Capture of Mexican Drug Lords Changes Trafficking But Doesn't Stop It Christopher Sherman and Katherine Corcoran - The Associated Press
go to original February 28, 2015

Mexico’s top drug lord gets paraded before the cameras — here’s what it looked like (Fusion/Tania Miranda)

It's another big score for the Mexican government, which has been tearing through its list of most-wanted drug lords in recent years.

Still, no one expects drug trafficking or violence to decrease after the capture of Servando "La Tuta" Gomez, a former grade-school teacher whose Knights Templar cartel once terrorized the western state of Michoacan.

Crime will only shift around as the now weakened cartel regroups, or even splinters, as has happened with some of Mexico's drug gangs after the killings or capture of top leaders. Others continue business as usual after top leadership hits.

"Dismantling them was a necessary step, but that does not end the problem of insecurity," Alejandro Hope, a Mexico City-based security analyst, said of the Knights Templar. "The next part is more complicated. There are still small groups, remnants, which will be extorting, robbing and perhaps even producing methamphetamine."

Gomez, 49, was arrested early Friday as he left a house in Morelia, the capital of Michoacan, along with eight bodyguards and associates toting a grenade launcher, three grenades, an Uzi machine pistol and assault rifles, National Security Commissioner Monte Alejandro Rubido said.

They were taken without a shot fired after a months-long intelligence stakeout.

Read the rest at New Europe

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