Saturday, October 21, 2006

Heads on Public Display

The drug lords at war in central Mexico are no longer content with simply killing their enemies. They are putting their severed heads on public display.

In Michoacan, the home state of President-elect Felipe Calderon, 17 heads have turned up this year, many with bloodstained notes like the one found in the highlands town of Tepalcatepec in August: "See. Hear. Shut Up. If you want to stay alive."

Many in Michoacan's mountains and colonial cities are doing just that: They are tightlipped, their newspapers are censoring themselves and in one town, 18 out of 32 police officers quit saying they had received death threats from drug smugglers.

Read the rest of the
US News and World Report article here.

[One of the great untold stories of our time is the heroism of honest law enforcement officials who have to confront threats like these.]


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