Wednesday, January 30, 2019

"Tijuana, a city of 1.8 million that not long ago was celebrating a major reduction in violence, is in the grip of an unprecedented homicide crisis"

LAT:
A record 2,518 people were killed here in 2018 — nearly seven times the total in 2012. With 140 killings per 100,000 people, Tijuana is now one of the deadliest cities in the world.

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In the past, the body count was driven by powerful drug cartels battling over lucrative trafficking routes to the United States. Now the main cause is competition in a growing local drug trade, with low-level dealers sometimes dying over the right to sell drugs on a single street corner.

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A high-ranking state police official who spoke on the condition of anonymity said cartel leaders may themselves be unable to control the violence, which is fueled by easy access to guns smuggled from the U.S.