Whack-a-mole: Expert says Azteca leader's arrest won't end violence

Another expert critic weighs in on the futility of the U.S. and Mexican government strategy of "whack-a-mole." This article also provides a history of the Azteca gang, "said to be one of the most violent of gangs in the U.S. allied with Mexican drug cartels and operate on both sides of the border."

Expert: Azteca leader's arrest won't end violence - El Paso Times:  "It is unlikely the arrest of the suspected leader of the Aztecas gang over the weekend will end the bloodshed in Juárez, said an researcher who studies Mexico. Mexican federal police arrested Arturo Gallegos Castrellon, known as "El Farmero," who allegedly told police he was responsible for 80 percent of the homicides in Juárez since August 2009.

'That sounds like a blue sky figure to me,' said George W. Grayson, a government professor specializing in Latin America at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Va. 'You know what a blue sky figure is? It's a high figure to make the government look good.'


Grayson is skeptical of the highly publicized arrests regularly presented at Mexican federal police headquarters in Mexico City. "I follow it fairly closely," he said. "When you have the PGR (Mexico attorney general's office) and the public security people, they always announce this is a big leader that has been caught and sometimes it is, but there have been a few (drug) lords that have been caught.

Even if Gallegos is the top gang leader, the violence in Juárez is not likely to end with his arrest, said Grayson, who studies politics and organized crime in Mexico. Grayson said underlings violently jockey for power each time a drug boss is eliminated. "There is a surge of violence after a leader has been captured, and the violence does not seem to abate," Grayson said. "It goes up and down some. Killing kingpins leads to an increase in violence.'" Nov. 2010