Another bad week for Mexican taxi drivers

Eight drivers murdered in latest Monterrey violence

Taxi drivers in Mexico are often in the bull's eye of drug cartel execution squads. Besides picking up fares they not infrequently moonlight for one organization or another, working as delivery boys, messengers and halcones -- spies whose job it is to report on police and military movements, as well as to keep an eye on competing narcotics traffickers in the area. Because they're driving cabs they easily blend in with routine street traffic. They're alert to even the slightest changes in the neighborhoods they traverse. Cabbies quickly learn "who belongs where" and who doesn't.

The so-called narco-taxistas operate heavily in Cancún, and on the other side of Mexico in the sprawling city of Monterrey, in northern Nuevo León state. Monterrey is only 100 miles south of the U.S. border, and lays squarely in northbound drug corridors. The Los Zetas maintain a significant presence in the city, but the Gulf Cartel is another regional player.

On Wednesday afternoon (Apri. 11) a heavily armed execution team descended upon and shot eight taxi drivers in suburban Guadalupe, part of the Monterrey metropolis. The men, 25-35 years old, were killed almost instantly. Police sources they were Zeta halcones, and therefore presumably were killed by Gulf Cartel gunmen. There have been no arrests.

In a separate incident yesterday a 42 year old taxi driver was shot to death on a busy street in the resort city of Acapulco, another common venue for narco-taxistas.

Monterrey is one of the most deadly cities in Mexico, and has been the scene of horrific cartel violence in recent years.

Delincuencia arraigada entre taxistas: http://www.poresto.net/ver_nota.php?zona=qroo&idSeccion=1&idTitulo=165077.
Sindicato de taxistas, fuera de control: http://www.poresto.net/ver_nota.php?zona=qroo&idSeccion=1&idTitulo=166484.
Taxistas, peones del crimen organizado: http://www.poresto.net/ver_nota.php?zona=qroo&idSeccion=1&idTitulo=162138.
Five juveniles executed in Monterrey: http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.mx/2012/03/five-juveniles-murdered-in-monterrey.html.
Five taxi drivers executed in Monterrey: http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.mx/2012/02/five-taxi-drivers-executed-in-monterrey.html.
U.S. missionaries murdered in Monterrey: http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.mx/2012/02/us-missionaries-murdered-in-monterrey.html.
Eight executed on street in Monterrey: http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.mx/2012/01/eight-publicly-executed-in-monterrey-nl.html.
Halcones brutally executed in Cuernavaca: http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.mx/2012/03/four-boys-13-17-kidnapped-from-school.html.
In Cancún, Los Pelones happily deliver drugs by taxi and death on demand: http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.mx/2012/03/in-cancun-los-pelones-happily-deliver.html.
"Southern Zetas" operating in Cancún's hotel zone: http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.mx/2012/02/southern-zetas-operate-in-cancuns-hotel.html.
Murder of another taxi driver has Mérida police on alert: http://mexicogulfreporter.blogspot.mx/2012/01/murder-of-another-taxi-driver-has.html.

Feb. 21, 2012 was not a good day for these five cabbies in Monterrey, who died where they fell. Their murders have not been solved.