US Drug Agents Launder Profits of Mexican Cartels

By Ginger Thompson

Washington - Undercover American narcotics agents have laundered or smuggled millions of dollars in drug proceeds as part of Washington's expanding role in Mexico's fight against drug cartels, according to current and former federal law enforcement officials.

The agents, primarily with the Drug Enforcement Administration, have handled shipments of hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegal cash across borders, those officials said, to identify how criminal organizations move their money, where they keep their assets and, most important, who their leaders are.

They said agents had deposited the drug proceeds in accounts designated by traffickers, or in shell accounts set up by agents.

The officials said that while the D.E.A. conducted such operations in other countries, it began doing so in Mexico only in the past few years. The high-risk activities raise delicate questions about the agency's effectiveness in bringing down drug kingpins, underscore diplomatic concerns about Mexican sovereignty, and blur the line between surveillance and facilitating crime. As it launders drug money, the agency often allows cartels to continue their operations over months or even years before making seizures or arrests.


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Legalizing Marijuana Would Hinder the Multi-Billion Dollar Empire of Mexican Drug Cartels

By Jonathan Benson
The prohibition of marijuana in the US has led to an "underground" cannabis industry in Mexico run primarily by violent gangster cartels like the ones wreaking havoc at the southern borders of Texas, Arizona, and California.

These cartels reap anywhere from $1 to $20 billion a year illegally selling marijuana to Americans, but advocates of reform and legalization say the crime and terror associated with the illicit drug trade would largely end if marijuana was simply decriminalized.

Just a few weeks ago, Mexican soldiers burned a 300-acre field of marijuana some 200 miles south of San Diego, Calif., near Tijuana, Mex. Operated by drug cartels, the field contained a potential yield of around 120 tons of marijuana, which is worth about $160 million, according to reports. And back in October, soldiers performed another burning on 134 metric tons of vacuum-packed marijuana discovered in the same region.

The constant pursuit of cartels that grow and sell marijuana, as well as raids and burnings of marijuana fields, have led to massive cartel backlash. After the Tijuana raid and burning in October, for instance, cartels murdered 13 recovering drug addicts at a rehabilitation center.

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