The crime that haunts Mexico, sowing fear, disrupting life: extortion

MEXICO CITY — A store owner, faced with threats, closes the clothing store that his family has owned for generations.

The leader of a citrus growers' association is kidnapped and killed after refusing the mafia's demands for a share of the profits.

Enraged peasant farmers, fed up with paying bribes, turned to cartel thugs in a bloody battle.

In Mexico, these real-life incidents all involve a signature crime: extortion.

Gang violence is rampant in Mexico, killing countless people – street vendors and taxi drivers, restaurateurs and farmers, factory owners and mine operators. Everyone is forced to pay tithes to criminal gangs, sometimes to the same cartels that traffic drugs.

“This is a very sensitive crime because of its social consequences,” Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said last week. “This is not just about one person. This applies to everyone.”

Sheinbaum launched a high-profile fight against extortion, but her efforts faced serious obstacles. Extortion, experts say, is a multibillion-dollar racket, perhaps even more lucrative than drug trafficking. It is sometimes called an “invisible crime” because most victims do not report threats for fear of retaliation.

Those who are persecuted are often faced with a terrible choice: accept ultimatums to hand over money, property or other assets – or face death – a threat that usually targets family members as well.

“Of course I can say, 'I won't pay; they might come and kill me,'” said Antonio, a flower grower in a Mexico City suburb who handed over nearly $600 in exchange for cash. floor on the right [protection] every time flowers are collected, with the number doubling during the holiday seasons, including this month. Feast of the Virgin of Guadalupe. “But I can't let them kill my children or take my wife.”

Like other victims who spoke to The Times, Antonio, 56, a father of four, asked that only his first name be used for his safety.

“We are living in terror,” he said. “We have to work for these criminals. And no one in the government is helping us.”

Mexico and two other Latin American countries, Colombia and Honduras, are among the five countries in the world most affected by extortion, according to Global Organized Crime Indexannual ranking by a Geneva-based research group. The top five are Somalia and Libya.

In addition to its devastating impact on individuals and families, extortion has enormous social costs: population displacement, deep feelings of insecurity, and distortion of local economies.

In Mexico, armed extortion gangs have been accused of fixing prices, taking over businesses, unions and transport routes, controlling construction sites and even fixing the prices of food, building materials and other goods.

Sheinbaum regularly brags about his administration's successes in violent crime suppressionHomicides have fallen by more than a third since she took office last year, according to official data. But she acknowledges that extortion is on the rise, although there are no accurate indicators of the crime, which is so widely underreported.

Calling ending extortion “one of the greatest challenges” facing Mexico, Sheinbaum vowed to tighten enforcement, increase penalties and strengthen safeguards for anyone who receives threats.

She advocates for a constitutional amendment to make extortion a federal crime and put the responsibility of tracking down offenders on law enforcement rather than individuals. Prosecutors could pursue cases without victims having to file complaints.

Since the adoption of Mexico's National Anti-Extortion Strategy in July, police have arrested more than 600 suspects and fielded more than 100,000 calls to an expanded toll-free extortion hotline, authorities said. Officials also moved to block access to cellphones in Mexican prisons, where gangs specialize in “virtual kidnappings” — calling people on the street and demanding ransom for supposedly kidnapped loved ones.

“Don't answer a phone number you don't recognize,” Sheinbaum warned people last week.

In one notorious case, authorities say a prison gang attacked 14 nurses sent to Mexico City during the COVID-19 pandemic. The prisoners used their cell phones to warn the nurses to stay in their hotel rooms and not say anything because they were allegedly being watched. The accomplices contacted relatives and demanded money. But the police found out about the scheme. No money was paid and no one was hurt.

Sheinbaum's anti-racketeering campaign faces a major hurdle: Unless there is a massive cultural shift, many victims will remain hesitant to turn to the law because they lack trust in the system.

“Filing a complaint is not an option because you never know if the authorities are in cahoots with the criminals,” said Cesar, co-owner of a restaurant in central Mexico City.

About two years ago, he said, one of his partners began receiving threats on his mobile phone. The callers had the names of his wife and children. The partner was nervous, but at first he did nothing.

“One day two South Americans came to the restaurant,” Cesar recalled.

Their message: Pay $2,500 a week to be “allowed to work in peace.”

His partner soon left the restaurant and the city.

Since then, management has not heard anything from the thugs.

Despite this, Cesar, like many business owners, tries to keep a low profile; his name and the names of his colleagues are not displayed in the restaurant. Staff are instructed not to chat to anyone.

“Still, we live in uncertainty and we worry all the time that these guys will come back,” Cesar said. “We know we could become victims at any moment.”

Recent victims whose cases have shocked Mexico include a successful young butcher entrepreneur in the state of Tabasco and a female taxi driver in the state of Veracruz. Both were reportedly found dead after denying extortion threats. The driver, 62-year-old Irma Hernandez, a retired teacher, was kidnapped and forced to film a jihad-style video in which – surrounded by armed men – she implored her fellow taxi drivers: “Pay yours.” share [fee] …or you will remain the same as me.”

Sometimes, however, annoying signs fight back.

Two years ago, corn and bean growers in the impoverished village of Tezcapilla grew tired of paying annual protection fees of about $200 per acre and decided: No more. Armed with machetes and shotguns, peasant farmers confronted the security forces of the cartel that dominated the territory. Michoacan familyon the football field near the school. According to authorities, by the time the brawl ended, 14 people had been killed: 10 gang members and 4 farmers.

Carlos Manzo, the former mayor of Uruapan in Michoacan state, also opposed it. He accused Sheinbaum's government of not doing enough in Michoacan, where gangsters have long plundered the thriving avocado sector and other industries.

“We are surrounded by criminal groups engaged in extortion and murder,” Manzo told a crowd in May. “But we are going to confront them.”

Manzo was killed last month at the Day of the Dead celebrations in Uruapan.

Less than two weeks earlier, Bernado Bravo, the leader of regional lime growers in Michoacán, was shot dead. Bravo has repeatedly condemned the extortion claims.

With so much risk, it is not surprising that some potential victims escape.
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For more than 80 years, the Vicente family operated a men's clothing business in downtown Mexico City. He didn't think much of it when, about four years ago, men started calling him and demanding money. And then one day three guys came to the store.

“They said that if I didn’t pay, I wouldn’t have security, and if I didn’t have security, something might happen to my workers—if not to me, then to my family,” Vicente recalls.

Like many other targets, Vicente hoped the threat would disappear. But the threatening strangers kept barging in and raising their demands: from $500 a month, to $1,000 a month, to $2,000 a month, all the way up to $10,000 a month.

His sons urged Vicente to leave: the business, no matter how beloved, was not worth a bullet to the head. Reluctantly, Vicente finally agreed. The shutdown left 15 people out of work, many of them longtime employees. Some ended up selling clothes at street stalls.

Vicente says he never reported the extortion attempt because, like Cesar, he was afraid that some rogue law enforcement official would reveal his name and address to the Mafia. He tried to put the experience behind him. But it wasn't easy. Three generations of family life revolved around this store.

“Because I refused to pay for the extortion, I was forced to close the business that my grandfather founded in 1936 and that my father and I continued,” Vicente, 67, said. “It hurt. It hurt a lot.”

McDonnell is a staff writer and Sanchez Vidal is a special correspondent.