To Die in Mexico

by John Gibler

  A few days before Rafael arrived, a convoy of cartel gunmen attacked the Reynosa prison in an attempt to break out some of their cohorts. Brazen prisoner breakouts are common in the drug war zones. In May 2009, some thirty gunmen traveling in a convoy of seventeen vehicles with a helicopter flying overhead raided a state prison in Cieneguillas, Zacatecas. The gunmen, some in federal police uniforms, pulled up before dawn, marched into the prison without firing a shot, demanded that the prison guards release fifty-three inmates, including eleven considered highly dangerous by Interpol, and then marched the prisoners—some of whom could not conceal their grins—out to the waiting vehicles, whereupon they drove off into the night. Before leaving, however, they broke into a prison storage room and stole twenty-three guns. The entire operation took two minutes and fifty-two seconds. Security cameras recorded the whole thing. Within days the prison director and all forty-four on-duty guards were themselves jailed for questioning. In Reynosa, the breakout attempt did not go so smoothly. Gunmen attacked and prison guards fought back. The gun battle lasted some two hours, until the attackers finally gave up and left without freeing any of the convicts.

  Rafael and his cameraman, Eduardo, fresh off the plane from Mexico City, decide to go out to the prison to film the bullet holes in the walls and guard towers. No one wants to speak with them, much less in front of the camera.

  They go to interview the mayor of Reynosa. He admits that things have become “difficult” in town. The city government has recently opened a Twitter account to inform residents of the locations of gun battles throughout town. Rafael thinks that in itself is a story, though perhaps a marginal one. So he asks the mayor about the Twitter account and about the locations of various gun battles over the previous few days. He and Eduardo produce a small segment on the Twitter account and the bullet holes out at the Reynosa prison and send it off to Mexico City.

  No one wants to speak with them. That makes reporting next to impossible. But Rafael does not give up; he does not stay in his hotel room. Their second day in town, Rafael and Eduardo decide to just head out and drive around for a bit. Eduardo drives and Rafael is checking Twitter on his mobile phone when they hear a police siren behind them. They are in downtown Reynosa, near the city government offices. They glance back and notice how traffic parts behind them to make way for the police car to pass. They pull over as well. But as they do, they see that the siren does not emit from a police car, but rather from a grey Jeep Cherokee with tinted windows, strobe headlights similar to those used by police vehicles, and a turret with a mounted machine gun. The Cherokee has no front license plate, but as it passes, Rafael sees that it has a back license plate that reads CDG, the Spanish acronym for the Gulf Cartel (Cartel del Golfo). The Cherokee speeds past blasting its siren and is followed by nine luxury SUVs—Suburbans, Escalades, Yukons—some without plates, others with plates from the Gulf of Mexico states of Veracruz and Tamaulipas. Some also bear the letters CDG painted with white shoe polish on the sides or back windows. In each of these nine SUVs men with assault rifles hover in the open windows with their weapons at ready. The convoy speeds by and turns a few blocks up ahead.

  Rafael looks to Eduardo and says, “Let’s follow them, but discreetly.”

  And so they do. They make the same turn up ahead and find the convoy already parked in front of a restaurant in downtown Reynosa, right behind City Hall. The gunmen get out and walk into the restaurant, fully armed, apparently making a lunch stop.

  Rafael and Eduardo drive by and keep going.

  The scene makes an impression on Rafael. He thinks, “Now that is tangible evidence of impunity, of the fact that they are the ones in charge of Reynosa. They can drive in convoys, hanging out the windows with assault rifles, and no one says a thing.”

  Rafael meets up with a friend who knows the town. He asks him who controls the plaza in Reynosa. The friend gives him the name: Samuel Flores Borrego, alias Metro Tres. Rafael types the name into an Internet search engine. He finds an entry on Borrego on the U.S. Department of State’s Narcotics Rewards Programs website. Borrego is 37 years old, weighs 155 pounds, stands five feet nine inches tall. He is a “ranking member of the Gulf Cartel and is currently in control of Cartel operations in Reynosa and Miguel Alemán, Mexico,” according to the website.

  The U.S. Department of State is offering $5 million for information that leads to Borrego’s arrest. Rafael keeps searching. He types in “Metro Tres” and is led to a video on YouTube. He listens. The song, by the Reynosa hip-hop duo Cano and Blunt, is called simply The Song of Metro Tres. The lyrics praise Metro Tres for his ferocity and loyalty: “He was a government official / now he’s in the gang / and he’s got hella people under his command.” One of the repeated verses says: “Straight up people, we tell it like it is; this is dedicated to Metro Tres / one of the good ones, he reigns over his territory / with a nine and an AK, he sends you to hell.” The video consists of a handful of still images of Cano and Blunt in various mafia outfits striking gangster poses. In one of the photographs they pose with a number of other men in front of a mural of themselves.

  This, Rafael thinks, is a story. The world of drug trafficking so deeply imbedded in popular culture and everyday life that local musicians compose and self-publish songs about the gangster in charge of their hometown plaza. Though there is a longstanding tradition of such compositions in the form of traditional corridos, Cano and Blunt represent the latest trend in hip-hop narco-music. “I need to find this group,” Rafael thinks. He asks around about where he might find the rapper mural he saw online and is directed to a low-income neighborhood where most residents work in the border maquiladoras. There he asks where he might find the muralist and the two rappers in the mural. After a bit of walking around he and Eduardo stand before them.

  Cano and Blunt come from hard streets and have crafted a hard look: shaved heads, dark glasses, and baggy shirts, flashing gang signals, hanging out in a luxury SUV. In one of their YouTube videos they pose with a cute, two-foot-tall stuffed rabbit. Cano holds the rabbit by its ears, pulling its head back, while Blunt aims a stockless AK-47 assault rifle at the bunny’s forehead. In one of their songs, Reynosa la Maldosa (roughly, Reynosa the Wicked) they sing this chorus: “We are pure Reynosa, a fuckload of thugs / pure mafiosos, suffer it or enjoy it / Reynosa the wicked, the street is dangerous / look alive, pure mafiosos.”

  Cano and Blunt are not happy to see Rafael and Eduardo. They repeatedly ask them who they are, what they are doing, why they have sought them out. Rafael explains, but his explanations do little to ease the suspicion. He says he’ll come back tomorrow. He does. This time they agree to an interview but say that they will not talk about their “dedicated songs,” referring to those praising specific figures in the drug-trafficking underworld like Borrego, el Metro Tres. In the interview Cano and Blunt sit on a concrete block in front of the mural of themselves. It is night. They talk about new generations who no longer listen to corridos but prefer reggaeton and hip-hop. Cano says of the song Reynosa la Maldosa, “We see what the street is like, what’s going down, and our song is about that. That’s it. That’s what’s happening and that’s where we get our inspiration.”

  When the interview is over and the camera turned off they speak a bit more frankly. One says about their dedicated songs, “We’ve never met the people we write about. But there are people who show up at my house and give me three hundred dollars and say they want me to write a song about one guy or another and that the song should more or less say this and that. And we try to be creative and give it good rhyme so that it’ll be catchy.” Rafael and Eduardo go back to the hotel, edit, and send a three-minute news clip about narco hip-hop that includes playing a few verses of The Song of Metro Tres over images of shot-up SUVs, police roadblocks, and military convoys.

  Rafael and Eduardo are waiting for an interview with the commander of the military base in Reynosa. They are television reporters, so they need images. Rafael says, “Let’s go film the police roadbloc
k out on the highway on the way into town.” They drive out and park about 200 yards away to shoot initial images from a distance. While filming from inside their rental car, they notice a group of police jump into a truck and head toward them at top speed. Within seconds they arrive, arms drawn and aimed.

  “Get out of the car! Hands on the dash!”

  “Easy, we’re press,” Rafael says as he complies. “We’re press. Here are our credentials. We’re from Mexico City.”

  The police officer in charge reviews their credentials and then says, “Sorry about that, things here are very tense. Very tense.”

  Now with permission, they drive up closer. Eduardo films the roadblock from various angles while Rafael talks with the police commander, who begins to speak with what might appear uncharacteristic candor for the police.

  “Look, what we want is to get the Zetas the fuck out of here,” he says. “All they do is commit barbarities among the civilian population, and we don’t want them here.”

  But this is still in code. Rafael begins to understand. The police are working with the Gulf Cartel. The roadblock is to either stop Zeta gunmen from entering Reynosa, or if overpowered, to tip off the CDG about any Zeta convoy arrivals. The gun battles raging in Reynosa are part of an open war between the Gulf Cartel and the Zetas, their former employees, fighting for control over the plaza. Just the other day Rafael had seen a narcomanta, a huge banner hung from an overpass that read: THE UNION OF CARTELS IS NOW HERE TO ELIMINATE THE ZETAS. AUTHORITIES, WE ASK THAT YOU NOT GET INVOLVED. VENOM MUST BE FOUGHT WITH VENOM. The police commander made clear that they were complying with the Gulf Cartel’s request, maintaining roadblocks on the outskirts of town, and leaving the gun battles to the CDG.

  Rafael and Eduardo have been in Reynosa for five days and they have stayed in five different hotels. Rafael gets up in the morning of the sixth day and checks his email. He has a message describing how a local reporter was taken to the hospital the previous night because he had fallen into a “diabetic coma,” but it turns out he had severe wounds all over his body from a beating. He died at the hospital, shortly after being admitted. Another email says that two reporters with Reynosa’s largest daily paper, El Mañana de Reynosa, are missing. Rafael writes down the names of these three reporters in his notebook and starts to call around. He finds the name and number for the deceased reporter’s wife and calls her. She says, “I can’t talk to you right now; I can’t give you an interview. We are on our way to Tampico to bury my husband.” He calls the editorial desk at El Mañana de Reynosa to ask for the two journalists reported missing. He does not mention their possible disappearance, but simply asks for them by name. The receptionist says, “No, they haven’t come in yet.”

  Rafael checks his email again and sees that people are starting to send Twitter messages about a gunfight in a neighborhood in Reynosa. Rafael says, “Well, let’s go look for this gunfight, no? See if we can get some images of what has happened.” They go out to their rental car, a red Volkswagen Jetta with Coahuila plates, and head out. They changed rental cars the day before after hearing rumors that a convoy of Zetas had arrived in town from Coahuila state. They had been driving an SUV with Coahuila plates and decided it would be best to get a different car. Unfortunately all the vehicles at the rental agency had Coahuila plates, but at least a red Jetta would not immediately look like a satellite unit from a Zeta death squad.

  They get in the car and head out toward the neighborhood where the Twitter messages had reported the shoot-out. They are driving through downtown, Eduardo at the wheel, Rafael checking Twitter on his mobile. They stop at a major intersection and look up to see a CDG convoy pass right in front of them. About seven Suburban-type SUVs traveling at top speed with armed men hovering in the windows. They decide to go straight and then turn right two blocks up ahead. But as they turn they see the convoy parked alongside an outdoor public square, right there in front of them. The men are out of their vehicles, putting on their bulletproof vests, loading their assault rifle clips, preparing for battle. Rafa and Eduardo drive on, but they notice that the men are watching them. And then they hear a whistle and a shout, “Go get them!”

  Eduardo speeds up and turns. Then he floors it and turns again. And then an SUV passes them and cuts them off. Eduardo brakes and five men jump out wearing bulletproof vests and aiming AR-15 assault rifles. They shout, “Get out of the car! Get the fuck out, assholes!”

  Rafael says to Eduardo, “We’re fucked.” Then they get out.

  One gunman says, “What are you fucks up to, eh?”

  Rafael holds his press credential out and says, “We’re reporters.”

  The men surround them and take their press credentials. One says, “Get in the truck. We’ll take your car. Give me the keys.”

  Eduardo gives him the keys and they get in. Rafael notices the plush leather seats.

  The gunmen tear off, back to the parked convoy. Two follow in the red Jetta. Traffic parts around them. One says to Rafael and Eduardo, “You guys are done. We’re going to fuck you up.”

  They pull up and park. Gunmen approach on both sides and open the doors, forcing Rafael and Eduardo out on each side. They frisk them and remove all their belongings: wallets, notebooks, and mobile phones, which they turn off. Another group of gunmen begins to extract everything from the red Jetta, opening the glove compartment, the trunk, checking under the hood, gathering their computers, backpacks, cameras, everything. The gunmen ask if they have a satellite-tracking device in the car, and they say no.

  Once the gunmen take all their possessions they force Rafael and Eduardo to get back in the SUV, each sitting on one side facing their interrogators, who stand gathered around the doors, weapons pointed straight at them. The gunmen all wear bulletproof vests with CDG stitched over the chest. They carry extra clips for their guns and some have grenades hanging from their vests; some carry radio equipment. All carry AR-15 assault rifles and most also have a 9mm pistol strapped to their thighs.

  A thick man, about five feet nine inches tall, with a flame tattoo on his neck, stands before Rafael. He carries only an AR-15. A thinner man stands guard slightly behind him with an AR-15 ready and a pistol in its holster.

  The interrogation begins.

  “Who are you and what the fuck are you doing here?”

  Rafael answers, “We are reporters for Milenio TV in Mexico City.”

  “Where are you from?”

  Eduardo answers, “I’m from Mexico City,” and the gunman with rage in his eyes standing before him says, “Ah? Chilango?” and begins to hit him in the face and body.

  Rafael, from a northern state known for drug production and trafficking, lets the question slide and luckily the gunman with the flame tattoo does not pursue it.

  “What are you doing here,” he asks Rafael.

  “We came to report on the Twitter account that City Hall has opened to inform residents about the gun battles.”

  “Bullshit.”

  And here the comandante arrives, the boss of this troop. Rafael sees him and thinks, “This guy’s a Rambo, a Blackwater mercenary.” Like the others, the comandante wears a bulletproof vest and a 9mm pistol on his thigh. He holds an AR-15 assault rifle, but he uses two huevos del toro, ammo drums capable of holding up to 150 rounds. The comandante’s arms are hugely muscular. On one arm he has a tattoo of a woman’s silhouette. He wears black combat boots and fatigues and a military haircut.

  “What are you doing here?” the comandante demands. “You guys are Zetas.”

  “We’re reporters,” Rafael begins to answer.

  “No, you guys are federal police. You guys are soldiers, you’re from the army. You’re here to betray us. But you know what? We’re going to give you the opportunity to tell us the truth.”

  “We are telling you the truth. We’re reporters from Mexico City here to cover this story.”

  And with that the beating begins. The comandante walks over to the other side of the SUV where they are beating Eduard
o. The thick gunman with the tattooed neck beats Rafael. Punches to the face. Slaps to the face. Open palm slaps over the ears. Punches using the side of the fist against the neck, hitting the carotid artery.

  “What are you doing here? Tell us the truth! You’re lying!”

  “I’m telling you the truth.”

  “Hand me the nine. This guy doesn’t get it,” the gunman says to the man standing behind him. “Hand me the nine, I left mine back at the house.”

  He takes the pistol, chambers a bullet, and presses it into Rafael’s ribs.

  “Tell me the truth or you will die right here, asshole.”

  “I’m telling you the truth. We are reporters, believe me sir,” Rafael says. “There are our IDs and press credentials. On the back is the phone number for the news desk. Call and confirm that we were sent here from Mexico City. Please.” Rafael’s voice shakes and cracks.

  “Why is your voice cracking, asshole?”

  “Because you’ve got a pistol pressed into me and you’re threatening me,” Rafael answers with the precision of a trained reporter.

  The gunman raises the pistol and slams the stock down against Rafael’s knee. Again. And Again. “You guys are a bunch of pansy-ass bitches,” he says.

  The comandante walks back over to Rafael’s side and flips through Rafael’s notebook. “Why do you have the telephone numbers for the public security chief in Reynosa?” he asks.

  “Because I wanted to interview him.”

  Rafael looks at the comandante when he answers him. A mistake.

  “What the fuck are you looking at punk? Don’t look at my face!”