"Socalj" for Borderland Beat
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“Sol Prendido” for Borderland Beat
The Chapiza mob is either winning or losing the civil war depending on who you ask.
For this broadcast, a captured Mayiza member finds himself having to utter what he was coached to say.
Does it mean it’s true? Again, it all comes down to who’s forcing him to claim this. The only thing certain here is that he won’t be walking away alive from this room.
His captors plan to remove him from the land of the living once his usefulness as a prop in another one of their videos is over.
Source: LaMVrg133
“Sol Prendido” for Borderland Beat
The arrest of "El Botox," leader of Los Blancos de Troya, has been reported in a joint operation in Michoacán. He was considered a priority target by state and federal authorities.
Cesar Alejandro Sepúlveda Arellano, “El Botox,” leader of the Los Blancos de Troya cartel and considered a priority target by authorities, was arrested this Thursday in a joint operation in Michoacán.
The criminal leader is charged with extortion against lemon producers and his probable responsibility in the murders of Bernardo Bravo Manríquez and Hipólito Mora Chávez.
The capture was confirmed by the head of the Secretariat of Security and Citizen Protection (SSPC), Omar García Harfuch, who reported that the arrest was achieved “in a joint operation by @Defensamx1 @SEMAR_mx @SSPCMexico @FiscaliaMich and authorities of the state of Michoacán,” and specified that it is “Carlos (sic) Alejandro N ‘Botox’, a priority target and generator of violence in Michoacán. The main extortionist of lemon growers and responsible for several homicides.” He added that “more information will follow…”
For his part, the governor of Michoacán, Alfredo Ramírez Bedolla, highlighted that the arrest was the result of intelligence work and coordination between federal and state agencies.
“Thanks to intelligence work and the excellent coordination between the Secretariat of Security and Citizen Protection of the Government of Mexico, SEDENA, SEMAR, the State Attorney General's Office and the Undersecretariat of Specialized Investigation (SIE) of the Michoacán Public Security Secretariat, we achieved the arrest of Carlos (sic) Alejandro ‘N’, alias ‘Botox’, a priority target and generator of violence in our state,” he wrote.
The state governor emphasized that with this apprehension “we are dealing a decisive blow against extortion of our lemon producers and making progress in the fight against impunity,” and acknowledged the participating agencies. Similarly, the Attorney General of Michoacán, Carlos Torres Piña, reported that the arrest was made possible thanks to coordinated efforts between the armed forces, security agencies, and prosecutors' offices.
“Thanks to the coordinated and strategic work between the Secretariat of National Defense (Sedena), the Secretariat of the Navy (Semar), the Secretariat of Security and Citizen Protection, the State Public Security Secretariat, the State Attorney General's Office, and the Attorney General's Office of the Republic, we achieved the capture of a criminal target, identified as a generator of violence in the Apatzingán region,” he stated.
Torres Piña affirmed that this result reflects the importance of inter-institutional cooperation. “This result demonstrates that inter-institutional coordination and the exchange of information strengthen our efforts to continue on the path of building peace,” he emphasized.
Cesar Alejandro Sepúlveda Arellano is identified by federal and state authorities as one of the main criminal operators in the Tierra Caliente region, particularly in Apatzingán, where he allegedly led extortion activities against agricultural producers, especially in the lime sector, one of the most affected by protection rackets in recent years.
In addition to extortion, “El Bótox” is being investigated for his probable involvement in the murders of Bernardo Bravo Manriquez and Hipólito Mora Chávez, the latter a former self-defense leader and public figure in the fight against criminal groups in Michoacán. These murders generated a strong social and political impact in the state.
It is expected that in the coming hours, information will be released regarding his legal status, his transfer to a judge, and the formal charges he will face.
The arrest of “El Bótox” is part of a series of recent operations against high-priority targets in Michoacán, in a context of reinforced federal presence and social pressure to curb the violence and extortion affecting producing communities in the region.
Sources: Contramuro, Borderland Beat Archives
“Sol Prendido” for Borderland Beat
The Attorney General's Office of the State of Sinaloa (FGE) has activated the Alba Protocol to locate Nicole Pardo Molina, a 20-year-old woman who was reported missing on January 20, 2026, in the city of Culiacán.
“Sol Prendido” for Borderland Beat
Four men accused in the beating and stabbing death of a man outside a Chula Vista restaurant more than 20 years ago entered not guilty pleas Tuesday morning.
The defendants arraigned include 50-year-old José Roque García, 42-year-old Carlos Herrera, 41-year-old Marco Herrera, and 43-year-old Franco Dominguez.
“Sol Prendido” for Borderland Beat
The influencer “La Nicolette” was allegedly abducted in the Isla Musala neighborhood of Culiacán.
Local media in Culiacán, Sinaloa, are reporting the kidnapping of Nicole Pardo Molina, aka “La Nicholette," a famous influencer in the area, who was abducted by at least three armed men who intercepted her while she was in Isla Musala.
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SSPC Director Omar Harfuch confirmed that 37 criminals were taken to the US and on to Washington, D.C., Houston, New York, Pennsylvania, San Antonio and San Diego; aboard 7 aircraft.
“With this transfer, 92 high-impact criminals have now been sent to the U.S. during this administration, and they will no longer be able to generate violence in our country,” the Secretary of Security reported.
“Sol Prendido” for Borderland Beat
Mexican authorities point to the growing influence of Fausto Isidro, once a mid-level regional crime boss, in drug trafficking to the United States
The dust has settled from the latest war within the Sinaloa Cartel, revealing the shape of what remains of the surviving criminal structures after 15 months of fighting. The infighting between factions has left the main ones battered, especially Los Chapitos, commanded by the sons of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, the old regional drug lord. Of the four sons, only two remain at large, living on the run and stripped of their key lieutenants, who have either been killed or captured. Their enemies — the sons and followers of their father’s former partner, Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada — have emerged stronger from the war. But the biggest victory in all this violent chaos belongs to neither faction.
A new “Chapo” is emerging in Sinaloa, less media-savvy than his predecessor, but just as capable of exporting drugs north. Security sources consulted by EL PAÍS indicate that the main beneficiary of the cartel war is, beyond a doubt, the group led by Fausto Isidro Meza Flores, alias “El Chapo" Isidro. One of the U.S. government’s biggest enemies, Meza Flores runs a major operation producing and trafficking synthetic drugs, fentanyl, and methamphetamine, primarily in northern Sinaloa, especially in Los Mochis and Guasave. “He exports more drugs than everyone else,” one of the sources asserts. “He’s the big winner of the war; he’s very powerful,” the same source adds, a surprising statement given the events of December.
In the final weeks of last year, Mexican authorities virtually wiped out one of the pillars of El Chapo Isidro’s faction, the Inzunza family. On December 1, marines killed the son, Pedro Inzunza Coronel, alias “El Pichón,” in Choix, a small municipality inland from the coastal city of Los Mochis. “[El Pichón] started shooting at the Navy helicopter, and they returned fire,” a source familiar with the federal security cabinet meetings noted. Several other arrests were also made in that operation. On New Year’s Eve, the National Guard arrested the father, Pedro Inzunza Noriega, alias “Sagitario,” 62, in Culiacán, the state capital. Unlike the previous arrest, this one was made without a single shot being fired.
One would think that the downfall of the Noriegas, the first criminals accused of narco-terrorism by the U.S., had dealt a significant blow to El Chapo Isidro’s group. The Trump administration, in fact, considered the Noriegas to be the leaders of the faction. In a statement released in May, the U.S. Department of Justice placed them at the head of the “Beltrán Leyva organization,” named after the family that founded the faction more than 20 years ago, now fallen from grace, with the Beltrán Leyva brothers either dead or in prison. “This organization, under the leadership of Inzunza Noriega, is allegedly responsible for some of the largest seizures of fentanyl and cocaine destined for the United States in history,” said the FBI agent in charge of the Noriega investigation at the time.
In Mexico, the interpretation is different. To begin with, authorities place El Chapo Isidro at the head of the faction, even above the son of Alfredo Beltrán Leyva, one of the founding brothers, who is serving a sentence in the United States. This son, Jesús Alfredo Beltrán, alias “El Mochomito,” is another target of the Trump administration, although not at the level of El Chapo Isidro, who a few months ago was added to the FBI’s list of the 10 most wanted fugitives. To give an idea of the scale of the new Chapo’s operation, one of the sources consulted stated: “I wouldn’t say that [the fall of the Noriega brothers] affected his operation. If anything, it was a blow to his morale.”
Little is known about El Chapo Isidro. In a profile prepared a few years ago by Cenapi, an analysis center of the former Attorney General’s Office, researchers placed his birth on June 19, 1982, in Navojoa, just across the regional border in the neighboring state of Sonora. It is unknown how he arrived in Sinaloa. “His strength was scrap metal; he dismantled ships in Guasave, at Las Glorias beach and El Colorado, and sold the scrap. He was involved [in drug trafficking], but he wasn’t very important,” says a Sinaloa security force agent, consulted about him.
Sometime in the first decade of this century, Meza Flores began to accumulate power. The Beltrán Leyva brothers — Arturo, above all, then Alfredo, and finally Héctor — cousins of El Chapo Guzmán, ran their own network exporting cocaine, methamphetamine, and heroin to the United States. Their group and Guzmán’s operated in parallel, without any issues. But at the end of the decade, the situation changed. In January 2008, authorities arrested Alfredo Beltrán, a capture his brothers attributed to a betrayal by El Chapo Guzmán. In May of that year, hitmen gunned down one of his sons, Édgar Guzmán López, in a shopping mall in Culiacán.
That war — like the one waged over the last 15 months by the rest of El Chapo’s sons against the faction loyal to El Mayo — resulted in thousands of murders, a fragmentation of the country’s drug trafficking structures, and their militarization, a situation that explains the present panorama and the last 20 years of violence. El Chapo Isidro thrived in the ruins of that first war. The only surviving member of the Beltrán Leyva cartel, Héctor, took refuge in Nayarit, from where he rebuilt his organization, notorious in recent years for its alleged ties to former Secretary of Defense Salvador Cienfuegos, as documented by U.S. authorities. Héctor was arrested in 2014 and died, supposedly of a heart attack, in 2018.
Once in Sinaloa, El Chapo Isidro grew up in the criminal corridor along the northern coast, between Los Mochis and Guasave, where authorities made the largest fentanyl seizure in the country’s recent history: over a ton, in December 2024. He rose to power under the wing of his uncles, Agustín and Salomé Flores Apodaca. After the former’s arrest in 2012 and subsequent extradition, El Chapo Isidro took command of the faction. “He inherited the entire Beltrán Leyva business, overseeing Guasave and the surrounding mountains, all the way to León Fonseca and Sinaloa de Leyva,” says the Sinaloa security forces agent.
From 2011 to 2020, Mexican authorities arrested him at least four times, according to Cenapi’s records, for serious crimes such as organized crime, drug trafficking, kidnapping, and weapons possession. For some reason, none of these resulted in him being imprisoned. The Mexico Attorney General’s Office has at least 15 open investigations against him. In the United States, the U.S. Attorney’s Offices in Southern California and the District of Columbia filed separate indictments against him for conspiring to traffic cocaine, methamphetamine, and heroin into the country, and for using weapons in that conspiracy. But, for now, he remains a target
Source: El País
“Sol Prendido” for Borderland Beat
It has become common to hear that, for Trump to be on favorable terms with Mexico, we must attack drug trafficking. Controlling organized crime, it is said, is Trump's main objective.
The problem with these assertions is that, while they align with Trump's rhetoric, they don't match his actions. What Trump's actions reveal is that the US president doesn't care about drug trafficking.
Let's start with the obvious. If Trump truly wanted to destroy organized crime and reduce fentanyl overdose deaths, he would start by fighting within the main stronghold of global drug trafficking and its main source of income: the United States itself.
Not only is this not happening, but several Trump policies are openly geared in the opposite direction.
Trump has facilitated the sale of weapons within the United States (many of which end up in the hands of drug traffickers), has cut billions of dollars from state health services budgets (reducing addiction treatment), has reduced housing support for homeless people (which is expected to further increase addictions), and, in the height of cynicism, has pardoned convicted drug traffickers (such as former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernández).
Trump's true interest, as it was in Venezuela and as it is in almost all his actions, is economic.
Drug trafficking is merely an excuse that Trump is using to extract all kinds of economic concessions from Mexico, from a more favorable negotiation of the USMCA to special favors for American industries or companies.
The drug trafficking excuse is perfect for Trump because the problem cannot be solved from Mexico. It doesn't matter how much Mexico does. It doesn't matter how many people it arrests or how many drugs it confiscates; drug trafficking will continue as long as the United States has a multi-million dollar market of captive consumers. Just yesterday, El País reported that a new Chapo has emerged in Sinaloa. Drug trafficking is, in Trumpian terms, the best bargaining chip Trump could have found. It's an issue that will keep Mexico running in circles, constantly giving in without ever reaching a solution. It must be acknowledged that Trump's idea of finding and using this excuse is diabolically brilliant.
For all these reasons, it is urgent that Mexican negotiators stop making decisions based on what Trump says he wants and start making them based on what Trump reveals as his true preferences through his actions.
If the goal is for Trump to be on better terms with Mexico, the focus, rather than on security matters, should be on economic issues.
That is, Mexico should maintain certain visible actions against drug trafficking, but it should focus the majority of its resources and talent on developing a strategy that helps Trump fight his most desired economic battle: competing with China. To the extent that Trump sees Mexico as indispensable in waging this economic battle, Mexico will be protected against the volatility of the United States.
Sources: Milenio, Borderland Beat Archives
“Sol Prendido” for Borderland Beat
The incident occurred at 7:10 p.m. on Amapola Street
Authorities are conducting the corresponding investigations.
On Friday night, January 16, the bodies of two women were found in the Juntas de Humaya neighborhood in Culiacán.
According to initial reports, at approximately 7:10 p.m., a call was received at the emergency number reporting gunshots on Amapola Street, near the corner of Alley number 3.
Following the report, security forces went to the scene and, upon arrival, confirmed the discovery of two young women with gunshot wounds, who showed no signs of life.
According to information released by security sources, one of the women was identified as Ivonne Daniela "N", who was said to be around 18 years old, while the other victim was named Michel "N". According to unofficial reports, she was a minor and approximately 14 years old.
The area was cordoned off to preserve the crime scene, while personnel from the Attorney General's Office carried out the corresponding procedures. Subsequently, the bodies were transferred to the Forensic Medical Service facilities.
Sources: El Sol de Sinaloa, Los Noticieristas
BY: CHAR
THIS ARTICLE WAS POSTED BY INFORMADOR MX AND WRITTEN BY: RUBI BOBADILLA
The arrests took place inside a house located in the Las Cañadas neighborhood of the municipality of Zapopan.
“Sol Prendido” for Borderland Beat
In two separate incidents in Ensenada, Jesús Romo, alias El Norris, and El Chakyn, both operators of a faction of Los Chapos dedicated to transporting goods between Baja California and Baja California Sur, were murdered.
El Norris was attacked at around 10:20 a.m. last Thursday, when gunshots were reported at the intersection of Lázaro Cárdenas and Primera streets, in the Ex Ejido Chapultepec neighbourhood, in front of an Oxxo store.
Two days later, Efraín Valadez, alias El Chakin, was shot dead on Emilio Abreu Street, in the San Borja neighbourhood, specifically in the parking lot of a Seven Eleven store.
The victim was taken to a police vehicle with the intention of transferring him to a hospital for medical attention; however, he was pronounced dead during the journey. The State Attorney General's Office (FGE) is in charge of the investigation.
Source: Zeta Tijuana
“Sol Prendido” for Borderland Beat
The number easily exceeds 200 people of different ages, mainly young men and women, in Río Bravo.
The number of people reported missing is unfortunately growing, and their personal information and photographs, which are becoming increasingly numerous, are being displayed in the corridors of the People's House.
The number easily exceeds 200 people of various ages, mainly young men and women, from the local area and surrounding municipalities, mostly from Reynosa and Matamoros, among others.
In some cases, based on information provided by their families, who are seeking help from the general public, they have been reported missing for several months; in other cases, for years. These are people who left their homes and never returned or were seen again, and their families are still searching for them.
In the state, according to reports from the Lupa Network, as of May 2025, there are 13,468 people registered as missing, placing the state as the third with the most cases in the country, with the majority concentrated in the neighboring city of Reynosa.
Source: El Mañana
By "El Huaso" for Borderland Beat
“Sol Prendido” for Borderland Beat
On Monday, a posthumous tribute was held for high school student Gabriel Alonso, who died last week after being struck by a stray bullet in an attack by organized crime in the town of La Constancia, in the municipality of Nombre de Dios, Durango.
La Constancia is located about 51 kilometers from Durango City.
According to El Siglo de Durango, his mother, Beatriz Herrera, lamented his death and blamed "evil" for taking his life during the tribute at the José Vasconcelos High School.
At the ceremony, students, teachers, and school staff remembered the 12-year-old boy for his joy and love of soccer. One of his teachers described him as "a boy full of life, with beautiful eyes."
As part of honoring the boy's memory, a roll call was taken, and then the students released white balloons into the sky.
Herrera rejected the idea that her son's death was due to God's will and instead blamed the insecurity in Durango, which makes it impossible to travel without fearing for the lives of one's children. The woman also reported that instead of receiving support, she has been harassed by the authorities.
Gabriel Alonso's funeral was held on January 8th at the Durango Cathedral, after he died on a stretch of the Durango-Zacatecas highway during a confrontation between armed civilians and the National Guard.
The family was receiving assistance due to a mechanical failure when the officers were attacked.
Imagen Televisión reported that the minor and a National Guard officer, identified as Juan Ramírez, lost their lives in the confrontation that occurred on January 6th, Three Kings' Day.
Source: El Siglo de Torreón
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