Thread: A Mexican Drug Cartel Killed Another Blogger

A Mexican Drug Cartel Killed Another Blogger

AP
Adam Clark Estes
6:58 PM ET

Authorities found the mutilated body of yet another blogger, the fourth in the past three months, who was executed by a drug cartel in the Mexican city of Nuevo Laredo. Robert Beckhusen at Wired describes the gruesome scene:

Nicknamed "Rascatripas" or "Scraper" (literally "Fiddler") on the network Nuevo Laredo en Vivo, the 35-year-old appears to have been handcuffed, tortured, decapitated and dumped beside a statue of Christopher Columbus one mile from the Texas border. Below the man's body was a partially obscured and blood-stained blanket. Written on the blanket in black ink: "Hi I'm 'Rascatripas' and this happened to me because I didn't understand I shouldn't post things on social networks." …

Next to his headless body was a scrawled message: "With this, I say goodbye to 'Nuevo Laredo Live' … always remember, never forget, my handle, 'Rascatripas.'"

Rascatripas was a moderator for Nuevo Laredo en Vivo, which specifically warns against the Zetas cartel. The execution comes nearly two months after the disfigured bodies of a man and woman were found hanging from an highway overpass with a similar warning about using social network to talk about cartels, and six weeks after the body of Rascatripas' co-moderator was found next to the Christopher Columbus statue. In response to those killings, the Mexican government has encouraged citizens to tip off authorities online rather than shy away from talking about the violence. Beckhusen explains that Mexican citizens have turned to forums like Nuevo Laredo en Vivo as well as Twitter to report on cartel activity in real-time, in part to help unsuspecting civilians from crossing paths with the gangs but also as a way "to strike back at the cartels." It's not going well.

Though the first three killings were widely covered, the American media has been slow to report on the latest death. At the time of this posting, only Wired and the Houston Chronicle had covered the stories, despite Mexican papers having published their reports on Wednesday morning. It would seem that the shock factor of messages posted online leading to gruesome murders has worn off a bit or at least blended in with the broader horror of the tens of thousands of deaths linked the Mexican drug wars over the past few years. However as Al Jazeera recently reported, a media blackout is exactly what the cartels want:

A 2010 analysis of drug war coverage from the Fundacion MEPI, and investigate journalism center, found that regional newspapers in Mexico are failing to report most execution style killings linked to cartels. Journalists interviewed for the study said threats, bribes and other forms of pressure influenced their decisions not to cover killings or name the suspected cartels involved.

"Organised crime members have tried to bribe or influence traditional media [and] that is the importance of social media," says Raul Trejo Delabre, an independent media analyst in Mexico City.

The story will eventually receive more coverage, but the news inevitably serves as a reminder of the chaotically violent situation at the border. Meanwhile, everyone from the U.S. government to the hactivists at Anonymous are redoubling their efforts to help. We're going to keep covering the story.

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/global/2 ... ger/44785/

Blogger on Mexico cartel beheading: 'Cannot kill us all'

msnbc.com staff and news service reports updated 32 minutes ago

Another blogger has been decapitated, purportedly in retaliation for postings about drug cartels, prompting users of social network sites to unite in their stance against the gangs.

The gruesome slaying on Wednesday is believed to be the fourth since early September in which a drug cartel killed people in Nuevo Laredo for what they said online.

"This happened to me for not understanding that I shouldn't report on the social networks," said a placard left with the man's body at a busy intersection in Nuevo Laredo, according to The Houston Chronicle.

Nuevo Laredo, across the border from Laredo, Texas, has been dominated for about the last two years by the violent Zetas drug cartel.
The victim was described as 35 and identified on social networking sites by the nickname El Rascatripas or "belly scratcher."

The victim reportedly posted updates on the Zetas' activities and had collaborated with slain journalist Mary Elizabeth Macias, 39, who was butchered in the same manner and dumped in the same spot, El Universal.com reported.

"I'm doing some digging on it now," blogger Oscar Villanueva emailed msnbc.com on Wednesday. "I am also helping and working with my Twitter circle in creating a Twitter manifesto, calling out for us to unite, continue denouncing, and we will be offering tips on how to continue doing so safely and effectively."
Villanueva, who blogs on Borderland Beat, added, "THESE DEATHS WILL NOT BE IN VAIN...They cannot kill us all!!"

Mexican citizens have been increasingly relying on social media chatrooms and sites, such as Facebook and Twitter, as traditional media self-censor in the face of cartel violence.

Bloggers who cover cartels have been increasingly at risk.

In September, police found Macias' decapitated body alongside a handwritten sign saying she was killed in retaliation for postings on a social networking site.

The message was signed with a "Z," the Zetas' trademark.

Earlier that month, the bodies of a man and a woman were found dangling from an overpass in Nuevo Laredo with a message threatening, "this is what will happen" to trouble-making Internet users.
'Killings, torture'

But according to a new report, the cartels are not the only side committing atrocities in Mexico's drug war, which President Felipe Calderon launched in late 2006.

Human Rights Watch in an investigation released Wednesday accused the Mexican government of torture, forced disappearances and extra-judicial killings in its war against organized crime.

The report outlines misconduct at all levels of authority, from prosecutors who give detainees prewritten confessions to sign, to medical examiners who classify beatings and electric shock as causing minor injuries.

Only 15 soldiers have been convicted out of the 3,671 investigations launched by military prosecutors into alleged human rights violations by soldiers against civilians from 2007 to June 2011, according to the report. Not a single soldier or state official has been convicted in any of more than 200 cases the New York-based organization documented in the report.

The report says it documented 170 cases with credible evidence of torture, including waterboarding, electric shocks and asphyxiation, 39 forced disappearances and 24 cases of extra-judicial killings by security forces. The investigators said they only used cases in which victims' accounts could be corroborated by eyewitnesses, medical reports, coinciding testimony by people with no connections to each other or official investigations.

Human Rights Watch investigators met with Calderon, the country's interior secretary, attorney general and leaders of the armed forces to present the report. Calderon said in a statement Wednesday that he would form a joint working group with Human Rights Watch to analyze the findings.

But he added that criminals are the biggest threat to the human rights of Mexicans and said his government has the legal and ethical obligation to employ every method at its disposal to establish authority in communities where drug gangs are warring.

The drug war had claimed more than 35,000 lives by the end of 2010. The government hasn't issued new figures since then, although news media and other groups put the number at more than 43,000.

The Associated Press contributed to this report compiled by msnbc.com's Sevil Omer.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45230870/ns ... -americas/