Four opposing Mexican drug cartels indiscriminately kill to declare supremacy over an 80-mile stretch of resorts along the Caribbean coasthttps://nypost.com/2024/02/22/us-news/associates-of-mexican-president-reportedly-linked-to-drug-cartels-doj-says-hes-not-under-investigation/ to claim the country’s $30 billion tourism income, private investigator Jay Armes III informed Fox News Digital.
In the process, visitors from around the world — have become collateral damage, seen horrible violence, or “just vanish, wiped off, never to be seen, Armes said.
Over the last two weeks, cartel associates mutilated competing gang members with machetes in tourist hot spot Cancun; a California woman was slayed in the clash near a common Tulum beach; and a kidnapped New York man was left in an isolated jungle with his eyes taped shut.
And that’s just what appeared in the national news.
It’s all shocking to us, but to individuals in Mexico, it’s just another day. This occurs all the time all over the nation, Armes said. But now it’s happening in parts that used to be restricted.
About 20 years ago, the leader of the cartels lived by a “code like to the Italian mob, famous PI said.
In the old days, you were not permitted to aim women or children. You were not permitted to intrude on another cartel’s territory. And the resorts were off-limits. … Cartels required to operate under the radar as much as they could.
Shooting broke out on a beach in Mexico’s Caribbean coast resort of Cancun, sending tourists running for cover.
A murdered foreigner in a tourist area, particularly an American, brought unwelcome attention and “compulsory, swift” action from the Mexican government, military and police, Armes said.
Government heads needed to protect tourism, which has been the country’s authorized economic foundation for years.
In 2022 alone, there were 66 million international guests, including approximately 34 million U.S. tourists, according to Mexico’s Ministry of Tourism and Statista, respectively.
Most of the tourists arrived through Cancun International Airport, which received 36.1% of all incoming travelers, according to a January statement by travelinglifestyle.net, to holiday along the beautiful, white sand beaches, thinking they were protected from cartel violence.
In reality, they’ve developed into a war zone.
The regulations have altered, Armes said. All that old code is out the window. The resorts are open for business.
He informed how travel bloggers and media influencers have attracted a surge of tourists that the cartel has never seen previously.
Who we see as visitors are potential clients or potential victims to the cartels, Armes said. Even if it’s 1% or 5% (of visitors to the resort zones), that’s millions of clients and a big chunk of business.
Ames further stated the “young kids” coming up through cartels have no respect for anyone.
Four main cartels controlled all the business in those areas. That comprises El Chapo’s old cartel, the Sinaloa Cartel; the Gulf Cartel; the Jalisco New Generation Cartel; and the Grupo Regional, a “smaller” cartel formed by former Zetas, viciously violent cartel enforcers, Armes said.
With all these new kids coming up (through the cartel ranks), there’s no respect for anything, he said. It’s developed as a free-for-all.
Travelers are dragged into the violence, either as marks for robberies or sex trafficking or as innocent onlookers in the wrong place at the wrong time.
One of the unfortunate outcomes of the drug wars and drug trafficking is, inevitably, some innocent individual is going to get trapped in the crossfire when the cartels are firing at each other, Armes said.
That’s what occurred to 44-year-old Los Angeles native Niko Honarbakhsh, according to the Quintana Roo State Attorney General’s Office.
On Feb. 9, Honarbakhsh was slayed, with a drug trader from Belize who had cocaine and “see-through bags with red and orange pills” as well as bags with “brown ground powder” in his custody when he was killed, the local Mexican AG’s office said.
That’s unlike the men who were hacked to death in Cancun, Armes said.
That was violence among drug sellers. That was a very public murder and that was intended to be a warning, he said. When they leave the dead to be found in the trunk of a car, inside a car on the street, in a public area hanging from a bridge, a cartel is conveying a message to a rival cartel or putting horror into the politicians. The region is taking a backward turn to the worst.
