It was a wide, sandy soccer field in front of an elementary school. Farmers and the La Familia Michoacana cartel gathered there on Friday afternoon. The appointment in Texcaltitlán in the south of the state of Mexico had been prepared since the previous day. There was only one point of the day: blackmail. The criminal group charged community members a fee for every square meter of their bean and pea fields. They refused. This year the harvest was poor. What happened next was the massacre: 14 dead and seven wounded, shot, macheted, beaten, in front of cell phones recording the latest example of violence that the Mexican government cannot put an end to.
There is a long history before reaching this battlefield. For years, the population of Texcaltitlán, the gateway to the Tierra Caliente region, has lived under the cartel's rules. There reigns the terror of the Familia Michoacana, a long-standing group whose alleged leaders, the Hurtado Olascoaga brothers, are the most wanted criminals by the Prosecutor's Office of the State of Mexico, with whom they are waging an all-out war.
Every year it is reminded that there is no ceasefire in the region. On March 18, 2021, the cartel murdered 13 agents – eight from the Security Secretariat and five from the Prosecutor's Office – in an ambush in the neighboring municipality of Coatepec Harinas. No member of the operation survived. In December 2022, a shootout in Texcaltitlán ended with the lives of eleven suspected members of the criminal group and their military-dressed monkey. In the midst of violence, citizens.
Police and experts at the scene of the murder of 13 agents in March 2021.EDGARD GARRIDO (Portal)
“The community of Texcaltitlán is tired of extorting so much that our rights are violated, just watching and remaining silent for fear that they will take our relatives, kill them or force them to work for them, all the farmers are tired of it “They are tired of seeing how criminals, Familia Michoacana and its manager (Don Payaso), drive around with trucks and armed men and intimidate the population,” says a recent publication by a group of neighbors. The same story is reflected in the prosecutor's investigation, which recognizes that since 2017 the cartel has been collecting fees “from ejidatarios, sawmills, butchers, mines and traders” and, if they do not pay, “they are kidnapped and imprisoned.” executed in many cases.”
In this scenario, some residents of Texcapilla, a municipality in Texcaltitlán, had a meeting with organized crime on Thursday evening where they charged them the annual housing fee. “That day they couldn’t come to an agreement and were summoned to the football field again on Friday at 12 p.m.,” a neighbor told Foro TV. The conflict was that Familia Michoacana wanted to charge one peso per meter, this neighbor said. If you have one hectare, you pay 10,000 pesos a year, about $500; But if you have three, that's 30,000 ($1,500) in a poor region that survives thanks to the harvest.
Shortly before the massacre, farmers from several communities – Texcapilla, Palomillas, Llano Grande, Santa María – banded together and decided not to pay. “We said we wouldn’t pay and they came up with the idea of killing the people,” says the farmer.
The first emergency call was registered at 12:14 p.m. A neighbor reported to 911 that people traveling in a van were discharging firearms in front of Miguel Hidalgo Elementary School. There is the soccer field, in the center of a washed-out community, criss-crossed by farm fields. In a more than two-minute video recorded from home, a meeting of several dozen people can be seen. Some in cars, many in hats. And suddenly the shots.
According to initial reports, the cartel opened fire on the farmers in the middle of the discussion. They replied: Some had shotguns, others had sticks and machetes. In the pictures you can see how the farmers grab one of the hit men, dressed in red and with blonde hair, and beat him until he no longer moves. A total of 10 suspected cartel members were murdered. Fourth, the farmers.
An image circulating on social networks of the confrontation between farmers from Texcaltitlán and members of the Familia Michoacana.
At 2:50 p.m., the public prosecutor's office opened an investigation file into the admission of five people injured by firearms to a hospital in Texcapilla. According to the investigation, two other injured people, apparently members of the criminal group, were taken from the hospital, where they were being treated by an armed group. At 3:20 p.m., security forces arrived at the soccer field, where there was also a burned-out vehicle with three bodies inside. A few minutes later the paramedics came in. At 7:00 p.m., the government of the State of Mexico began the crisis meeting.
According to prosecutor José Luis Cervantes, the deceased include the alleged leader of the Familia Michoacana in the state of Mexico, Rigoberto de la Sancha Santillán, alias Payaso. The official did not give any additional names, but said that the two other deceased were “high- or mid-level killers.” “This criminal cell has a direct history with the action of March 18, 2021 in Coatepec de Harinas, in which 13 security guards lost their lives,” said Cervantes, who has accused De la Sancha of leading the ambush against the agents. “He had a warrant for his arrest,” he noted.
One of the most respected community leaders in Texcaltitlán also died in the confrontation: Noé Olivares Alpízar, who is remembered on social networks: “You will undoubtedly be remembered as the greats, you brought together the hardworking and honest people of your city. Just as Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla once did on the night of the cry of pain, you fought alongside your people with what little they had to defend themselves. Your death and the death of your companions will not be in vain. “You are our heroes!”
National Guard members guard the town of Texcaltitlán on December 11. Felipe Gutierrez (EFE)
That same night, a fear began to spread that has not gone away. At 9:51 p.m., a call alerted the emergency center to the possibility that 30 members of the cartel were regrouping to launch an attack on the population. Cervantes said no “risk situation” had been identified, but 600 members of the Secretariat of National Defense (Sedena) and the National Guard had been deployed to the area.
Neighbors warn that the cartel is trying to find those who rebelled and killed ten of its members. “Of course there is the National Guard, the Army, the State Police, but they are stuck in the gap, they won't leave until they find the 'perpetrators,' and the worst part is that they don't see it anymore.” If it was one family or another, it is the entire community to which we have revealed ourselves and now we are afraid. The reality is that we live in fear, afraid that they will continue to persecute us,” said one person, who asked not to be named, told Reforma newspaper.
In social media groups, some Texcaltitlán residents mention the possibility of organizing to confront the threat of crime, as is already happening in states like Guerrero. However, the governor of the state of Mexico, Delfina Gómez, who visited the community this Monday, has denied that this will happen. The president already said at the weekend that she would not leave the city: “I demand the constant presence of federal forces in the region.” In the south of the state of Mexico, I tell you: you are not alone, we are with you.”
Texcaltitlán now resembles a ghost town. Shops closed, families left their homes until the situation calms down again. And there was still blood on the football field that Monday.
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