Thread: Mexico says US man smuggled grenade parts

Mexico says US man smuggled grenade parts

(AP) – 1 hour ago

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Police have arrested a U.S. man for smuggling American grenade parts into Mexico, where they were assembled for use by the Sinaloa drug cartel, prosecutors said Tuesday.

Mexico's Attorney General's Office identified the man as Jean Baptiste Kingery, but said he used several aliases. It said Kingery allegedly bought weapons parts and grenade casings in U.S. stores and even over the Internet, and smuggled them into Mexico through the border city of Mexicali.

The office said Kingery was arrested late last week in the Pacific Coast city of Mazatlan, in Sinaloa state, in a raid on a house where five guns were found. He is being held under a form of house arrest.

Police also raided five other homes, and found what appeared to have been facilities for assembling grenades, including gunpowder and grenade triggers, pins and caps.

In April, two men were arrested with 192 grenade casings in Baja California, the state where Mexicali is located. They told police they were part of the grenade smuggling ring, and that led to the detention of another American man, who led police to Kingery, prosecutors said.

The U.S. Embassy in Mexico City would not confirm the man's name, hometown or nationality, citing privacy concerns.

Mexican drug cartels have frequently used hand grenades in battles with police and soldiers, and occasionally against civilians.

On Aug. 14, gunmen tossed a grenade onto a busy tourist boulevard in the Gulf Coast city of Veracruz, killing a man and seriously wounding his wife and their two young children.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/art ... e29bc0490f

As long as there's a market for ammo and weapons, there will always be those willing to supply them no?

After all, mexico blames drug smuggling on the American market, don't they? Mexico blames everything on Americans, all the while shoving millions of their poor into the US. The gullible mexican nationals, espressing the love for mexico, don't seem to get that mexico doesn't want them. Fools.

U.S. man nabbed for smuggling grenade parts to Mexico cartel

MEXICO CITY | Tue Sep 6, 2011 6:46pm EDT

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Mexican police arrested a U.S. man accused of trafficking grenade and gun parts to one of the country's deadliest drug cartels in a sign the gangs could now be making their own weapons, authorities said on Tuesday.

Federal police captured Jean Baptiste Kingery last week at a house in the Pacific tourist town of Mazatlan in Sinaloa state, where they seized a small cache of guns and found a Hummer sports utility vehicle parked outside.

Law enforcement officials accuse Kingery of delivering parts used to make grenades and firearms, some bought at stores and online in the United States, to the Sinaloa cartel, headed by Mexico's most wanted man Joaquin "Shorty" Guzman.

Kingery's capture raises the possibility powerful cartels are manufacturing weapons inside Mexico and not just smuggling arms from the United States, the attorney general's office said.

Drug gangs frequently use grenades and automatic weapons in an escalating battle between rival gangs and against law enforcement that has claimed more than 42,000 lives since late 2006 when President Felipe Calderon launched a war on traffickers.

As part of the sweep that netted Kingery, Mexican police also found gunpowder, grenade pins and other components to assemble firearms in several different houses in Sinaloa state, home to the dominant drug cartel with the same name.

The arrest is part of an ongoing operation with U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) agents which led to the arrest of another American gun runner last month.

The Obama administration recently announced a major shake-up at the U.S. agency after it botched an operation to track smuggled guns into Mexico, known as "Fast and Furious," that allowed weapons to flow freely over the border.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/ ... 9420110906