Violence erupts in Mexico's drugs heartland

By Mica Rosenberg
REUTERS

7:45 a.m. May 20, 2008

CULIACAN, Mexico, – Violence has exploded in Mexico's drug smuggling heartland in a three-way battle between rival gangs and security forces, the biggest challenge yet to President Felipe Calderón's war against the cartels.
About 300 people have died in drug murders so far this year in Sinaloa, an arid western state that serves as the home turf of one of Mexico's main drug gangs and where traffickers worship a bandit as their own patron saint.


The killing spilled over to Mexico City this month when assassins hired by Sinaloan smugglers shot dead one of Mexico's top federal policemen at his home, in a direct challenge to the government.
Calderón has staked his reputation on weakening the cartels, and responded to the murder by sending an extra 2,700 soldiers to Sinaloa to try to tame the state.

But Sinaloa's hitmen, known for their swagger, were undaunted. A gang threw grenades at a police station and machine-gunned three houses just hours after the troop deployment, killing one person in the town of Guamuchil.

Synonymous for many Mexicans with drugs and “narcocorridoâ€