Murders in Mexico Double in 2008

The New York Times reports that the murder rate in Mexico during 2008 has doubled since the previous year. We recently talked about Tijuana.

Killings linked to Mexico’s drug war have more than doubled this year compared with 2007 and are likely to grow even further before they begin to fall, Attorney General Eduardo Medina-Mora said Monday.

The prosecutor tied the sharp increase in deaths to a battle for control among cartels and a power vacuum created by a series of high-profile arrests and seizures.

The number of gangland killings reached 5,376 from the beginning of the year until Dec. 2, a 117 percent increase over the 2,477 killings in the same period in 2007, Mr. Medina-Mora said in a luncheon meeting with foreign correspondents.

I was especially interested to see the statistics of "Mexico’s overall homicide rate last year, 11 deaths per 100,000 people, was a small fraction of the rates in Colombia, Guatemala, El Salvador and Brazil, he said." That makes the U.S. with 5.5 seem like Disneyland by comparison. Of course, you know how I feel about statistics.

It's not easy for poor Mexico, living in the shadow of its giant neighbor to the north.

Taking on the cartels that supply most of the illegal drugs consumed in the United States has been a frustrating exercise for Mexico. Officials complain that the guns the criminals use are coming from the United States and that the billions of dollars in drug profits have corrupted many institutions in Mexico.

So what does that mean? Not only are the guns in the U.S. flowing into the U.S. black market, they also supply Mexico? This does come as a bit of a shock because I've been told that the illegal guns in America come from countries like Mexico in shipments of drugs. But, suddenly we have a different theory. The incredible abundance and availability of guns in America flows out, in a type of cross-commuting. Drugs come in, guns and money go out.

Something must be done. Do you agree?

FBI Agent on Trial for Murder and Conspiracy

CNN reports on the complicated trial of an FBI Agent mixed up with a Boston hit man who was convicted of killing a gambling czar in Miami in 1982. John Martorano spent just over 12 years in prison after pleading guilty to killing the former World Jai-Alai president John Callahan and admitting to 19 other murders. Now free, the 67-year-old's agreement with prosecutors requires him to testify against John Connolly, former Agent with the FBI.

CBS Springfield has a good description of the intricacies of the case.

A hit man for Boston's notorious Winter Hill Gang pulled the trigger that killed John Callahan, but Connolly was equally responsible, prosecutor Fred Wyshak told a jury. Wyshak is a Boston federal prosecutor working as a special assistant in the Miami trial."He gave sensitive information to gangsters, who used that information to protect themselves. And (they) used that information to kill people. One of those people was John Callahan," Wyshak said of Connolly.

Connolly, 68, faces life in prison if convicted of first-degree murder and murder conspiracy charges.

What occurs to me is that people like this hit man, Martorano, are much more culpable than some of the other characters we've discussed on this blog. Joseph Edward Duncan III, for example and Richard Cooey are men who have committed horrible crimes, for sure, but should be considered to have diminished capacity. The viciousness of their actions alone could be evidence of mental illness, but I'll bet there's a history of childhood abuse in both their cases. Little boys don't grow up to do that stuff otherwise.

The mob hit man, on the other hand, who received a sentence of 12 years, was recruited for the job because he was friends with the target. He "reluctantly" agreed to kill Callahan in Miami. To me that's more frightening and horrible than anything a mentally deranged young man might do.

The FBI Agent, Connolly, who's on trial now, not only fingered people to be murdered, but in so doing betrayed the public trust of his oath of office. That's far worse in my opinion than what the sickest murderers out there get up to.

Even in these cases, I oppose the death penalty. But in an attempt to establish a hierarchy of evil behaviour, I put these characters at the top, and then we can list the others.


What's your opinion?