Mexican prisons are assets of criminal organizations: Enrique Zúñiga

Las prisons have a relevant specific weight in the operation of the organizations of the organized crime in the country, says Enrique Zúñiga.

The author of the book The fight for hell. The mafias that dispute the business of the prisons of Mexicoedited by Grijalbo, points out that, at least until mid-2021, the Sinaloa Cartel (CS) maintained its domain in the prisons of eight states and shared control or disputed it in those of another seven entities; the Jalisco Nueva Generación Cartel (CJNG) in eight and disputed or maintained command in nine more; the Gulf Cartel (CG) dominated in the five and disputed or shared command in the other four.

Meanwhile, the Northeast Cartel (CNE) dominated the Nuevo Laredo prison and disputed or shared command in others in Zacatecas and Quintana Roo; The Beltran Leyva (BL), those from Querétaro, two from Sinaloa and shared with the Gulf Cartel control of Cadereyta, Nuevo León and maintained a dispute or shared command with the Sinaloa Cartel and CJNG others from Guerrero; while the Zetas Old School (ZVE) dominated that of Pachuca, Hidalgo and disputed or shared control in others of the State of Mexico.

However, it emphasizes that although criminal organizations seek to control the prisons that interest them and therefore can confront each other, in many cases they rather agree with authorities “the concession” of those “businesses.”

He stressed that there is a background, because, obviously, what is at stake there are positions of power and that “many times they do not need to be fought; rather they are conceded, they are given.”

Said from the call drug war initiated in 2006 by the government of the then president Felipe Calderonprisons in Mexico went from being governed by signs and codes to becoming criminal enterprises that serve as assets of organized crime and other powerful groups.

These places have many purposes: first, they are places where power groups settle that exercise co-government with the authorities.

The fact that they say that a criminal group arrived and settled by force in a prison is nothing more than theatrical, because there are direct agreements in which groups are granted control of those places.

Once in control, they place pieces that exercise control not only of what happens to the inmates, and the enormous diversity of illegal businesses among the prison population, such as drug dealing, but even the lucrative activities they carry out using the prisoners as employees, such as telephone extortion.

That is why there are places like the Piedras Negras Prison that at some point it served as a warehouse for drugs that did not have prison as their final destination, but were passing through the city on their way to the United States. The same thing has happened in the Los Cabos prison.

The former visitor of the National Human Rights Commission He considered that Mexican prisons are microcosms that reproduce a social world in an exacerbated way and with sometimes more violent codes.

The criminologist stressed that the changes in the criminal world outside of them are reflected inside. For example, those of Tamaulipas They went from being places full of fayuqueros to drug traffickers who, when they arrive at those places, suddenly have weapons and operators of violence.

He commented that currently the prisons of Zacatecasparticularly that of Fresnillo, is in dispute between criminal groups, who consider it to be a valuable place for their activities.

The same thing happened in Chihuahua where criminal gangs had to negotiate control spaces within their facilities.

A similar situation occurs in the East Prison of Mexico Citywhere there are several groups of power coexisting and where sometimes there are shows of strength from one and the other.

He recalled that a few years ago the penitentiary center of Big bridge, in Jalisco, where before the federal penitentiary center was closed there was a place for federal prisoners such as state prisons. In that place, the federal prison was controlled, at least in part by the Jalisco Cartel and the police station by the Sinaloa Cartel, and there were attempts to violently take control of the latter.

He mentioned that there have been cases such as the one in the prison of black stoneswhich was used by leaders of criminal organizations as a hiding place, because being a fortress not only serves so that what is inside does not get out, but also so that those from outside do not enter.

On the other hand, he stressed that large criminal organizations only seek control of certain prisons, those that are profitable for them.

That is why in Quintana Roo, for example, the dispute is over the prison of cancun and not the one in Cozumel or the one in Playa del Carmen.

The criminologist said that in federal prisons one of the biggest problems is the serious violations of the prisoners’ human rights.

In this case, it is difficult to find co-governments, although in some there are powerful groups that act with the complacency of the authorities, which allows drugs or cell phones, collections and extortion to continue entering.

Federal prisons show the enormous asymmetry between federal authority and inmates. They are implacable, all the force of the State falls on the prisoners.

Federal prisons represent meaningless captivity, breaking bodies and breaking souls. There is no readjustment, there is only insubstantial confinement, particularly when it comes to people who were “priority objectives sought by the justice system.

diego.badillo@eleconomista.mx

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