{ "id": "R41576", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "R", "number": "R41576", "active": true, "source": "CRSReports.Congress.gov, EveryCRSReport.com, University of North Texas Libraries Government Documents Department", "versions": [ { "active": true, "sourceLink": "https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/details?prodcode=R41576", "source_dir": "crsreports.congress.gov", "date": "2022-06-07", "typeId": "R", "formats": [ { "format": "PDF", "filename": "files/2022-06-07_R41576_787d265ff22c5a88a68925c1a25aa3327b89cb1e.pdf", "url": "https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R41576/46", "sha1": "787d265ff22c5a88a68925c1a25aa3327b89cb1e" }, { "format": "HTML", "filename": "files/2022-06-07_R41576_787d265ff22c5a88a68925c1a25aa3327b89cb1e.html" } ], "type": "CRS Report", "summary": null, "title": "Mexico: Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking Organizations", "retrieved": "2022-07-10T04:03:22.022544", "source": "CRSReports.Congress.gov", "id": "R41576_46_2022-06-07" }, { "active": true, "sourceLink": "https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/details?prodcode=R41576", "source_dir": "crsreports.congress.gov", "date": "2020-07-28", "typeId": "R", "formats": [ { "format": "PDF", "filename": "files/2020-07-28_R41576_c1e2eb977865e74a55c081b3942538ef0b148cff.pdf", "url": "https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R41576/41", "sha1": "c1e2eb977865e74a55c081b3942538ef0b148cff" }, { "format": "HTML", "filename": "files/2020-07-28_R41576_c1e2eb977865e74a55c081b3942538ef0b148cff.html" } ], "type": "CRS Report", "summary": null, "title": "Mexico: Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking Organizations", "retrieved": "2022-07-10T04:03:22.019599", "source": "CRSReports.Congress.gov", "id": "R41576_41_2020-07-28" }, { "source": "EveryCRSReport.com", "id": 611928, "date": "2019-12-20", "retrieved": "2020-01-02T13:33:19.511462", "title": "Mexico: Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking Organizations", "summary": "Mexican drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) pose the greatest crime threat to the United States and have \u201cthe greatest drug trafficking influence,\u201d according to the annual U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration\u2019s (DEA\u2019s) National Drug Threat Assessment. These organizations work across the Western Hemisphere and globally. They are involved in extensive money laundering, bribery, gun trafficking, and corruption, and they cause Mexico\u2019s homicide rates to spike. They produce and traffic illicit drugs into the United States, including heroin, methamphetamine, marijuana, and powerful synthetic opioids such as fentanyl, and they traffic South American cocaine. Over the past decade, Congress has held numerous hearings addressing violence in Mexico, U.S. counternarcotics assistance, and border security issues.\nMexican DTO activities significantly affect the security of both the United States and Mexico. As Mexico\u2019s DTOs expanded their control of the opioids market, U.S. overdoses rose sharply to a record level in 2017, with more than half of the 72,000 overdose deaths (47,000) involving opioids. Although preliminary 2018 data indicate a slight decline in overdose deaths, many analysts believe trafficking continues to evolve toward opioids. The major Mexican DTOs, also referred to as transnational criminal organizations (TCOs), have continued to diversify into such crimes as human smuggling and oil theft while increasing their lucrative business in opioid supply. According to the Mexican government\u2019s latest estimates, illegally siphoned oil from Mexico\u2019s state-owned oil company costs the government about $3 billion annually. \nMexico\u2019s DTOs have been in constant flux. In 2006, four DTOs were dominant: the Tijuana/Arellano Felix organization (AFO), the Sinaloa Cartel, the Ju\u00e1rez/Vicente Carillo Fuentes Organization (CFO), and the Gulf Cartel. Government operations to eliminate DTO leadership sparked organizational changes, which increased instability among the groups and violence. Over the next dozen years, Mexico\u2019s large and comparatively more stable DTOs fragmented, creating at first seven major groups, and then nine, which are briefly described in this report. The DEA has identified those nine organizations as Sinaloa, Los Zetas, Tijuana/AFO, Ju\u00e1rez/CFO, Beltr\u00e1n Leyva, Gulf, La Familia Michoacana, the Knights Templar, and Cartel Jalisco-New Generation (CJNG). In mid-2019, leader of the long-dominant Sinaloa Cartel, Joaquin (\u201cEl Chapo\u201d) Guzm\u00e1n, was sentenced to life in a maximum-security U.S. prison, spurring further fracturing of a once-hegemonic DTO.\nBy some accounts, a direct effect of this fragmentation has been escalated levels of violence. Mexico\u2019s intentional homicide rate reached new records in 2017 and 2018. In 2019, Mexico\u2019s national public security system reported more than 17,000 homicides between January and June, setting a new record. In the last months of 2019, several fragments of formerly cohesive cartels conducted flagrant acts of violence. For some Members of Congress, this situation has increased concern about a policy of returning Central American migrants to cities across the border in Mexico to await their U.S. asylum hearings in areas with some of Mexico\u2019s highest homicide rates. \nMexican President Andr\u00e9s Manuel L\u00f3pez Obrador, elected in a landslide in July 2018, campaigned on fighting corruption and finding new ways to combat crime, including the drug trade. According to some analysts, challenges for L\u00f3pez Obrador since his inauguration include a persistently ad hoc approach to security; the absence of strategic and tactical intelligence concerning an increasingly fragmented, multipolar, and opaque criminal market; and endemic corruption of Mexico\u2019s judicial and law enforcement systems. In December 2019, Genero Garcia Luna, a former top security minister under the Felipe Calder\u00f3n Administration (2006-2012), was arrested in the United States on charges he had taken enormous bribes from the Sinaloa Cartel, further eroding public confidence in government efforts.\nFor more background, see CRS Insight IN11205, Designating Mexican Drug Cartels as Foreign Terrorists: Policy Implications, CRS In Focus IF10578, Mexico: Evolution of the M\u00e9rida Initiative, 2007-2020, and CRS Report R42917, Mexico: Background and U.S. Relations. On the issues of fentanyl and heroin, see CRS Report R45790, The Opioid Epidemic: Supply Control and Criminal Justice Policy\u2014Frequently Asked Questions.", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORTS", "active": true, "formats": [ { "format": "HTML", "encoding": "utf-8", "url": "https://www.crs.gov/Reports/R41576", "sha1": "47b433e2521ade3e3d76cc8cdae88ca33f8b07d9", "filename": "files/20191220_R41576_47b433e2521ade3e3d76cc8cdae88ca33f8b07d9.html", "images": { "/products/Getimages/?directory=R/html/R41576_files&id=/0.png": "files/20191220_R41576_images_8117dfc1d416b0de1f531241e59304a50d2623cb.png", "/products/Getimages/?directory=R/html/R41576_files&id=/2.png": "files/20191220_R41576_images_e7ded49a18c1330d9cc5a84cbcc6d7c0a4beb0c8.png", "/products/Getimages/?directory=R/html/R41576_files&id=/1.png": "files/20191220_R41576_images_adc0519a01f60e1656830654e82375b845dcee0b.png" } }, { "format": "PDF", "encoding": null, "url": "https://www.crs.gov/Reports/pdf/R41576", "sha1": "9daf21c37beafa9b8e2fe6dbaef2c26d51e5d9d5", "filename": "files/20191220_R41576_9daf21c37beafa9b8e2fe6dbaef2c26d51e5d9d5.pdf", "images": {} } ], "topics": [ { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4793, "name": "Drug Control" }, { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4878, "name": "International Terrorism, Trafficking, & Crime" }, { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4883, "name": "Border Security" } ] }, { "source": "EveryCRSReport.com", "id": 604082, "date": "2019-08-15", "retrieved": "2019-08-28T22:22:40.521739", "title": "Mexico: Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking Organizations", "summary": "Mexican drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) pose the greatest crime threat to the United States and have \u201cthe greatest drug trafficking influence,\u201d according to the annual U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration\u2019s (DEA\u2019s) National Drug Threat Assessment. These organizations work across the Western Hemisphere and globally. They are involved in extensive money laundering, bribery, gun trafficking, and corruption, while causing Mexico\u2019s homicide rates to spike. They produce and traffic illicit drugs into the United States, including heroin, methamphetamine, marijuana, and powerful synthetic opioids such as fentanyl, and they traffic South American cocaine. \nAs Mexico\u2019s transnational crime groups expanded their control of the opioids market, U.S. overdoses rose sharply to a record level in 2017, with more than half of the 72,000 overdose deaths (47,000) involving opioids. Although preliminary 2018 data indicate a slight decline in overdose deaths, many analysts believe trafficking continues to evolve toward opioids making possible a future rise of overdose deaths from opioids. This prospect deeply concerns Congress. In July 2019, the notorious crime boss Joaquin Guzm\u00e1n Loera (\u201cEl Chapo\u201d) received a life sentence in a maximum-security U.S. prison for his role leading the Sinaloa Cartel. Guzm\u00e1n had been extradited by Mexico to the United States in January 2017, following two escapes from Mexican prisons. The major Mexican DTOs, while increasing their business in opioid supply, have continued to diversify into such crimes as human smuggling and oil theft. According to the Mexican government\u2019s latest estimates, illegally siphoned oil from Mexico\u2019s state-owned oil company costs the government about $3 billion annually. \nMexico\u2019s DTOs have been in constant flux. Former Mexican President Felipe Calder\u00f3n (2006-2012) launched an aggressive campaign against the country\u2019s drug traffickers that was a defining policy of his government; the DTOs violently resisted this campaign. By some accounts, there were four dominant DTOs in 2006: the Tijuana/Arellano Felix organization (AFO), the Sinaloa Cartel, the Ju\u00e1rez/Vicente Carillo Fuentes Organization (CFO), and the Gulf Cartel. Government operations to eliminate DTO leadership sparked organizational changes, which increased instability among the groups and violence. Over the past 12 years, Mexico\u2019s large and comparatively more stable DTOs fragmented, creating at first seven major groups, and then nine, which are briefly described in this report. The DEA has identified those nine organizations as Sinaloa, Los Zetas, Tijuana/AFO, Ju\u00e1rez/CFO, Beltr\u00e1n Leyva, Gulf, La Familia Michoacana, the Knights Templar, and Cartel Jalisco-New Generation (CJNG). \nMexico\u2019s intentional homicide rate reached new records in 2017 and 2018. In 2019, Mexico\u2019s national public security system reported more than 17,000 homicides between January and June, setting a new record. For some Members of Congress, this situation has increased concern about a policy of returning Central American migrants to cities across the border in Mexico to await their U.S. asylum hearings in areas with some of Mexico\u2019s highest homicide rates.\nMexican President Andr\u00e9s Manuel L\u00f3pez Obrador, elected in a landslide in July 2018, heads a new party, MORENA. He campaigned on fighting corruption and finding new ways to combat crime, including the drug trade. He aimed to avoid the previous two administrations\u2019 failure to lower violence and insecurity. According to some analysts, challenges for L\u00f3pez Obrador since his inauguration include a persistently ad hoc approach to security; absence of strategic and tactical intelligence concerning an increasingly fragmented, multipolar, and opaque criminal market; and endemic corruption of Mexico\u2019s judicial and law enforcement systems.\nFor more background on Mexico, see CRS In Focus IF10578, Mexico: Evolution of the M\u00e9rida Initiative, 2007-2020, by Clare Ribando Seelke, and CRS Report R42917, Mexico: Background and U.S. Relations, by Clare Ribando Seelke and Edward Y. Gracia. On the issues of fentanyl and heroin, see CRS Report R45790, The Opioid Epidemic: Supply Control and Criminal Justice Policy\u2014Frequently Asked Questions, by Lisa N. Sacco et al.", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORTS", "active": true, "formats": [ { "format": "HTML", "encoding": "utf-8", "url": "https://www.crs.gov/Reports/R41576", "sha1": "7aa5b73ea095bdc618adb5df0d904c516b990e50", "filename": "files/20190815_R41576_7aa5b73ea095bdc618adb5df0d904c516b990e50.html", "images": { "/products/Getimages/?directory=R/html/R41576_files&id=/0.png": "files/20190815_R41576_images_d32bb6b05abbe0c080033853cd1a5046ad1253bd.png", "/products/Getimages/?directory=R/html/R41576_files&id=/2.png": "files/20190815_R41576_images_f9cbddf60b160585b7d6fb97aa8b4846c8adedfc.png", "/products/Getimages/?directory=R/html/R41576_files&id=/1.png": "files/20190815_R41576_images_1bee8dd21b3850fbf1278fcfd9f79b6133428c07.png" } }, { "format": "PDF", "encoding": null, "url": "https://www.crs.gov/Reports/pdf/R41576", "sha1": "56fe8f4bb00b34b5168e2fd655e64837ed2377f6", "filename": "files/20190815_R41576_56fe8f4bb00b34b5168e2fd655e64837ed2377f6.pdf", "images": {} } ], "topics": [ { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4793, "name": "Drug Control" }, { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4878, "name": "International Terrorism, Trafficking, & Crime" }, { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4883, "name": "Border Security" } ] }, { "source": "EveryCRSReport.com", "id": 584104, "date": "2018-07-03", "retrieved": "2018-08-27T15:10:19.798295", "title": "Mexico: Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking Organizations", "summary": "Mexican drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) pose the greatest crime threat to the United States, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration\u2019s (DEA\u2019s) National Drug Threat Assessment published in October 2017. These organizations have for years been identified for their strong links to drug trafficking, money laundering, and other violent crimes. These criminal groups have trafficked heroin, methamphetamine, cocaine, marijuana, and, increasingly, the powerful synthetic opioid fentanyl. U.S. overdoses due to opioid consumption sharply increased to a record level in 2016, following the Mexican criminal syndicates expanded control of the heroin and synthetic opioids market. The major DTOs and new crime groups have furthered their expansion into such illicit activity as extortion, kidnapping, and oil theft that costs the government\u2019s oil company more than a billion dollars a year.\nMexico\u2019s DTOs have also been in constant flux. Early in his term, former Mexican President Felipe Calder\u00f3n (2006-2012) initiated an aggressive campaign against Mexico\u2019s drug traffickers that was a defining policy of his government and one that the DTOs violently resisted. By some accounts, in 2006, there were four dominant DTOs: the Tijuana/Arellano Felix organization (AFO), the Sinaloa cartel, the Ju\u00e1rez/Vicente Carillo Fuentes organization (CFO), and the Gulf cartel. Government operations to eliminate DTO leadership sparked organizational changes, which led to significant instability among the groups and continued violence. \nIn recent years, larger and more stable organizations have fractured, leaving the DEA and other analysts to identify seven organizations as predominant: Sinaloa, Los Zetas, Tijuana/AFO, Ju\u00e1rez/CFO, Beltr\u00e1n Leyva, Gulf, and La Familia Michoacana. In some sense, these organizations include the \u201ctraditional\u201d DTOs, although the 7 organizations appear to have fragmented further to at least 9 (or as many as 20) major organizations. A new transnational criminal organization, Cartel Jalisco-New Generation, which split from Sinaloa in 2010, has sought to become dominant with brutally violent techniques. During the term of President Enrique Pe\u00f1a Nieto that will end in 2018, the government has faced an increasingly complex crime situation that saw violence spike. In 2017, Mexico reached its highest number of total intentional homicides in a year, exceeding, by some counts, 29,000 murders. In the 2017-2018 electoral season according to a Mexican security consultancy recording political violence, 152 office holders and political candidates (and pre-candidates) were killed, allegedly by crime bosses and others in an effort to intimidate public office holders. If non-elected public officials are included, victims in the 2018 electoral season exceed 500.\nOn July 1, 2018, Andr\u00e9s Manuel L\u00f3pez Obredor won the election for President by as much as 30 points over the next contender. He leads a new party, Morena, but has served as Mayor of Mexico City and comes from a leftist ideological viewpoint. L\u00f3pez Obredor campaigned on fighting corruption and finding new ways to combat crime and manage the illicit drug trade.\nU.S. foreign assistance for Mexico in the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2018 (P.L. 115-141) totaled $152.6 million, with more than $100 million of that funding focused on rule of law and counternarcotics efforts. The 115th Congress pursued oversight of security conditions inside of Mexico and monitored the Mexican criminal organizations not only because they are the major wholesalers of illegal drugs in the United States but also to appraise their growing control of U.S. retail-level distribution. This report examines how the organized crime landscape in Mexico has been altered by fragmentation of criminal groups and how the organizational shape-shifting continues. For more background, see CRS In Focus IF10867, Mexico\u2019s 2018 Elections; CRS Report R41349, U.S.-Mexican Security Cooperation: The M\u00e9rida Initiative and Beyond; and CRS In Focus IF10400, Transnational Crime Issues: Heroin Production, Fentanyl Trafficking, and U.S.-Mexico Security Cooperation.", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORTS", "active": true, "formats": [ { "format": "HTML", "encoding": "utf-8", "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/R41576", "sha1": "5ed46e5dc502f848e07c008b5651d4eff9b96b4c", "filename": "files/20180703_R41576_5ed46e5dc502f848e07c008b5651d4eff9b96b4c.html", "images": { "/products/Getimages/?directory=R/html/R41576_files&id=/0.png": "files/20180703_R41576_images_4000cb6c931b0179d3de252467da2e876dc7fde2.png", "/products/Getimages/?directory=R/html/R41576_files&id=/2.png": "files/20180703_R41576_images_53a494c419e36559c67516e6f181c651abca627b.png", "/products/Getimages/?directory=R/html/R41576_files&id=/1.png": "files/20180703_R41576_images_89b41d58f38db8cbd930c90efb5f692b5437668d.png" } }, { "format": "PDF", "encoding": null, "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/pdf/R41576", "sha1": "c81bf55c4f4e71efac4945307ca2ce5e82159d08", "filename": "files/20180703_R41576_c81bf55c4f4e71efac4945307ca2ce5e82159d08.pdf", "images": {} } ], "topics": [ { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4793, "name": "Drug Control" }, { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4878, "name": "International Terrorism, Trafficking, & Crime" }, { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4883, "name": "Border Security" } ] }, { "source": "EveryCRSReport.com", "id": 460628, "date": "2017-04-25", "retrieved": "2017-04-25T17:10:19.077193", "title": "Mexico: Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking Organizations", "summary": "The notorious drug trafficking kingpin Joaqu\u00edn \u201cEl Chapo\u201d Guzm\u00e1n is now imprisoned in the United States awaiting trial, following the Mexican government\u2019s decision to extradite him to the United States on January 19, 2017, the day before President Trump took office. Guzm\u00e1n is charged with operating a continuing criminal enterprise and conducting drug-related crimes as the purported leader of the Mexican criminal syndicate commonly known as the Sinaloa cartel. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) maintains that the Sinaloa cartel has the widest reach into U.S. cities of any transnational criminal organization. In November 2016, in its National Drug Threat Assessment, the DEA stated that Mexican drug trafficking groups are working to expand their presence, particularly in the heroin markets inside the United States. Over the years, Mexico\u2019s criminal groups have trafficked heroin, methamphetamine, cocaine, marijuana, and increasingly the powerful synthetic opioid fentanyl.\nMexico\u2019s drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) have been in constant flux. By some accounts, in 2006, there were four dominant DTOs: the Tijuana/Arellano Felix organization (AFO), the Sinaloa cartel, the Ju\u00e1rez/Vicente Carillo Fuentes organization (CFO), and the Gulf cartel. Since then, the more stable large organizations have fractured. In recent years, the DEA has identified the following organizations as dominant: Sinaloa, Los Zetas, Tijuana/AFO, Ju\u00e1rez/CFO, Beltr\u00e1n Leyva, Gulf, and La Familia Michoacana. In some sense, these organizations might be viewed as the \u201ctraditional\u201d DTOs, although the 7 organizations appear to have fragmented to at least 9 (or as many as 20) major organizations. New crime groups have emerged since the December 2012 inauguration of Mexican President Enrique Pe\u00f1a Nieto, who has faced an increasingly complex crime situation. The major DTOs and new crime groups have furthered their expansion into such illicit activity as extortion, kidnapping for ransom, and oil syphoning, posing a governance challenge to President Pe\u00f1a Nieto as daunting as that faced by his predecessors.\nFormer Mexican President Felipe Calder\u00f3n (2006-2012) initiated an aggressive campaign against Mexico\u2019s drug traffickers that was a defining policy of his government and one that the DTOs violently resisted. Operations to eliminate DTO leaders sparked organizational change, which led to significant instability among the groups and continued violence. Such violence appears to be rising again in Mexico. In January 2017, the country registered more homicides than in any January since the government began to release national crime data in the late 1980s. In a single weekend in April 2017, more than 35 died in what was assumed to be drug trafficking-related violence.\nAlthough the Mexican government no longer estimates organized crime-related homicides, some independent analysts have claimed that murders linked to organized crime may have exceeded 100,000 since 2006, when President Calder\u00f3n began his campaign against the DTOs. Mexico\u2019s government reported that the annual number of all homicides in Mexico declined after Calder\u00f3n left office in 2012 by about 16% in 2013 and 15% in 2014, only to rise in 2015 and 2016. In 2016, the Mexican government reported a 22% increase in all homicides to 22,932, almost reaching the high point of nearly 23,000 murders in 2011, Mexico\u2019s most violent year.\nThe 115th Congress remains concerned about security conditions inside Mexico and the illicit drug trade. The Mexican DTOs are the major wholesalers of illegal drugs in the United States and are increasingly gaining control of U.S. retail-level distribution. This report examines how the organized crime landscape has been significantly altered by fragmentation and how the organizational shape-shifting continues. For more background, see CRS Report R41349, U.S.-Mexican Security Cooperation: The M\u00e9rida Initiative and Beyond, and CRS In Focus IF10400, Heroin Production in Mexico and U.S. Policy.", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORTS", "active": true, "formats": [ { "format": "HTML", "encoding": "utf-8", "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/R41576", "sha1": "806d83fe2515333765de83d44dacaca71f8679d9", "filename": "files/20170425_R41576_806d83fe2515333765de83d44dacaca71f8679d9.html", "images": null }, { "format": "PDF", "encoding": null, "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/pdf/R41576", "sha1": "f71e380102fe52623c50ec93bf51cc5374459996", "filename": "files/20170425_R41576_f71e380102fe52623c50ec93bf51cc5374459996.pdf", "images": null } ], "topics": [ { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4793, "name": "Drug Control" }, { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4878, "name": "International Terrorism, Trafficking, & Crime" }, { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4883, "name": "Border Security" } ] }, { "source": "EveryCRSReport.com", "id": 460275, "date": "2017-03-31", "retrieved": "2017-04-07T15:32:56.793313", "title": "Mexico: Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking Organizations", "summary": "The notorious drug trafficking kingpin Joaqu\u00edn \u201cEl Chapo\u201d Guzm\u00e1n is now imprisoned in the United States awaiting trial, following the Mexican government\u2019s decision to extradite him to the United States on January 19, 2017, the day before President Trump took office. Guzm\u00e1n is charged with operating a continuing criminal enterprise and conducting drug-related crimes as the purported leader of the Mexican criminal syndicate commonly known as the Sinaloa cartel. The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) maintains that the Sinaloa cartel has the widest reach of any transnational criminal organization into U.S. cities. In November 2016, in its National Drug Threat Assessment, the DEA stated that Mexican drug trafficking groups are working to expand their presence, particularly in the heroin markets inside the United States. Over the years, Mexico\u2019s criminal groups have trafficked heroin, methamphetamine, cocaine, marijuana, and increasingly the powerful synthetic opioid fentanyl.\nMexico\u2019s drug trafficking organizations (DTOs) have been in constant flux. By some accounts, in 2006, there were four dominant DTOs: the Tijuana/Arellano Felix organization (AFO), the Sinaloa cartel, the Ju\u00e1rez/Vicente Carillo Fuentes organization (CFO), and the Gulf cartel. Since then, the more stable large organizations have fractured. In recent years, the DEA has identified the following organizations as dominant: Sinaloa, Los Zetas, Tijuana/AFO, Ju\u00e1rez/CFO, Beltr\u00e1n Leyva, Gulf, and La Familia Michoacana. In some sense, these organizations might be viewed as the \u201ctraditional\u201d DTOs, although the 7 organizations appear to have fragmented to at least 9 (or as many as 20) major organizations. New crime groups have emerged since Mexican President Enrique Pe\u00f1a Nieto\u2019s inauguration in December 2012, so he has faced an increasingly complex crime situation. The major DTOs and new crime groups have furthered their expansion into such illicit activity as extortion, kidnapping for ransom, and oil syphoning, posing a governance challenge to President Pe\u00f1a Nieto as daunting as that faced by his predecessors.\nFormer Mexican President Felipe Calder\u00f3n (2006-2012) initiated an aggressive campaign against Mexico\u2019s drug traffickers that was a defining policy of his government and one that the DTOs violently resisted. Operations to eliminate DTO leaders sparked organizational change that led to significant instability among the groups and continued violence. Such violence appears to be rising again in Mexico. More than 2,000 homicides were registered in January 2017, more than in any January since the government began publishing national crime data in the late 1980s.\nAlthough the Mexican government no longer estimates organized crime-related homicides, some independent analysts have claimed that murders linked to organized crime may have exceeded 100,000 since 2006, when President Calder\u00f3n began his campaign against the DTOs. Mexico\u2019s government reported that the annual number of all homicides in Mexico declined after Calder\u00f3n left office in 2012 by about 16% in 2013 and 15% in 2014, only to rise in 2015 and 2016. In 2016, the Mexican government reported a 22% increase in all homicides to 22,932, almost reaching the high point of nearly 23,000 murders in 2011, Mexico\u2019s most violent year.\nThe 115th Congress remains concerned about security conditions inside Mexico and the illicit drug trade. The Mexican DTOs are the major wholesalers of illegal drugs in the United States and are increasingly gaining control of U.S. retail-level distribution. This report examines how the organized crime landscape has been significantly altered by fragmentation and how the organizational shape-shifting continues. For more background, see CRS Report R41349, U.S.-Mexican Security Cooperation: The M\u00e9rida Initiative and Beyond and CRS In Focus IF10400, Heroin Production in Mexico and U.S. Policy.", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORTS", "active": true, "formats": [ { "format": "HTML", "encoding": "utf-8", "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/R41576", "sha1": "f0d88054e09ee8adee5cd104bab167aab1e1d5a0", "filename": "files/20170331_R41576_f0d88054e09ee8adee5cd104bab167aab1e1d5a0.html", "images": null }, { "format": "PDF", "encoding": null, "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/pdf/R41576", "sha1": "6319e6d5029dbc72c7cdec3c6c01f9fae84d2811", "filename": "files/20170331_R41576_6319e6d5029dbc72c7cdec3c6c01f9fae84d2811.pdf", "images": null } ], "topics": [ { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4793, "name": "Drug Control" }, { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4878, "name": "International Terrorism, Trafficking, & Crime" }, { "source": "IBCList", "id": 4883, "name": "Border Security" } ] }, { "source": "EveryCRSReport.com", "id": 443605, "date": "2015-07-22", "retrieved": "2016-04-06T18:45:37.573555", "title": "Mexico: Organized Crime and Drug Trafficking Organizations", "summary": "Reversing a fairly robust record of capturing and imprisoning leaders of Mexico\u2019s drug trafficking organizations (DTOs), the escape of notorious cartel leader Joaqu\u00edn \u201cEl Chapo\u201d Guzm\u00e1n on July 11, 2015, was a huge setback for the Mexican government already beleaguered by charges of corruption and low approval ratings. Mexico\u2019s efforts to combat drug traffickers have touched all of the major organizations that once dominated the illicit drug trade: for example, the February 2014 capture of Guzm\u00e1n who leads Sinaloa, Mexico\u2019s largest drug franchise; top leaders of Los Zetas in 2013 and March 2015; the October 2014 arrests of Hector Beltr\u00e1n Leyva of the Beltr\u00e1n Leyva Organization and, later, of Vicente Carrillo Fuentes of the once-dominant Ju\u00e1rez cartel. \nThe DTOs have been in constant flux in recent years. By some accounts, in December 2006 there were four dominant DTOs: the Tijuana/Arellano Felix organization (AFO), the Sinaloa cartel, the Ju\u00e1rez/Vicente Carillo Fuentes organization (CFO), and the Gulf cartel. Since then, the more stable large organizations have fractured into many more groups. In recent years, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) identified the following organizations as dominant: Sinaloa, Los Zetas, Tijuana/AFO, Ju\u00e1rez/CFO, Beltr\u00e1n Leyva, Gulf, and La Familia Michoacana. In some sense, these might be viewed as the \u201ctraditional\u201d DTOs. However, many analysts suggest that those 7 seem to have now fragmented to 9 or as many as 20 major organizations.\nSeveral analysts estimate there have been at least 80,000 homicides linked to organized crime since 2006. Few dispute that the annual tally of organized crime-related homicides in Mexico has declined since 2011, although there is disagreement about the rate of decline. It appears that the steep increase in organized crime-related homicides during the six-year administration of Mexican President Felipe Calder\u00f3n (2006-2012) is likely to trend down far more slowly than it rose. The Mexican government no longer publishes data on organized crime-related homicides. However, the government reported the rate of all homicides in Mexico has declined by 30% since 2012 (roughly 15% in 2013, and another 15% in 2014). Although murder rates have diminished, the incidence of other violent crimes targeting Mexican citizens, such as kidnapping and extortion, has increased through 2013 and stayed elevated. Notably, questions about the accuracy of the government\u2019s crime statistics persist.\nFormer President Calder\u00f3n made his aggressive campaign against the DTOs a defining policy of his government, which the DTOs violently resisted. Operations to eliminate DTO leaders sparked organizational change that led to significantly greater instability among the groups and continued violence. Since his inauguration in December 2012, Mexican President Enrique Pe\u00f1a Nieto has faced an increasingly complex crime situation. The major DTOs have fragmented, and new crime groups have emerged. Meanwhile, the DTOs and other criminal gangs furthered their expansion into other illegal activities, such as extortion, kidnapping, and oil theft, and the organizations now pose a multi-faceted organized criminal challenge to governance in Mexico no less threatening to the rule of law than the challenge that faced Pe\u00f1a Nieto\u2019s predecessor. According to the Pe\u00f1a Nieto Administration, 93 of the 122 top criminal targets that their government has identified have been arrested or otherwise \u201cneutralized\u201d (killed in arrest efforts) as of May 2015, although Guzm\u00e1n\u2019s escape confounds that achievement.\nCongress remains concerned about security conditions inside Mexico and the illicit drug trade. The Mexican DTOs are the major wholesalers of illegal drugs in the United States and are increasingly gaining control of U.S. retail-level distribution through alliances with U.S. gangs. This report provides background on drug trafficking and organized crime inside Mexico: it identifies the major DTOs, and it examines how the organized crime \u201clandscape\u201d has been significantly altered by fragmentation. For more background, see CRS Report R42917, Mexico: Background and U.S. Relations, CRS Report IF10160, The Rule of Law in Mexico and the M\u00e9rida Initiative, and CRS Report R41349, U.S.-Mexican Security Cooperation: The M\u00e9rida Initiative and Beyond.", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORTS", "active": true, "formats": [ { "format": "HTML", "encoding": "utf-8", "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/R41576", "sha1": "e5465cd57d7518ce6361ec889b62aba414f1cff2", "filename": "files/20150722_R41576_e5465cd57d7518ce6361ec889b62aba414f1cff2.html", "images": null }, { "format": "PDF", "encoding": null, "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/pdf/R41576", "sha1": "f17c19f8e7eae318997b929b074f461d00468d09", "filename": "files/20150722_R41576_f17c19f8e7eae318997b929b074f461d00468d09.pdf", "images": null } ], "topics": [ { "source": "IBCList", "id": 272, "name": "International Trafficking and Crime" }, { "source": "IBCList", "id": 471, "name": "Border Security and Management" } ] }, { "source": "University of North Texas Libraries Government Documents Department", "sourceLink": "https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc817195/", "id": "R41576_2013Apr15", "date": "2013-04-15", "retrieved": "2016-03-19T13:57:26", "title": "Mexico\u2019s Drug Trafficking Organizations: Source and Scope of the Violence", "summary": null, "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORT", "active": false, "formats": [ { "format": "PDF", "filename": "files/20130415_R41576_be73e5a20488558cab7aa6db09ae9a3c133425ba.pdf" }, { "format": "HTML", "filename": "files/20130415_R41576_be73e5a20488558cab7aa6db09ae9a3c133425ba.html" } ], "topics": [] }, { "source": "University of North Texas Libraries Government Documents Department", "sourceLink": "https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc93854/", "id": "R41576_2012Jun08", "date": "2012-06-08", "retrieved": "2012-07-24T12:39:36", "title": "Mexico's Drug Trafficking Organizations: Source and Scope of the Rising Violence", "summary": "This report provides background on drug trafficking in Mexico: it identifies the major drug trafficking organizations (DTOs); how the organized crime \u201clandscape\u201d has been altered by fragmentation; and analyzes the context, scope, and scale of the violence. It examines current trends of the violence, analyzes prospects for curbing violence in the future, and compares it with violence in Colombia.", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORT", "active": false, "formats": [ { "format": "PDF", "filename": "files/20120608_R41576_746470757c66f59330dcb3c918513b9cd830414e.pdf" }, { "format": "HTML", "filename": "files/20120608_R41576_746470757c66f59330dcb3c918513b9cd830414e.html" } ], "topics": [ { "source": "LIV", "id": "Foreign relations -- Mexico -- U.S.", "name": "Foreign relations -- Mexico -- U.S." }, { "source": "LIV", "id": "Foreign relations -- U.S. -- Mexico", "name": "Foreign relations -- U.S. -- Mexico" }, { "source": "LIV", "id": "Drug traffic", "name": "Drug traffic" }, { "source": "LIV", "id": "Crime and criminals", "name": "Crime and criminals" } ] }, { "source": "University of North Texas Libraries Government Documents Department", "sourceLink": "https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc93853/", "id": "R41576_2011Sep07", "date": "2011-09-07", "retrieved": "2012-07-24T12:39:36", "title": "Mexico's Drug Trafficking Organizations: Source and Scope of the Rising Violence", "summary": "This report provides background on drug trafficking in Mexico, identifies the major drug trafficking organizations, and analyzes the context, scope, and scale of the violence. It examines current trends of the violence, analyzes prospects for curbing violence in the future, and compares it with violence in Colombia.", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORT", "active": false, "formats": [ { "format": "PDF", "filename": "files/20110907_R41576_289e10d5a98a825fc93b90059335019f5f360df9.pdf" }, { "format": "HTML", "filename": "files/20110907_R41576_289e10d5a98a825fc93b90059335019f5f360df9.html" } ], "topics": [ { "source": "LIV", "id": "Drugs and crime", "name": "Drugs and crime" }, { "source": "LIV", "id": "Criminal justice", "name": "Criminal justice" }, { "source": "LIV", "id": "Crime and criminals", "name": "Crime and criminals" } ] }, { "source": "University of North Texas Libraries Government Documents Department", "sourceLink": "https://digital.library.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc227700/", "id": "R41576_2011Jan07", "date": "2011-01-07", "retrieved": "2013-11-05T18:07:05", "title": "Mexico's Drug Trafficking Organizations: Source and Scope of the Rising Violence", "summary": "Report which provides background on drug trafficking in Mexico, identifies the major drug trafficking organizations, and analyzes the context, scope, and scale of the violence. It examines current trends of the violence, analyzes prospects for curbing violence in the future, and compares it with violence in Colombia.", "type": "CRS Report", "typeId": "REPORT", "active": false, "formats": [ { "format": "PDF", "filename": "files/20110107_R41576_c2f99019e3bebabb391ec3773ff827f6f326644e.pdf" }, { "format": "HTML", "filename": "files/20110107_R41576_c2f99019e3bebabb391ec3773ff827f6f326644e.html" } ], "topics": [ { "source": "LIV", "id": "Drugs and crime", "name": "Drugs and crime" }, { "source": "LIV", "id": "Criminal justice", "name": "Criminal justice" }, { "source": "LIV", "id": "Crime and criminals", "name": "Crime and criminals" } ] } ], "topics": [ "Foreign Affairs", "Intelligence and National Security", "Latin American Affairs", "National Defense" ] }