Free Republic

Some 7,667 people were killed in Mexico in the first quarter of 2018, up 20 percent on the same period last year, making it the most violent year in two decades, government figures showed Sunday.

MEXICO CITY (AP) -- Homicides in Mexico rose by 22 percent in 2016, the government reported Friday, the highest rate of increase since the height of the drug war. Official statistics released by the Interior Department show that Mexico had 20,789 homicides in 2016, compared to 17,034 in 2015. Some states saw murders rise by dizzying levels. Homicides in the Pacific coast state of Colima more than tripled, and in the Gulf coast state of Veracruz they more than doubled. Murders rose by 42 percent in the border state of Baja California, 30 percent in the border state of Chihuahua...

Mexican authorities are looking into the deaths of three US citizens who were shot dead on a visit to see their father. The investigation is focused on a specialist security unit known as "Hercules", made up of former marines and soldiers who police hot zones for crime. Nine of 40 Hercules officers, working in the violent border city of Matamoros, are being questioned over the deaths of four people, including the three US siblings. According to a witness, brothers Alex Rivera, 22, and Jose Angel, 21, arrived at their father's house to find security personnel hitting their sister Erica, 26....

In average, 34 people die every day in Mexico, in crimes related to drug trafficking and the war on drugs. In the latest numbers released by Mexico’s government 4,451 people had been murdered in the period between January and April 2013. Besides the 4,451 deaths, this year there are 26 people that have been reported missing and are currently unaccounted for. ... People executed by drug gangs are found shot, beheaded, dismembered and wrapped in black plastic bags, with or without written messages in pieces of cardboard. In Mexico, drug cartel related executions have become so common that some news...

A Venezuelan campaign group says the country has suffered a record number of murders in 2011. The Venezuela Violence Observatory says at least 19,336 people have been killed this year, an average of 53 a day. The figures suggest Venezuela's murder rate is the highest in South America and four times that of Mexico. Criminal violence is set to be a major issue in next year's elections, when President Hugo Chavez is seeking another term in office. "We must inform the nation that 2011 will end as the the most violent year in the nation's history," the Venezuela Violence Observatory...

TUCSON (KGUN9-TV) – Nine On Your Side has learned three of the four suspects arrested in the shootout that killed U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry will not be charged with his murder. In fact, all three suspects could be freed and deported sometime this week. The FBI suspected bandits shot and killed Terry on the night of December 14th. Agents immediately arrested four suspects. But two weeks after Terry's killing, KGUN9 News learned the FBI had yet to charge them with murder. The Federal Public Defender's office and private defense Attorney Leslie Bowman then sounded off by telling Nine...