American teen "Juanito Pistolas" was killed but with his head intact

By Chivis Martinez Borderland Beat 

 "I am a criminal and so I am going to die, I am a zeta until death," so says one of the songs dedicated to Jaunito.

Juanito Pistoles

A ghastly image of a dead assassin with his head blown off  made the rounds, as did  subsequent reports that it was “Juanito Pistoles”.  This set off a debate here at Borderland Beat, suicide or gun blast?  At least that part of the debate is settled, the person sitting upright, weapon at attention, missing his head, was not "Juanito".

However, he was killed in the fray that day of August 27^th, in the war torn Tamaulipas city of Nuevo Laredo, but with his head intact.

This past Tuesday, in the middle of the day, there was a flurry of radio communication being transmitted between CDN assassins, warning; “Do not advance to Los Aguacates!”

For Juanito and the other assassins, they were surprised by, from elements of state police, waiting for the sicarios at the bridge known as “Los Aguacates”. The version of police [Special Operations Group of the Center for Analysis, Information and Studies of Tamaulipas (CAIET)] is when the sicarios spotted the police they began firing, and the police fired back.

As a teen assassin, his moniker was Juanito Pistoles”.  As an American his given name was Juan Francisco Díaz.

That’s right----Juanito was an American kid.

The 17 year old was recruited for a killing career at the age of 12 and said to have his first kill at 13.

A peculiar aspect of the Juanito story is that his criminal “career” began with CDN, when his father was alledgedly executed by CDN.  Dad is dead, his executioners offered Juanito a position as an assassin.  He was 12.

He eventually became a part of the bloody CDN assassin group, Tropa del Infierno' or ‘Hell Troop’.

At 17 his life was packed with stunning events enough for a couple of volumes of books.  Even his personal life was advanced; we now know he was married. 

On Tuesday, Juanito’s mother traveled to SEMEO and positively identified the body  waiting to be autopsied, as that of her son, Juan Francisco Díaz.

Reports in Mexican press state that Juanito was arrested in 2015, at which time he gained his notoriety.  Supposedly he confessed to killing scores of people, “maybe 100”.  Apparently authorities did not believe him as he was e\released allegedly “because of his age.

That is questionable because although Mexico treats young criminals with kid gloves, in cases of murder the youthful criminals are usually sent to a facility with other minors for social rehabilitation and treatment for mental disorders with psychological help.  They are then released back into society when becoming of age, or 18.  As an example look at the Ponchis case.

He was lovingly raised by his grandmother, when she died
he was 10 and alone on the streets of Mexico

Édgar Jiménez Lugo aka El Ponchis, also an American teen assassin, was sent to the Centre custodial Measures for Implementation of Freedom for Teenagers (CEMPLA)

It was on December 3 of 2010,  when elements of the Mexican Army detained Édgar Jiménez Lugo, aged 14, at the Mariano Matamoros airport in Cuernavaca, when he intended to board a plane bound for Tijuana in the company of his sister Elizabeth. "El Ponchis" was already being tracked due to a series of videos on social media networks, where he appeared torturing enemies of the South Pacific Cartel (the organization that recruited him) and confessed that he had killed at least four people.

Ponchis was released just before his 18^th birthday, back to the United States, where he had briefly reunited with his mother in San Diego, after being released to relatives in San Antonio. 

On the morning of November 26, 2013, the day he was released under a strong security operation,. Ponchis made a request before leaving; "That the federal government give him protection so that the South Pacific Cartel would not re-recruit him, or in his case, kill him."

A convoy of the Mexican Army transferred him to the International Airport of Mexico City, where he took a flight to San Antonio, Texas; or rather, towards freedom, where his family expected him.

Since then, publicly, nothing has been heard of about Ponchis.