Chihuahua – For years, the municipality of Guadalupe y Calvo has been the scene of violent events; However, since 2022, the war between Los Salgueiro, of the Sinaloa Cartel, and Los Arellanes, a La Línea faction from Camargo, for territorial control of the communities has intensified, leaving dozens dead and displaced.
Just last Wednesday, the bodies of five men, alleged members of the Salgueiro group, were located inside a Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) truck that had been reported stolen by the parastatal worker who managed to escape alive. Three of the five executed were already identified by the State Attorney General’s Office (FGE) as: Pascacio GC, 32 years old; Natalio GC, 27, both from El Muertecito, Guadalupe and Calvo, and Lorenzo Guadalupe LH, 41, from Baquiriachi, Balleza. The discovery occurred a day after videos circulated of alleged members of La Línea breaking into homes inhabited by their rivals. This event is the last of many confrontations and executions resulting from the rivalry between the Sinaloa Cartel, headed by Ruperto Salgueiro, and Los Arellanes, under the command of Ildefonso “Poncho” Arellanes and his allies Benito “El Mexicano” Ruelas and Noel “ Noelillo” Mendívil, who are in charge of the criminal operation from Guadalupe and Calvo to Parral. Although the FGE, the State Public Security Secretariat, the Mexican Army and the National Guard announce various operations to inhibit the incidence of this type of situation, during the last three years criminal acts have been recurrent that even have an impact on the security of the civilian population.
plane crash
It was the crash of a small plane going from Camargo to Los Mochis in 2020 that sparked the enmity between both sides. On June 22 of that year, two adults and four minors, relatives of “Poncho,” died as a result of the plane crash, which La Línea attributed to the Los Salgueiro group. The State Attorney General himself, César Jáuregui Moreno, maintained in the middle of this year that the cause of the violence in Guadalupe and Calvo is this event, in which Leonilo González Olivas, 38 years old, died; Katia Arellanes Santos, 23; Ana Paulina López Arellanes, 12; Esmeralda Arellanes Santos, 13 years old; Idelfonso Arellanes Santos, 14, and Luis Ángel López Arellanes, 14. Starting in 2022, shootings have been recurrent in the territory of Guadalupe and Calvo, whose isolated communities have been the scene not only of deaths, but also of forced displacement of residents seeking shelter from the violence that prevails throughout the region known as the “golden drug triangle,” which includes areas of Sinaloa and Durango. In that year there is a record in journalistic archives of at least eight high-impact events, including homicides, clashes between armed civilians and attacks on the armed forces in which 10 people died. There are also records of at least two episodes of forced displacement, in January and June, where at least 40 families left the communities of San José del Rincón, Santo Domingo, Calabazas, El Tigre and Los Espinos. In January there were two events: a shooting in the Milpillas de Abajo community, where three men were killed, and an attack on the convoy of the 42nd Military Zone led by Francisco Aldaba Macías, which ended with one civilian killed and another detained. That year, on March 7, in the community of Coloradas de la Virgen, activist José Trinidad Baldenegro López, 47, brother of Isidro Baldenegro, another defender of indigenous peoples murdered in 2017, was killed. That same month, on the 25th, three people died and two minors were injured after being shot with 500 “goat horn” and R-15 shots in the community of El Zorrillo. On June 16, in Atascaderos, they reported the murder of Gerónimo Ramírez Rivera, 39, who was a businessman from Tamazula, Durango, and on September 15, Fermín Edel Guzmán, 37, identified as nephew of Joaquín “El”, was executed. Chapo” Guzmán Loera, in the Donato Guerra square of the municipal seat. In December there was a shooting confrontation between military forces and a group of Los Arellanes in the towns of Santo Domingo and Rancho Viejo.
Invasion of The Line
In 2023, the emergence of Los Arellanes in Guadalupe and Calvo was more noticeable, coinciding with a weakening of the structure of Los Salgueiro due to the capture of at least 15 direct or indirect relatives of the family that heads the group, during 2022 and 2023. Such is the case of Efrén “El Maniaco” Salgueiro, sentenced to six years in prison for federal crimes in June, or José Bryan SZ, alias “El 90” or “El Bryan”, also sentenced in December for a kidnapping that occurred in Zaragoza Valley of 2020. Even the extradition of Ovidio Guzmán, son of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, had an impact on this criminal group. Between June 8 and 9, a confrontation took place between these rivals in the communities of San Gerónimo, Santa Rita and La Sierrita, which left one person dead, two deprived of their liberty and 39 displaced, including 31 minors, mostly from the Tepehuán ethnic group. The FGE confirmed that the shooting was caused by members of Los Arellanes who entered the town in search of the leader of the antagonistic faction, identified as Sergio CP, alias “La Campamocha.” On July 16, a scuffle began in the community of Saucito de Araujo in which the brothers Esteban Eras Gutiérrez and Eliseo Pulido Gutiérrez, both lieutenants of a criminal cell attached to the Los Salgueiro group, as well as Faustino Rosas Navarrete, ejidal commissioner, died. Between October 13 and 15, residents of the communities of Dolores and Saucito de Araujo itself reported the fear that, for days, the shootings caused by a new incursion by the Camargo group, after which Ediel’s body was located Isaí GC, 21 years old, who had an absence report, as well as five abandoned trucks. On November 25, the presence of armed men and shootings was reported from the towns of San José del Rincón, Ejido de El Nopal and Nuestra Señora. The corporations that came to inspect the area found three lifeless men, between 20 and 32 years old, at the junction with the community of Santa Rita. In December 2023, the Diocese of Tarahumara reported a series of direct attacks against the population of various communities, for which it demanded immediate intervention from the authorities. On the 13th, an armed group prevented residents of Santa Tulita, Puerto de Ánimas and Puerto Riyito from continuing on their way to return to their homes. Two days later, alleged hitmen based in the community of Alisos went to the Puerto de Ánimas ranch and forcibly took two boys: Emanuel Ángel Guevara Ayala, 15 years old, and Jesús Manuel Ayala Almanza, 13 years old, when They were working in the field. On Saturday the 16th, several vans with armed people circulated in the communities of Las Taunas and Puerto de Ánimas; The next day, they reported that two other young people from Puerto Riyito were “arrested” by the armed group, in addition to the fact that the same kidnappers warned the members of the aforementioned communities that they had three days to leave their homes. This year, on July 5, three men were executed at the police station in the Llano Grande community. The victims were identified as Emiliano García, 16 years old, and Jesús García Quiñones and Florencio Navarrete Solís, both 31 years old. The latter had a report of deprivation of liberty in the community of Milpillas, municipality of Chínipas. Between August 18 and 19, residents of the Dolores community, located a few kilometers from the Los Salgueiro operational center, made it known through telephone calls and videos that they feared for their physical integrity in the face of the umpteenth confrontation between hitmen from both sides. The same thing happened at the beginning of September in the Cinco Llagas community, where even organizations raised their voices regarding the risk that the inhabitants had of being displaced due to insecurity. Some people requested to be removed from the town and around the 5th, images of alleged small planes belonging to Los Salgueiro that had been burned came to light. Finally, on September 25, the homicide of an active municipal police officer from said place occurred and whose body was found on the afternoon of Wednesday, September 25, on one side of the gap that leads from the town of Llano Grande to the community of Milpillas.
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