Vigilante Group Turns 11 Detained as Suspected Criminals Over to Authorities Mark Stevenson - Associated Press
go to original February 9, 2013

Outraged at relentless extortion, kidnapping and theft as a wave of drug-related violence washes over Mexico, farmers, shopkeepers and other residents in the mountainous southern state of Guerrero are taking the law into their own hands as "community police." (ntdtv.org)

MEXICO CITY - Mexican farmers who took up arms against drug-gang violence and other crime in the mountains of southern Mexico have turned over to authorities 11 of 53 people that the vigilantes have put in improvised jails over the last month as suspected criminals.

Bruno Placido, leader of the self-styled "self-defence" movement, described the 11 as the detainees accused by local residents of the most serious crimes, such as murder, kidnapping and extortion. He said they were turned over to state and federal officials.

The authorities will presumably weigh bringing charges against the detainees, but given that the suspects were taken and held with no legal authority, in some cases for weeks, any prosecution might prove difficult.

The government of the Pacific coast state of Guerrero, where the vigilante movement sprang up after a series of kidnappings in early January, said that Placido's group had agreed to turn over "the first 20" detainees, implying that more would eventually follow.

But Placido said an assembly of residents in the township of Ayutla would determine the next step.

Read the whole story at Canada.com

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