Barack...

Jose Reyes Ferriz, mayor of the Mexican border city of Juarez, presides over what may be the western hemisphere's most dangerous town, certainly the hardest hit by Mexico's drug-war terror. Since the start of last year, Juarez has seen almost 2,000 drug-related murders. Reyes this month requested thousands of federal army soldiers to rein in the violence, which has subsided for the moment — giving him a chance to rebuild Juarez's corrupt police force. He talked with TIME's Tim Padgett this week about his police reform, drug-cartel death threats against him and comparisons of Juarez to Baghdad. (See pictures of...

The body of a U.S. marshal has been discovered in Juarez, Mexico, according to the U.S. Marshals Service -- the latest discovery in a wave of violence that has gripped towns along the U.S.-Mexican border in recent months. The body of Deputy Marshal Vincent Bustamante -- who was the subject of an arrest warrant accusing him of criminal theft of government property -- was found in Juarez on Wednesday, said Marshals Service spokesman Jeff Carter. Chihuahua state police said the body had multiple wounds to the head -- apparently consistent with an execution-style shooting, according to Edgar Roman, a reporter...

Walked over to Juarez Mexico this morning...took some clips of the many soldiers deployed on the streets...they are everywhere. Thought fellow freeper might like to see a compilation of clips so I uploaded to youtube....if you click the [HD] box you can watch it in nearly the original quality. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFNM4VM236E

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico — A retired Mexican army general took over as head of public safety in the violence-plagued border city of Ciudad Juarez on Monday and a retired colonel was sworn in as police chief, as part of a militarization that includes 7,000 soldiers dispatched to keep the peace in the city of 1.3 million. Gen. Julian Rivera Breton was sworn in as city public safety secretary to replace a man who resigned after criminals threatened to kill a policeman every other day until he left. Two such signs appeared on the bodies of a dead officer and a...

EL PASO, Texas -- An El Paso woman said she is lucky she made it home safely after she says she was a victim of an attempted carjacking in Juarez on Sunday. "I thank God we were able to make it because there's plenty of people who don't," Virginia Quiroz said. Quiroz and her family were in Juarez when suddenly, she said, they were blocked in by a car in front and a car behind them. Quiroz said five people tried to carjack her family, and one of them had a gun. A bullet hole was visible in the front...

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico -- Few Americans enter this border city anymore. Crossing south on the right side of the bridges is lonely, with only a smattering of people, mostly Mexicans living in El Paso. The army base has banned soldiers from crossing, and few if any kids come looking for a good time -- most of the bars have closed anyway. The reason: Juárez is at war. The city is fighting drug cartels, and the cartels are fighting each other. In 2008, more than 1,600 people were killed in Juárez in drug-related violence, often assassinations carried out in daylight. Some...

The Mexican president has blamed US "corruption" for hampering his nation's efforts to combat violent drug cartels. Felipe Calderon also told the AFP news agency that the main cause of Mexico's drug gang problems was "having the world's biggest consumer [of drugs] next to us". "Drug trafficking in the United States is fuelled by the phenomenon of corruption on the part of the American authorities," he said on Wednesday. The Mexican president launched a massive assault on drug cartels after entering office in late 2006 but the cartels have responded with campaigns of violence and intimidation that left 6,000 dead...

Mexico troops enter drug war city Mexico hopes to have up to 7,000 troops in the city in a few days More than 1,500 Mexican troops have moved into a city on the US border being fought over by rival drug gangs.Soldiers moved into Ciudad Juarez to try to regain control of a city in which more than 2,000 people have been murdered over the past year. Officials say they intend to have 7,000 troops and police in position by the end of the week. Rival gangs are battling for control of the city, which is a key entry...

Armed to the hilt, they came from land and air, determined to restore order to Mexico's most violent city. Nearly 2,000 Mexican soldiers and armed federal police poured into the border town of Ciudad Juarez last weekend.