From Sunday to Thursday: Organized Crime Kills 31 in Acapulco

(Acapulco, ElSur 5 August) In the last five days, 31 have been killed by presumed organized crime groups in Acapulco. According to Mayor Manuel Añorve Baños, this is a reaction to the arrest last week of “El Koreano” a kingpin in Acapulco’s local narcotics cartel. Usually, after a key arrest, the power vacuum causes factional reprisals, as “adjustments” are made in the leadership of the gangs. Most of the killings took place in the poorer neighborhoods quite distant from Acapulco’s tourist zone; two assassinations, however, have caused fear and consternation, as they occurred at the Mojito bar in Condesa and in front of Tabares, a strip club not far from the Costera Alemán. Sunday was a violent day, with eight gangland executions and one other person wounded. Two of the victims were women, killed in a cheap restaurant in the Progreso district. Monday, following the arrest of El Koreano, nine persons were executed including a minor political figure from the suburb El Cayaco and a teenager who worked as a “footman” on a city bus.