Los Zetas Drug Cartel

III.Case Studies: The Rise of Human Trafficking and Kidnapping in the Los Zetas Drug Cartel

(179) Some of the primary examples of the power of the Los Zetas in Tamaulipas define the increasing role of immigrant-related human trafficking issues, which relate to kidnapping as a business opportunity. Los Zetas is an organization that kidnaps immigrants from Central America against their will in order to extort money from immigrants wanting to get into the United States:

The immigrants found in Madero, Reynosa and Matamoros were being held against their will, according to prosecutors. Drug gangs have taken to kidnapping and extorting Central Americans and other immigrants who traverse Mexico on their way to the U.S. (Buch, 2011, para.4).

This type of immigrant-related issue dictates the power of the Los Zetas to house people from differing Latin American countries that wish to work in the United States. The issue of human trafficking becomes a powerful statement on the ability of the organization to extort money from immigrants, but more importantly, to control their value in the American labor market. The Los Zetas define the advanced state of immigrant operations that often result in the exploitation of men and women

seeking to enter the United Sates through South Texas.
Another case study defines the “fragmentation” of the Gulf Cartel and the importance relevance of the Los Zetas as the “second place” organization that often handles immigration and human trafficking as a secondary market. This type of outsourcing of border operations illustrates the increasingly profitability of immigrant exploitation for profit through this military arm of the Gulf Cartel:
Of these, the Gulf Cartel is the most reliant on outsourcing work to smaller groups -- they work with 12 gangs, mostly in Tamaulipas state. In second place are the Zetas, who work with nine groups, followed by the Sinaloa Cartel with eight affiliates, then the BLO with six, as indicated in the chart below (Pachico, 2014, para.3).
These variables define the power of the Los Zetas within the Gulf Cartel, but it also exposes the many other smaller gang organizations that handle the “outsourcing” of daily operations in human trafficking. This aspect of immigrant exploitation through Los Zetas provides more insight into the organizational structure of this business. Certainly, Los Zetas is not working alone in these operations, since they have many smaller underlings that work for them to smuggle and kidnap immigrants.
The political protection of the Gulf Cartel and the Los Zetas has typically been organized through bribery, and in some cases, the use of violence. Historically, the Gulf Cartel relied in bribes to ensure that Mexican and U.S. government officials made it possible to smuggle cocaine and immigrant over the border in Tamaulipas and into Laredo, Texas. The depth of political corruption in Mexico not only relates to taking bribes, but to the active role that bureaucrats plays in facilitating Los Zetas and other criminal, activity in human trafficking activities:
The characteristics of the Mexican State and its political regime are conducive to the role that politicians and bureaucrats play in organized criminal activities, a role even more decisive in sustaining organized crime than the role played by the criminals themselves (Perez, p.518).
In this political and governmental point of view, the use of bribery and organizational corruption is part of a direct form of influence that keeps Los Zetas and the Gulf Cartel out of reach of law enforcement monitoring and containment. Certainly, these are important reasons why these drug cartel organizations are unable to prosecuted or prevented from expanding their activities in the exploitation of immigrants and other forms of human trafficking that occur through borderland business. The Los Zetas are an important organization that controls local politicians, but it also confirms that there are operants within the government that are directly involved in facilitating these drug-related and human trafficking operations through government institutions, such as the military.
Finally, the social chaos of governmental corruption and the role of drug cartels in the community defines the violence and kidnapping methods used by the Los Zetas to control political opposition in Matamoros Tamaulipas, Mexico. The collusion between local police and the drug cartel members/factions of the Los Zetas define the depth of corruption related to a recent incident in which 43 students were kidnapped and possibly murdered for opposing the drug cartel’s presence in the region:
The students are from a rural teachers’ college called Ayotzinapa. They had gone to the small city of Iguala to gather funds, when police ambushed their buses. Six people were killed in an initial series of attacks. More than 20 police have been detained and accused of collaborating with a drug gang, Guerreros Unidos, with ties to the city’s mayor, who has fled (para.3).
This aspect of kidnapping defines the expanded complexity of operations that include the cooperation of police with the drug cartels to ensure that academic institutions and students do not interfere with the political process. More so, these students are suspected to have been mass-murdered and buried in graves. The power of the Los Zetas and smaller fringe gangs defines the massive corruption of the Mexican government in drug cartel activities, which now extend to killing students due to thereat of political activism and protest against the drug trade in Tamaulipas.

(716)IV.Comparing and Contrasting Border Issues and the Problem of Human Trafficking and Immigration

The Arellano-Felix family has historically controlled the drug cartels in Tijuana, California, but the transition to a new cartel defines the same political and governmental corruption related to drug smuggling. The fall of the Arellano-Felix drug syndicate illustrates the way that Sinaloa Cartel has taken control of the region on the San Diego/Tijuana border. This arrest defines the impact of drug smuggling operations in this type of border corruption:
The source — a member of the 39-year-old's inner circle — assured VICE News that Sánchez Arellano’s was no longer "relevant," since the Sinaloa Cartel gained control of the Tijuana-San Diego drug-trafficking corridor (Reyna, 2014, para.8).
This type of organizational shift illustrates the continued presence of drug smuggling as the primary activity of the Sinaloa Cartel as the dominant power in these drug smuggling operations. More so, the predominant role of drug smuggling is very different fro the increasingly important role of human trafficking, which is seen in the Los Zetas organization in South Texas. The movement of immigrants (kidnapped or voluntary) through the coastal waters of the United States and Mexico is simply too dangerous in this type of smuggling operation. In recent times, the continued movement of drugs from Peru, Columbia, and other South American nations defines the effect of police corruption, bureaucratic dissonance, and gang activity that continues to threaten the community of Tijuana. Corruption is still the mainstay of drug smuggling activity, which defines a large portion of business for these gangs. Although the Arellano-Felix has fallen, the Sinaloa Cartel as replaced this organization with greater power and the usual corruption associated with police and political figures in the community.
In El Paso, Texas, drug cartels continue to operate with a different focus on immigrant smuggling and kidnapping than what is found in Tijuana and in the drug shipment operations of the Sinaloa Cartel.

In a similar way, the drug cartels of the El Paso Cartel define a similar shift towards immigrant kidnapping and extortion rackets that provide a source of income for these gangs. In Chihuahua, the increased role of immigrant smuggling ahs become a very strong part of the drug smuggling culture, which exploits women and children for profit, much like the Los Zetas in Tamaulipas. The increase of human trafficking for immigrants has become a serious issue for the American city of El Paso and the neighboring city of Ciudad Juarez across the

border.
And it's not just unaccompanied children. Darling said that for the past month, McAllen has had the arrival of about 1,000 people — members of families with children — from Central America (Schladen, 2014, para.7).
This massive immigration issue defines the impact of drug cartel violence, which has involved children being sent across the border with their mothers and other family members. This defines the major impact of violent drug cartel operations in El Paso, which are not dissimilar from those of the Los Zetas cartel. In this manner, the importance of immigration issues in El Paso and Tamaulipas continue to reflect the exploitation of immigrant women and children felling from the violence of drug cartels in this part of Texas and Mexico borders. In contrast, the Sinaloa Cartel does not rely as heavily on immigrant populations as a profitable aspect of drug smuggling, since because of the sea routes used by drug smugglers. Geographic location is an important features of the similar and contrasting elements of human trafficking that are increasingly bring more women and children into the United States as refuges from these violent gang operations in land-locked territories.