'Hot Land' Is Teeming with Gangs, and Violence There May be About to Get Worse Christopher Woody - Business Insider
go to original September 10, 2016

View of the police helicopter wreckage which was shot down during an operation to capture leaders of an unidentified criminal, on September 7, 2016 in Michoacan state, Mexico. (Pedro Pardo/AFP/Getty Images)

On Tuesday, unidentified gunmen reportedly shot down a Mexican government helicopter in the restive southwest state of Michoacan.

The downing came amid a series of gun battles between Mexican security forces and members of one of the many gangs operating in the region.

The possibility that these gunmen knocked a helicopter out of the sky not only demonstrates the firepower that these criminal groups have; it is also a sign that organized crime in Michoacan and the surrounding area has not been rooted out — and that violence related to it could get much worse.

The fighting broke out on Tuesday afternoon after the attempted kidnapping of a local businessman in Michoacan's Tierra Caliente region. Local residents responded to fight off the would-be kidnappers, and the arrival of Mexican security forces initiated the gun battles that ultimately led to the helicopter's downing, which killed five.

Since then, however, a confused picture of the groups involved has emerged, reflecting the fractured and uncertain state of the criminal underworld in Michoacan and the region around it.

Michoacan was the stomping ground of the Knights Templar, or Caballeros Templarios, cartel from about 2010 until about 2014, when pushback from local civilian-defense groups and the heavy deployment of federal security forces fractured and weakened it.

What was left on the criminal landscape were remnants of the Knights Templar, regional groups, and a new entrant in the area: the Jalisco New Generation cartel (CJNG), which is now one of the country's most powerful criminal organizations.

...In all, according to officials at the 43rd Military Zone of Apatzingán in Michoacan state, there are 12 criminal groups operating in the state, all them allied with either the Knights Templar or the CJNG.

Read the rest at Chron

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