Friday 15 February 2013

Locals in Tabasco city warn will lynch thieves

Amid concerns about Mexicans arming themselves against crime in parts of the country, locals in Cárdenas in the south-eastern state of Tabasco were reported to have formed a protection group in one or two city neighbourhoods, following similar initiatives in the states of Guerrero, Oaxaca and Michoacán. Thieves were warned in one public notice they would be lynched if caught red-handed, Proceso reported on 14 February. The residents have formed the United Neighbours (Vecinos Unidos) group, alleging that state and district authorities were unable or unwilling to curb crime. Their warning was written on sheets or banners hung in public, a practice favoured by drug cartels in Mexico. Another banner warned "we shall take our own measures" against anyone found entering into houses or caught spying, thieving or vandalising in that part of town. The review cited an unnamed resident of Cárdenas as saying that people were "terrified" by the surge in local crime - examples of which were not lacking. On 11 February two bodies and their heads were found in different parts of town, a former policeman was shot dead in the neighbouring district of Cunduacán on 12 February, a decomposing body with torture marks found that day in or near Cárdenas and a man executed in a bar there on 13 February. A prominent legislator said in Mexico City on 14 February that such groups could not usurp state authority in spite of the inability of some states to assure residents' security, La Crónica de Hoy reported. The leader of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in the lower legislative chamber, Manlio Fabio Beltrones, said no state governor could "take refuge or find a refuge for his incapacity in the presence of community guards." He said "let's not generate greater signs of ungovernability in the country." The head of the chamber's Public Security Committee Alejandro Montano Guzmán, also of the PRI, told the daily the government must "attend to" Mexicans' security needs not just "recognize" such initiatives. La Crónica separately reported that armed residents of Ayutla in Guerrero released four more of 54 suspected criminals they had detained in January, after they were found not to be in organized crime. Eleven were earlier handed over to the authorities and 39 appeared to remain in detention. The four were apparently cattle thieves and pledged to carry out unspecified community services.