More Than 55 People, Including Children Presumed Dead in Tamaulipas

The Gulf Cartel faction that took over the cities of Reynosa, Miguel Aleman and Camargo have allegedly cleansed their fueding counterparts as a result of their internal fighting to take control of the region.

By H. Nelson Goodson

March 28, 2013

Miguel Alemán, Tamaulipas,  Mexico - On Thursday, Valor por Tamaulipas (VpT),  a local Facebook social page whose administrator has been marked for death and a reward of $47,000 dollars has been offered for his head is reporting that at least 60 people, including entire families with children has been killed. The victims were rounded up (kidnapped) by a faction of the Gulf Cartel (GC) on Saturday as a result of a three to four months long feuding battle between factions of the same GC.

The victims apparently were family members of those who were killed by the rival GC faction who have now taken over the cities of Reynosa, Miguel Alemán and Camargo. The winning GC faction began to cleanse the region of anyone left from the rival faction. 

Last, Saturday, gunmen went to homes and kidnapped victims who were taken to secure location to get dispose off. Their vacant homes have now been taken over by families of the winning GC faction, according to a VpT Facebook posting. No addresses or actual locations were provided by VpT.

VpT is alleging that the GC killed the victims that were kidnapped and their bodies were then burned. 

No local, state and federal police action was ever initiated to locate the missing victims that are now presumed dead, VpT reported. There is also no indication that anyone ever filed a missing report or contacted the authorities to investigate the kidnappings and the disappearances of 60 people in the area. Most likely the missing reports were never made for fear of reprisals. 

VpT has become one of the main sources to post news and alerts about the current violent activities of organized crime and feuding drug cartels in the region. The local main stream media have been forced to censor all organized crime activity for fear of death threats, actually making VpT the only news source for people in the region to get their updates of criminal activity in the area.

In the last six years, the Mexican government reported that more than 50,000 people have been killed in relation to the drug cartel wars. More than 26,161 people including children have disappeared without a trace in Mexico. Another 70,000 undocumented immigrants from Central and South American have been reported either lost or have disappeared in Mexico making their way to the U.S. border, according to Ruben Figueroa, from the Mesoamerican Immigrant Movement organization. 

Figueroa is one of the few who attempts to locate the immigrants, but has only found or located 80 of them. The Mexican government has done almost nothing to locate immigrants. Mexico is under siege by the proliferation of criminal organizations associated with drug cartels whose influence and corruption has reached all levels of the government.

Today, at least one member of a family living in Mexico knows of someone who has been killed, kidnapped, extorted, robbed, raped, disappeared or involved in drug trafficking and smuggling. President Enrique Peña Nieto and his administration have become almost helpless in eliminating the major drug cartels that are gaining control of Mexico.