I'm a Mexican citizen, living in Mexico, and from these postings one reality is very clear to me, one that every other person outside the US knows, that no matter how long and how hard the war against drug traffickers outside the US is carried on, as long as demand and consumption for these drugs is not put into perspective by the American people, each and every drug related death of a law enforcement agent, in any part of the world is completely useless.
We in Mexico are experiencing a war now, unlike any Americans have known on their streets, one that is claiming an average of 20 lives a day, and is disrupting the lives of every single law respecting person in Mexico, and knowing full well that this is caused in great part by the international drug cartels teeming up with local cartels to smuggle the drugs to the US. It???s very easy to criticize the Mexican government however corrupt it may be, for not making enough efforts to stop the traffickers before they get the drugs across the border, with the incredibly enormous costs, both human and economic, that it takes, and then see the US senators debate on putting their money where their mouth is??? footing a part of the bill thru the proposed ???plan merida???, which could help in a large part to equip Mexican forces against the drug cartels. It makes me wonder what would happen in the US if Mexican authorities simply take a more laid back approach to these drugs, like its been proposed on this blog, and not engage drug traffickers on their activities towards the US??? it would be very likely that the war we are know fighting would be transferred to your front yard???and believe me it is not a pretty picture, for your own sake take responsibility for your drug problems as we are trying to take care of our own.
‘These Guys Had to Be Taken Down’
Four pounds of cocaine. Fifty pounds of marijuana. Inside the San Diego State University drug raid.
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Bathed in the SoCal breeze, a frat-house party at San Diego State University could offer more than a whiff of indulgence. At some of these bashes, young visitors came to hang out, share small talk about college life, dish about professors. Along the way, they might drop a little slang about weed and coke. They were hip. They got cozy enough to collect some cell-phone numbers. Turns out, some of these visitors weren't students. They were undercover drug agents.
Early last Tuesday morning, officers with the Drug Enforcement Administration paid a visit to the Theta Chi fraternity. They came with a search warrant—and a battering ram they used to crash through the door. It was the culmination of a five-month sting that netted 4 pounds of cocaine, 350 Ecstasy pills, 50 pounds of marijuana, 30 vials of hash oil, $60,000 in cash and two guns, one of them taped to a bed frame. It ranked among the biggest college drug busts in U.S. history, with police making 128 arrests, including 95 San Diego State students.
The raid, which included crackdowns on several fraternities, came a year to the day after the overdose death of Jenny Poliakoff, a 19-year-old student at San Diego State. It was the tragedy that triggered the undercover drug operation. The college student had gone to a party and a sorority dance the night before; she died of poisoning from cocaine and alcohol. In February, during the course of the investigation (called Operation Sudden Fall), a student from nearby Mesa College died of a drug-and-alcohol overdose after attending a San Diego State frat party. In still another case, a student at a San Diego State fraternity reportedly lapsed into a drug induced mania and was shot with a Taser gun by friends in an effort to subdue him. He was taken to a hospital and survived the overdose.
The highly organized, widespread drug dealing at a university with a solid academic reputation astonished seasoned prosecutors and narcotics officers, says Damon Mosler, chief of the narcotics division of the San Diego County District Attorney's Office. "There was high-level dealing going on, and that is shown by the fact that students were dying," Mosler tells NEWSWEEK. "These guys had to be taken down." At the Theta Chi house, agents discovered a rough draft of a handwritten business plan for selling drugs. "It talks about what percentage they would mark up the drugs," says Mosler. The authorities say Kenneth Ciaccio is the suspected leader of the Theta Chi cell; Mosler says it was the biggest of several on campus. Investigators claim the student sent a mass text message to "faithful customers" promoting a coming "sale" on cocaine. (Ciaccio pleaded not guilty to drug charges last week. "I do not believe he's the main guy," his lawyer told the Associated Press.)
Operation Sudden Fall reached from the town of La Mesa, east of the university, all the way to the beaches. Undercover work was conducted at fraternity houses, in student housing and in front of dormitories. Some authorities say the behavior of some suspected drug dealers revealed an odd mix of arrogance and naiveté. Ralph Partridge, the special agent in charge of the DEA in San Diego, says that one suspect, a criminal-justice major, inquired after being charged "whether or not his arrest and incarceration would have an effect on him becoming a federal law-enforcement officer." Also arrested on drug charges was Michael Montoya, a Phi Kappa Psi fraternity member, who worked as a community-service officer on campus and would have earned a master's degree in homeland security next month.
Stephen Weber, the president of the 36,000-student university, was kept out of the loop during much of the investigation, says Mosler. "Everyone in law enforcement felt that if the administrators knew about it, they would have put the kibosh on the whole thing," the prosecutor says. Mosler says college officials typically dread the PR nightmare that comes with news about drugs or other crime on campus. Weber tells NEWSWEEK he was made aware last May that "a general investigation regarding drugs on campus" was going on, and that he was told on April 21 that arrests were imminent. "I knew what I needed to know," says Weber.
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