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Death and destruction in Texas follow on the heels of Boston violence just as "reform" rears its ugly head: time to connect the dots: Viscious Mexican gangs and savage drug cartels are operating freely across the border in Austin---the Texas state capital---right under the noses of Texas politicians.
EDITED Zeta hit man details killings on both sides of border mySA.com | January 24, 2012 | Jason Buch / FR Posted by SwinneySwitch
LAREDO, TEXAS — A hit man for the Zetas Mexican drug cartel calmly related to jurors in a drug conspiracy trial---to his role as a hired killer. In US District Court. Rosalio Reta pointed to Gerardo Castillo Chavez, 25, and identified him as a fellow Zeta. Reta, 22, told jurors that he had been in a team of hit men headed by Gabriel Cardona, an admitted Zeta, who has pleaded guilty to five murders that occurred in Texas 2005-06. Reta said he was the triggerman in the murder of Moises Garcia, a Mexican Mafia prison gang member, in Dec 2005.
Reta, a US citizen, received national media attention after the teenager was deported from Mexico in 2006 at age 17. He's known for his distinctive facial tattoos and boasts that he became a killer when he was 13 years old. Prosecutors say Castillo Chavez was also a sicario, or hit man, in a crew that worked with Cardona's group, gunning down two people at a busy Laredo, Texas intersection in April 2006. He faces up to life in prison if convicted on firearms and racketeering charges and wide-ranging drug conspiracy charges; prosecutors presented evidence of a decade's worth of Zeta operations in Texas.
Us citizenn Reta said that he fled to Mexico after two murders in Texas, for which he's now serving 70 years in prison, and worked with Castillo Chavez.” In May 2006, Reta testified, a team of killers was dispatched to El Punto Vivo, a nightclub in a suburb of Monterrey, Mexico. “Hitmen Chema and Chavezs went into the bar,” Reta said. “They shot, they threw some grenades and they killed four people.” Afterward, the hit squad went to a convenience store for snacks and drinks. Prosecutors played security video showing Reta and three others making purchases.
Jurors also heard Laredo police detective Robert Garcia testify that he linked the sicarios using phone records. The big break came when an insider---a DEA informant---was tasked by the Zetas with renting a safe house for Cardona's crew. Garcia said he worked with the feds to thwart the Zetas' attempted hits and to gather evidence.
Defense attorneys questioned Reta as to why someone who had shown great care to hideout after killings in the U.S. would so brazenly hang out at a convenience store, even microwave popcorn, after committing a high-profile killing in Mexico. “In Mexico, the cartels run everything,” Reta replied. “So it doesn't matter if you get caught on video. We are the law over there.
Rosalio Reta.
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NY POST REPORT---Mexican cartels deep inside US - spreading into non-border states
CHICAGO (AP) — Mexican drug cartels, whose viscious operatives once rarely ventured beyond the US border, are dispatching some of their most trusted agents to live and work deep inside the United States — the cartels' move into the American interior could pave the way for the hardened criminals to expand into other criminal enterprises such as prostitution, kidnapping-and-extortion rackets and money laundering.
In Mexico, the cartels are known for a staggering number of killings — more than 50,000, according to one tally. Beheadings are the savages' signature message.....the Texas Department of Public Safety reported 22 killings and five kidnappings in Texas at the hands of Mexican cartels from 2010 through mid- 2011......US police worry that increased cartel activity could fuel heightened violence.--SNIP--
In Chicago, the police commander who oversees narcotics investigations, James O'Grady, said street-gang account for most of the city's uptick in murders, when slayings topped 500 in 2012 for the first time since 2008. Riley argues that the Mexican cartels should be seen as an underlying cause of Chicago's disturbingly high murder rate. (NY POST EXCERPT)
SOURCE http://www.nypost.com/p/news/national/mexican_cartels_dispatch_agents_ZsKwR5wQCvQvpBXnejs1TJ