This week, InSight Crime’s on-the-ground investigation revealed how a cell of El Salvador’s MS13 street gang came to rule a coastal cocaine...

Weekly InSight
March 26, 2021 ([link removed])

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This week, InSight Crime’s on-the-ground investigation revealed how a cell of El Salvador’s MS13 street gang came to rule a coastal cocaine smuggling route, a rare example of the gang making inroads on cross-border drug trafficking. We also look at how US prosecutors, who usually go to painstaking lengths not to implicate heads of state in drug trafficking, have made an exception in the case of Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández. Other notable reports this week included a dissection of the criminal landscape in the State of Mexico, where 13 police officers were gunned down in an ambush; a look at how drug trafficking fueled Ecuador’s deadly prison gang riots; and a report on how the killing of a young woman revealed systemic sexual violence in Venezuela’s prisons.


** Featured
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** How an MS13 Clique in El Salvador Took a Cocaine Corridor ([link removed])
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Juan Pablo Salamanca was just leaving a cockfight in Santa Rosa de Lima, in eastern El Salvador, when he was attacked. He had been in what was maybe his favorite place in the world: in the pit with the roosters and the beer and the bravado. Around was the chaos he loved in a world he thought he’d tamed. They bet, drank and flashed wads of cash. Then he left and the shots rang out, setting into motion one of the most important transfers of power that El Salvador’s underworld has seen in years.

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** NewsAnalysis
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** Honduras President’s Alleged Role in Drug Conspiracy Comes Into Focus ([link removed])
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Usually loath to name sitting presidents in criminal cases, prosecutors in the United States...

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** Color-coded Bracelets for Migrants: Separating Poor from Poorer at US-Mexico Border ([link removed])
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A recent report from the US-Mexico border revealed that human smuggling organizations...

The Fuel Not the Fuse: Drug Trafficking and Ecuador’s Prison Violence ([link removed])
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Deadly Ambush of 13 Police Meets Little Government Response in Mexico ([link removed])
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Revived Drug Routes, Evolving Street Gangs in El Salvador ([link removed])
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DEA Report: Drug Traffickers Adapt to COVID-19 Crisis ([link removed])
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Stolen Forests: Uncovering Colombia’s Illegal Timber Trade ([link removed])
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Land Grabbing: Tracing and Targeting the 'Invisible' Threat Destroying Colombia’s Forests ([link removed])


** Criminal Actors
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Profiles of some of the notable criminal personalities and groups that have marked this week.

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** Familia Michoacana ([link removed])
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At the height of its power, the Familia Michoacana’s brutal tactics, strong base of operations...
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** Los Choneros ([link removed])
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Los Choneros is one of Ecuador’s most prominent criminal groups, which first emerged in the late 1990s as a drug...


** Media Mentions
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About Us ([link removed])
MARCH 24, 2021
THE GUARDIAN ([link removed])

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"According to the InSight Crime foundation, gangs are social as well as criminal organizations: they seek to create a collective identity, a place of protection and support for members."
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** Impact
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What We do ([link removed])
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** Making Front Pages
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InSight Crime’s investigative series on crime and corruption in Central America’s Northern Triangle and the Southern Cone’s Tri-Border Area wrapped up this week. Reports from the series have been reproduced in newspapers in Paraguay, Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras. Our accompanying online seminars -- in which the InSight Crime team discussed findings gleaned from two years of fieldwork in six key countries -- generated interest among country observers and were discussed widely on social media. Thousands of users have also interacted with InSight Crime’s online dashboard, a part of the project that maps criminal economies, underworld actors and homicides in nearly 40 border departments. If you missed any of the events, you can view them in Spanish ([link removed]) on our YouTube channel and in English ([link removed]) on our Facebook page. The investigative series can be found here
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Go to the dashboard > ([link removed])

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** Collaborating with Journalism Organizations
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InSight Crime was selected ([link removed]) from a pool of 40 applicants to become a member of the Global Investigative Journalism Network ([link removed]) (GIJN), an international association of news outlets that support each other with training, data sharing, and distribution of content. The organization has members in 82 countries and focuses on international crime, countries with repressive regimes, and marginalized communities.

Similarly, as part of our commitment to support other journalism organizations, InSight Crime Co-director Jeremy McDermott spoke with the Western Balkans Organized Crime Radar ([link removed])%20%2D%20Serbia.-,The%20Western%20Balkans%20Organized%20Crime%20Radar%20(WB%2DOCR)%20is,their%20policies%20on%20the%20ground.) , sharing with them lessons learned and challenges facing organizations that investigate organized crime.
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** Our Trending Topics
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HONDURAS ([link removed])
MEXICO ([link removed])
COCAINE ([link removed])
ELITES AND OC ([link removed])

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