Free Republic

HOUSTON: Jesús Malverde has been revered for almost a century in northwestern Mexico. According to folklore, he was a Mexican Robin Hood who took from the rich and gave to the poor until he was killed by the police in 1909. Now, immigrants have brought his legend to the United States. His image, which is thought to offer protection from the law, can be found on items that include T-shirts and household cleaners. Malverde is widely considered the patron saint of drug dealers, say law enforcement officials and experts on Mexican culture. A shrine has been erected atop his grave...

...Reconciling O’Connor’s claims with Storie’s suggests the only item potentially linking the Marine veteran to a drug conspiracy was the picture of Jesús Malverde. Jesús Malverde, a probably mythical Robin Hood figure who is said to have died at the hands of Porfirio Diaz’s dictatorship in 1909, is the subject of a cult centered in Sinaloa, Mexico. Malverde tchotchkes can be found throughout Mexico and the Southwestern United States. With judicious use of Our Fathers and Hail Marys, the official prayer to the non-church-approved Malverde is said to be effective for immigrants and people who have been ripped off.

Jesus Huerta, 27, of Johnson City, was sentenced Thursday to serve 16 years in federal prison. [SNIP] Huerta and other members of the organization were responsible for the distribution of more than 13,000 kilograms of marijuana across the U.S. for a profit exceeding $7 million, officials said. Huerta and others obtained bulk marijuana from Mexico for distribution in Tennessee and elsewhere. Members of the organization also cultivated at least one marijuana grow operation in the Pisgah National Forest in N.C. During the investigation, DEA agents and Washington County Sheriff's Office investigators discovered that members of the organization were using iconic...

<p>A family has built what could be the first public shrine in Mexico City to Jesus Malverde, Mexico's so-called "narco-saint" revered by many of the nation's drug traffickers.</p> <p>Malverde, whose original shrine is located in the city of Culiacan in northern Sinaloa state — considered the cradle of Mexico's top drug clans — is a controversial figure.</p>

MEXICO CITY — Jesus Malverde is considered a Mexican Robin Hood and the patron saint of drug lords. On Wednesday, he got his own beer. A Mexican brewery in the western city of Guadalajara began selling the Malverde beer in the northwestern state of Sinaloa, long considered one of the country's main drug strongholds. Malverde is believed to have been a construction or railroad worker who was hanged in 1909 in Culiacan, Sinaloa's capital. He later developed a reputation as someone who stole from the rich and gave to the poor. Eventually he was adopted as the saint for drug...

MEXICO CITY — Prison cells are decorated with his image. Drug traffickers carry symbols of him. Now, he has a shrine in Mexico City. Jesus Malverde, a legendary crime figure revered as a saint by many of the country's drug traffickers, has received plenty worshippers since the shrine went up in the capital's rough Doctores neighborhood, said Maria Alicia Pulido Sanchez, a housewife who built it two months ago. Accounts of the true life of Malverde differ, with some saying he was a railway or construction worker who became a bandit before being hanged in Culiacan in 1909. Admirers say...