DEA Legend Reveals the Most Disturbing Cartel Rituals Youve Never Heard Of

➡ The leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, known for his brutal methods, has been captured, leading to a surge in violence as members fight for control. This cartel leader used to recruit people online under the guise of hiring security guards, only to train them in isolated mountain areas in terror tactics, including the use of weapons and cannibalism. Over the past decade, disappearances in Mexico have increased by 200%, with the epicenter being where this cartel operates. The capture of this leader has led to violent reactions from the cartel, similar to previous instances when cartel leaders were captured.
➡ El Mencho, a notorious cartel leader, was captured by the Mexican military with the help of a close source. The operation involved a well-planned assault with special forces and helicopters. Despite heavy resistance and a firefight, El Mencho and his bodyguards were severely wounded and later died. The capture was significant due to El Mencho’s violent control over the Jalisco New Generation Cartel and his evasion of authorities despite a large bounty on his head.
➡ Cartels are using tableting machines to make drugs look harmless and mixing fentanyl with other drugs to increase potency, often without the user’s knowledge. They are also diversifying their income sources by infiltrating industries like avocado, lime, and petroleum, and making billions from moving migrants. The Jalisco New Generation cartel is now making over $50 billion on their own. The U.S. is not controlling the flow of weapons into Mexico, which often end up in the hands of the cartels. The cartels will not be eliminated until the demand for drugs in the U.S. is reduced.
➡ El Mencho, a cartel leader, had a rule to dispose of bodies to avoid evidence of crimes. His cartel used a method called “pozoleros” where bodies were dissolved in barrels using caustic acid. The cartel has no value for human life and has started recruiting minors for their operations. Over the last decade, disappearances in Mexico have increased by 200%, with the epicenter being the areas where these cartels operate. The Mexican government’s attempts to address the issue have been ineffective, and the cartels continue to grow in power. The cartels also control a significant portion of drug trafficking into the U.S., primarily through tunnels along the U.S.-Mexico border.
➡ Drug cartels are forcing pharmacies to sell their drugs, threatening them with violence if they refuse. The only way to combat this is to reduce the demand for drugs in the United States through education and stricter border control. Fentanyl, a potent drug, is being mixed with other drugs for a stronger high, leading to many deaths. Despite the dangers, cartels continue to sell it due to a constant stream of new clients. Travel to Mexico is currently advised against due to potential violence from cartels.
➡ The speaker warns about the dangers of visiting certain countries due to drug-related issues, emphasizing the need for caution and awareness. They mention a smart but undercover figure named El Mencho and deny any involvement of the mafia in drug dealing. The speaker also highlights the continuous production of drugs like fentanyl and methamphetamines, urging listeners to educate their children about these dangers. They end by wishing safety, health, and blessings for everyone, and promise to return with more information.

He was an individual that ran the, the Jalisco New generation cartel with an iron fist. He was like a dictator. He had these terror schools and he would go on the Internet and recruit people and say, okay, you know, we’re hiring security guards. And then they would transport them to these isolated areas in the mountains where they had the terror schools. And they would tell them, you’re not going to leave here unless that’s feet first. They would teach them how to use weapons. But then it used to targets. They used human beings. They had to practice cannibalism.

And I remember one of them spit it out and it was full of dirt. And they say, eat it or you’re gonna die. During the last 10 years, disappearances in Mexico have increased by 200%. Wow. 200%. And guess where the epicenter of those disappearances is? Where? Hey everyone. Welcome to another sit down with Michael Francis. Hope everybody is doing well. All is very good, very blessed on this end. As always, my friends, all the praise, honor and glory goes to our God. For that, I want you to buckle your seat belts. This is a tremendous, tremendous interview that you’re going to hear.

Now I have never been so educated and informed on the business of the cartels in Mexico. And like I have been in my conversation with this gentleman, Mike vigil. He was 31 years with the DEA, assigned to all the cartels, not only in Mexico, here in America, but in various parts of the world. The information he gave me was so eye opening. I was just, I just couldn’t believe it. You’re not going to believe it either. I mean, the methodology that they use. He talked about cannibalism. Wait till you hear this and listen to this from the beginning to the end, because it’s, it’s unbelievable.

You’re going to get a real education. You’re going to understand the cartels. You’re going to understand why when I say the cartels and the mafia, two separate organizations, you can’t even compare them. Can’t even compare them other than the fact that they engage in criminal activity. Anything more than that, just stop the comparison. He’s going to back up some things that I’ve said and I want you to really listen to this. This is an eye opening interview. I don’t think you’re going to get any better. You was very straight, very forward, told it like it was.

And I really respect his experience. So before I do that, you know this people, I don’t ask you for much. I never ask you to subscribe to my channel. But here’s the deal. May 27th is my birthday. We’re closing in on 2 million subs. My birthday present will be for all of you that are listening now. If you’re not a sub, please join in. I promise you, you’re going to love the content. We’re going to continue it. That’s my birthday present. If you’re generous and generous, you know enough to, to say happy birthday in that regard, we’d really appreciate it.

With no further delay, my very special guest, Like I said, don’t leave. From the beginning to the end, it’s nothing but power packed information about the cartels and you’re going to appreciate it. And all you people in America that are planning to visit Mexico, listen up. Very important, no further delay. My very special guest, Mike Vigil. So my first question before we get into really the main subject matter in all of your years, and I understand is about 31 years in very high positions in the DEA, you know, really rose to the top. Have you ever had experience with the Mafia, whether it be in the United States or Italy, with respect to, you know, drug movement and drug enforcement? Not with the Mafia.

I primarily worked in Latin America against the Mexican cartels. I worked in Colombia and then I also worked undercover, for example, in Brazil and many other areas. Because that’s really what I started off doing is working undercover. All right. So I have maintained throughout my time in that life over 20 years that we weren’t major drug dealers in any way, shape or form. We didn’t come close to what the cartels were doing. I just want to know that obviously was your experience also, because had we been major drug dealers, you probably would have known about it.

That’s correct. I know that the Mafia was engaged in heroin trafficking, for example, but nowhere near what the Colombian and the Mexican cartels were involved in. For example, we had one individual by the name of Amado Carrillo Fuentes. They called him the Lord of the Skies. And he was the head of the Juarez Chihuahua cartel. This man was moving 12, 15 tons of cocaine at a time using commercial aircraft like DC9s and then also French made caravels. So these guys handle millions, billions of dollars worth of product. Wow. And that, that is. And like we said, we, we didn’t come anywhere close to that.

You know, during my time in that life, we were told if we dealt with drugs, we’d get killed. And I know of situations where people got in serious trouble for doing that. So some guys were doing it on a smaller scale and I never even Came across the DEA in any investigation that I was myself under. I never dealt with drugs, but neither do I know anybody that was being investigated by the dea. I just wanted to get that out because it’s always a question that’s asked of me and you verified that. So I appreciate it.

You know, getting into what’s going on now in Mexico, I was kind of stunned. I visit Puerto Vallarta quite a bit. We have a condo down there. It’s always been a very peaceful, quiet town. We were always told that cartels wouldn’t really show their presence there because they respected the tourism and the people involved. And that seems to have all been blown up in the last couple of days here with this, you know, uprising, I would say, over the capture and killing of El Mencho. That’s correct. And one of the things that is a very strange phenomenon is that the cartels, whenever they have one of their leaders captured, let’s say, by the Mexican government, they react very violently.

I recall they did the same thing, not at this great scale, but when they captured Ovilio Guzman, Chapa Guzman’s son, in 2019 in Culiacan, Sinaloa, there were about 30 National Guard members that. That captured him. But they made the mistake of going into the wolves mouth. And the cartel reacted probably quicker, Michael, than any military force in most countries. Within minutes, they sealed off the entire city of Kuliakan. They burned buses. Then they went to the airport and started shooting a commercial aircraft leaving the airport and landing. Thank God they didn’t kill anybody. But the same thing now with El Mencho, but they did it over 12 states.

They burned buses, they shut off businesses, commerce. And then the Canadian government, as well as the US Government, had to issue advisories to tell citizens that were residing in Mexico or were there as tourists to hunker down in hotels and stay off the streets or the roadways because. And it’s still a little bit dangerous there. Let me ask you, Mike, in your opinion. All right, everyone, quick thing before we continue. You know what everyone tells me at events? They come up and they say, michael, I bought your wine just to support you. And then they say, but I kept buying it because it’s so darn good.

And that’s the best compliment I ever get. So, so enjoy it. Here it is. Let’s get back to it. Do you think this is going to last quite a while? Because I know there is an advisory out there. I mean, my wife, who is Mexican, she’s Mexican American, but she said she don’t ever want to visit Mexico again because she’s afraid that an uprising like this could happen at any time. Well, normally these type of events where they start to do what they call narco blockades, will last for a few days. The Mexican government has already sent 2,000 troops into the state of Jalisco, as well as to other states to try to quell the violence that’s taking place there.

So they don’t last long. Here’s the real dilemma is that when you kill or capture one of the leaders of the cartels, historically, what happens is they fragment, and then all of a sudden you have two, three, four individuals that are fighting for control of the cartel, and that is what leads to major violence. Example, with the kidnapping of Mayo Sambada, the leader of the Sinaloa cartel, on July 25th of last year, all of a sudden you started to see violence take place on the 9th of September. And right now, they killed about 3,000 people. There’s about 2,500 that are disappeared.

And they cost the state of Sinaloa about a billion dollars in revenue because a lot of business had to go shop. Wow. Let me ask you this. In your experience, because of the fact that the United States, at least according to what we’re told, played a pretty significant role in, you know, the location that El Mencho was in and helped the Mexican government or the Mexican military go in and capture him, because of the fact that the United States was involved, because of the fact that Trump is now named the cartels as terrorists, do you think that they would start.

The cartels would start retaliating against American tourists in. In Mexico? That’s a good. That’s a strong possibility. I think that the United States made a mistake by saying, we provided information because the cartels will retaliate and they may start killing American citizens that, you know, in Mexico, the. That’s always a possibility, but I will say this, is that the vast majority of the intelligence that led to El Mencho’s killing came from the Mexican military. And basically what they did, Mike, is they developed a source that was very close to one of El Mencho’s paramours, and she was inadvertently telling him about El Mencho and that she would go see him.

And the information was then provided to the Mexican army, and they started to follow her. And then last week, they followed her to an isolated area in Tapalpa, and they saw her go in. And then On Saturday, the 21st of this month, she came out. And by that time, well, at that time, they decided to develop an operational plan to assault that location. And they did it very quickly. They used components from the special forces of the army. They also had the National Guard. And then what they did is they brought in six helicopters, but they didn’t bring them into the state of Jalisco simply because they have a lot of people working for them in that state.

That’s their hum. So they put him in adjoining states so that, you know, it would not filter that, you know, the Mexican army is going to do an assault and you know, you know, be being very careful. So on Sunday morning and you know, the wee hours of the morning, the special forces started to surround this compound that was very isolated. And at the same time it started to bring in these six helicopter gunships. And then they also had military fixed wing aircraft that were going to participate. They went in and they encountered heavy resistance. They engaged in a tremendous firefight initially.

They had reported that it was four cartel members that were initially killed, but it was actually eight. And when the firefight started and Mencho and a couple of bodyguards ran out of the area and they went into like a forest, you know, heavily wooded. But the, but the special forces were already in that area and they, they, they encountered resistance. Resistance. And they started shooting at El Mencho and his two bodyguards. They, El Mencho and his two bodyguards actually hand rocking propelled grenades, but fortunately didn’t use them. And Mencho and his two bodyguards were severely wounded.

They were put on a helicopter and they were going to take him to a hospital there in Jalisco, but they expired. They were, they were severely wounded. They died en route. So then they took him to the, to Morelia in the state of Michoacan. And there they put him on a CASA aircraft and then took him to Mexico City where they actually identified definitively that it was El Mencho. Yeah, I had also read, I don’t know if this was true or not, that he was suffering from kidney failure, he was on dialysis, and I had heard something that they were tracking the medical devices that were actually to his different hideouts or the places that he were.

I don’t know if ultimately that led to any success in locating him, but apparently it was this woman that eventually led them to his whereabouts, correct? That’s correct, Mike. And you’re also correct in the fact that he was suffering from kidney disease. And as a result of that, he built his own clinic and brought in doctors to treat him because he didn’t want to go to a regular hospital or clinic where they might report him and turn him into the authorities keep in mind that the US government had a $15 million bounty on his head. The Mexican government also had a few hundred thousands of dollars reward.

So he was not going to take any chances. And the thing is that he was an individual that kept a low profile. He was an individual that ran the Jalisco New generation cartel with an iron fist. He was like a dictator. And as a result of that, he controlled every facet of that organization. And he then allowed for independent decisions to be made extremely ultra violent. I remember in 2015, he was traveling in a convoy and he was intercepted by military helicopters. And one of the military helicopters, Michael, hovered over the convoy. They made the mistake of hovering and one of the cartel members fired a rocket propelled grenade, downing the the helicopter, killing everybody on board.

And then I remember he enforced police convoy and his gunmen killed them all. There were about 20 of them. They were lying wounded on the roadway and they came out from the wooded area and executed the ones that were still alive. And then also in 2019, and I’m sure you’ve heard the, the name Omar Garcia, Harry, who at that time was the public security director for Mexico City. And Carpuch was traveling to his office from his house on Avenida Reforma, which is the main avenue in Mexico City. And I lived in Mexico City. And these cartel gunmen from Jalisco ambushed him and they wounded him three times.

He was lucky to have survived. They killed two of his bodyguards and then they killed a woman, was just a bystander, you know, nearby. So the Jalisco cartel, extraordinarily violent and ruthless. Wow. You know, I have to ask you this, Mike, you know, and I try to compare it to the United States, Mexico and the United States, meaning that there is no organized group in America that could ever become as powerful as the cartels have become in Mexico. I mean, the United States government would never, it would never happen here. I look at Mexico and I say to myself again, as a novice in that regard, does the Mexican government just not have the will or the ability to wipe these cartels out? How did they become so strong? They’re like their own paramilitary group and have such influence and power in that country.

How did it ever happen like that? They became very powerful, Michael, because I remember in the 1950s, for example, Mexico cultivated marijuana. They cultivated marijuana and that’s basically what they sold. And they were very loose groups of people that did that. And then Mexico brought in Chinese laborers to work in building their railroads. And what did these Chinese laborers do? They brought opium poppy seeds because they weren’t used to smoking opium. And they started cultivating them in Mexico. And then you had some innovative entrepreneurs there that said, well, you know, hey, we can produce heroin, you know, we can cultivate Ethiopian poppies, you know, extract the opium, and then we can make heroin and make even more money.

But where the cartels became extraordinarily powerful is back in the 1980s, and you’ll recall George Bush senior that created a joint interagency task force in Florida. So he started to put a lot of resources, sources in the Caribbean, and the Colombian cartels said, okay, we’re going to have to change the route from the Caribbean. And they looked at Mexico. Why? Cultural factors, common language. And then at the same time, they figure, well, you know, we can use their existing pipelines that they have for heroin and marijuana to run our cocaine. And initially they would pay them to import it into the United States.

And then the Mexicans, you know, the light went on and said, well, you know, what the hell are we doing this for them? You know, we can control everything. We can control, you know, every aspect of the cocaine trade and make a hell of a lot more money. Then they went into the synthetic drugs, Michael, fentanyl and methamphetamine. Why? Because with synthetic drugs, and they import the precursor chemicals from China and also India. But with precursor chemicals, Michael, they can manufacture it 24 7. Whereas with plant based drugs like opium poppy or the coca plants or marijuana, if they’re destroyed by, let’s say, Mexico or Colombia, then they have to wait till the next cultivation cycle that can last three months.

And people. And I’m sure, Michael, you’ve heard them talk about super labs. You know, they’re making super labs, you know, they’re making fentanyl on super lab, you know, and that gives people the wrong impression because they think that they’re like pharmaceutical labs, you know, like the Bunsen burners, the beakers and the flask. No, these are nothing more than metal tubs that you can buy at Lowe’s or any hardware store. And they, they import the precursor chemicals from China, India, primarily through the ports of Lazaro Cardinals and Michoacan, and then also Manzanillo in the state of Colima.

They take them to these labs and these, these guys will mix the precursor chemicals with a dirty shovel or a stick, and they make them very quickly. And then they use tableting, tableting machines to make them look like Xanax or, you know, other, you know, drugs to make him look harmless. But at the same time, the Cartels also mix fentanyl with heroin, with marijuana, with cocaine, with methamphetamine to give it a little bit more potency. And the drug addicts here in the United States a lot of times don’t know that they are actually ingesting fentanyl. And 2 milligrams of fentanyl, which is about equivalent to a few grains of salt, can be lethal.

And it’s 50 times stronger than heroin, 100 times stronger than morphine. So it’s a very deadly drug. But you know, the drug addicts many times don’t even know that they’re taking it. But, but the principal cartels that make or produce fentanyl, Sierra Loa and then Jalisco. But here’s the other thing with the cartels is that they diversify their portfolio because for example, the Jalisco New generation cartel has penetrated the $3.5 billion avocado industry, the 3 billion dollar lime lemon industry. They penetrated the fishing industry, they’re stealing lumber. And then even more so they go into the Pemex or the petroleum, Mexican petroleum pipelines.

And they, along with other groups, these steal a billion dollars worth of petroleum from these pipelines. Now, not everybody uses drugs, but they certainly everybody uses petroleum. And then they’re making billions of dollars in terms of moving migrants, you know, coming from different parts of Latin America, you know, Central, the seven Central American states, South America, even the Caribbean. And so I remember a few decades ago, Michael, all the cartels in Mexico are making an estimated $35 billion. The Lisco New Generation cartel is now making about over $50 billion themselves on their own. And so they grew very powerful.

And then the problem is that the United States is not controlling the weapons that are going into Mexico. Here in the United States we have about 80,000 registered gun dealers. That’s more than Wendy’s, McDonald’s, Burger King, and then also Subway sandwiches combined. And we estimate that there’s about 300,000 or more weapons that flow every year into Mexico. A lot of those military grade weapons end up in the hands of the cartels. Here’s the other thing is that Mexico and the entire country has one gun store, one, and it’s on a military base near Mexico City. And they sell low caliber weapons, like, you know, 22 caliber weapons to go hunting.

Very, very, very low caliber weapons. And they are extraordinarily stringent in terms of who they sell these weapons. You know, they do background checks, they do everything. And so it’s tightly controlled. The other thing is that we’re never going to do away with the cartels until we reduce the demand and the consumption here in the United States. Because it’s the basic law of supply and demand. Or if you don’t have the demand, then you’re not going to have the cartels. But even if you eliminated the cartels, let’s say tomorrow, and you still had that demand and the consumption, you know, somebody else would be producing it and importing it.

So that’s why, you know, we have to work together with these countries. And you know, I, I worked in Mexico for 13 years, I worked in Colombia for many, many years. And then I was the agent in charge of the Caribbean. So I’m very, very familiar with a lot of these operations and there’s so many things that, that we can do. And I’m hoping, Michael, that now that the, the, the Jalisco generation cartel is weakened because of what I said mentioned, control it with an iron fist. So it’s going to have at least an immediate impact.

I don’t know if it’s going to last. But at the same time, you know, everybody thought that mentioned was invincible, that he was never going to be captured, he was never going to be killed, killed. And now that he has been eliminated, that is having a major psychological impact on, on the cartel. Well, let me ask you this two questions here. Number one, do you think that it was the plan of these cartels all along to say we are going to become as powerful, as well armed, as well equipped as the Mexican government so that we can show the kind of control that we have in this country and we can maintain our business, number one.

And then number two, what is the structure like now that El Mincho was taken out? I know in the Mafia we have a structure. There would be somebody that would be ready to take their place. How does it work on the cartel? Do they have that kind of a structure in place or is it just somebody that exerts himself, the guy that has the most money? How do they operate and stay, you know, so organized and disciplined? Well, I’ll give you two things, is when you take a look at the Sinaloa cartel, they have a horizontal structure and they allow for decision making to be made along the entire organization.

And they have like McDonald’s. You know, give you a comparison is they have like franchises. They have franchises. The Sinaloa cartel operates in six of the seven continents. They don’t operate in Antarctica because the penguins don’t have any monies. And then you have the Jalisco new generation cartel. That has a vertical structure and they normally have people that are going to take over, but still you may have other individuals that have different ideas where they want to take over. And the heir apparent for El Mencho was Ruben Osayira Gonzalez El Menchito, as they called him. But here, a few months ago, Michael, he was sentenced to life imprisonment here in the United States.

Most of El Mencho’s family has been in prison. His wife, Rosalinda Gonzalez Vanencia, was given a five year sentence for money laundering for the cartel. And then you have Jessica Joanna Mentos daughter, that was detained and sentenced to about one or two years here in the United States. I don’t know if she’s still, if she’s still in or she’s out, but. And then let me give you a little bit of an example of, of the background. Well, let me, let me continue. So normally they do have somebody, but a lot of times, like I said, you know, other people have different ideas that, you know, I should run the cartel and they go to war and the a car table fracture.

And we’ve seen that over and over again. Because between 2006 and 2012, when Felipe Calderon was president of Mexico, he came up with this kingpin strategy. And he said, I’m going to go after the leaders of the cartels. I’m going to either kill them or I’m going to capture them. And he killed and captured about 27 of the 33 drug leaders. But what he never foresaw, Michael, is that the fragmentation of the cartels and that led to, you know, bloodshed, bloodshed in Mexico. We were seeing about 35,000 people killed in the country every year. And I want to get back to El Mencho because El Mencho, not too many people know this, but he had these terror schools.

And he would go on the Internet and recruit people and say, okay, you know, we’re hiring security guards, you know, like it was a legitimate business. And they would, you know, they would tell these people, you know, you’ll come to this area. And then they would transport them to these isolated areas in the mountains where they had the terror schools. And they would tell them, okay, you know, we’re the Jalisco new generation cartel. You’re not going to leave here unless that’s feet first. And they would, they would teach them how to use weapons, but they didn’t use silhouettes or targets.

They used human beings, you know, rival cartel members. And they would put them up there and say, okay, boom, boom. And they’d start killing them and Then they would teach them to be robotic killing machines, and they had to practice cannibalism. For example, when they kill some of the rival cartel members, you know, they would say, okay. And they would take a knife and give it to him and have them cut off a piece of flesh and eat it. And I remember one of them spit it out and it was full of dirt, and they say, eat it or, you know you’re going to die.

So, you know, he’s gagging it and he ate it. And this is how what they turn out. And there was one scenario, and then it’s on tape, and they have a rival cartel member on the ground. One individual has his foot on his neck, and another one comes up with a long knife that looks like a bayonet. And the guy’s just moving, and he slices his chest open. And you can see the body parts just moving. The guy’s screaming. And then the man with the knife goes in again, severs the heart, has it in his hand, and then bites it like it’s an apple.

This is. This is. This is what they teach them. They. They lose all sense of decency, all. All sense of humanity. And, you know, they. They. They commit murders in the most inhuman way. And, you know, it doesn’t bother them. And El Mencho had a rule that, you know, if you kill people, try to get rid of the body, because if you have no body, you know, there’s no crime that can be proved. So they would hire these guys. Do you know what pozole is? No, Michael. Pozole is like a. Like a Mexican dish. It’s very.

Oh, pozole. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, I know. I love. I actually love it. Yeah, it’s like harmony with porridge. And they put red chili. It’s really good. So they would have these guys that they called pozoleros, and what they would do is they would go take the cadavers to them, and these guys would put the bodies into these 55 gallon barrels with water. And then they would have a heat source like wood underneath to boil the water. And they. They would put, like, about a kilo of caustic acid. And. And they would, you know, they would continue to burn wood under there, and then after about 24 hours, the flesh would dissolve and would look like a thick coffee.

And then they would take the bone husk that you remain and smash it up with, you know, one pipe, a lead pipe or whatever, and get rid of the entire body. I mean, we’re talking about horrible things, but this is the reality of these cartels, so they had. They basically have no value of human life. They’re just. None. Brainwashed. None. They were brainwashed and, and they became killing machines. And then now that, you know, there’s a lot of conflict, for example, with the Sinaloa cartel, like with any army, they’re losing a lot of the sicarios or the hitmen, the guys that go out and do the killings or engaged in the gun battles.

So now they are recruiting minors, they’re recruiting children to go out and fight, you know, with, you know, the different factions and, and what have you. And the. Here’s another, here’s another fact for you is that during the last 10 years, disappearances in Mexico have increased by 200%. Wow. 200%. And guess where the epicenter of those disappearances is? Where? Mike, let me, let me ask you this. Do you think the Mexican government, knowing that if they really went all out against these cartels, that it would be. Would basically be Mexico at war and that there would be so much bloodshed and so much disruption to the country that they would just rather see them work and not cause any trouble? And, hey, just don’t be out there in our face and we’ll leave you alone.

You know, import your stuff to America, but keep everything quiet here. I mean, it almost seems that that’s the way they would want to operate. I don’t know, maybe. Maybe it’s silly what I’m saying, but it sounds that way. Yeah. Well, here’s the problem, is that when Lopez Obrador was president, you know, before Claudia Sheinbaum, he came up with this policy called abrazos y noba lazos, hugs and not gunshots. And he didn’t want to rile up the cartels and caused a lot of violence. And what he wanted to do is look at the root causes, because most of these drug cartel leaders come from rural areas like Chapo.

Guzman was born to a very, very poor family in Sinaloa, in the Latuna, in the municipality of Badiraguato. The mother, Maria Consuelo, baked bread, and then he would sell oranges on the street. The father, Emilio, was an incorrigible drunk, and he engaged in marijuana cultivation on a small scale. But he would use the money not for the family, but for. For women and then liquor. And when he would get doozed up, you know, he would become very violent. So Chapa Usman only had about a sixth grade education. The same thing with El Mencho. El Mencho grew up in the state of Michoacan, which has common border with Halifax, go extremely poor.

He dropped out of elementary school because he needed to help support the the family. And what they did is they would cultivate, you know, very small little crops of avocado. And El Mencho wanted a better life. So what does he do? He goes to the United States. He goes to the Bay Area near in San Francisco, California. And at the age of 19, in 1986, he was arrested for carrying a weapon and then having sold in property. Later, in 1989, he and his brother Abraham were sold 5 ounces of heroin to undercover cops. And Mencho was just conducting like counter surveillance.

And his brother Abraham sold it. When he came back, he had money. And this is how astute El Mencho was even at that age. And he said that Abraham, he says, don’t ever sell drugs to those guys anymore. Those guys are cops. He said, look at the money. It’s all brand new bills. They’re crisp. Nobody uses brand new bills except cops. And later el Mencho, in 1992 was arrested on federal drug trafficking charges. He was sentenced to three years. Once he was released, he went to Jalisco and became what, what? A police officer? Became a police officer.

And then as a police officer in Mexico, you meet a lot of cartels, you know, especially the state and local are extremely corrupt. He becomes a member of the Millennial Cartel, which was headed by Armando Valencia. And El Mencho becomes a low ranking member. He’s actually like a hitman. But he marries one of the Valencia daughters, Rosalinda Gonzalez Valencia, and goes up the ranks. And later the cartel, with the rest of the leaders, fractured into what it was the resistancia or the resistance. And then the Torcidos were the twisted ones. And the leader of the Torcidos was El Mencho.

And he actually won the conflict. And then around 2009, formed the Jalisco Generation Cartel. And as you know, they operate like a paramilitary force. They take these straight trucks and they get these 2 inch steel plates and wrap it around the truck, thereby turning it into a makeshift tank. And then they mount 50 caliber machine guns on the truck and they roll into the cities with impunity. So I guess the point that I’m trying to make is that, you know, you have different politics that come into bear, but they have to take action because if not, the cartels will become even more and more and more powerful and then you’re never going to be able to take them out.

But like I said, it has to be a combination of things. Obviously you have to, but you can’t only take out the leaders. You have to take out the entire infrastructure to have any impact. But here we have to stop the, the flow of weapons. We have to also reduce the demand. And Michael, I’ve always been an advocate of creating, you know, anti drug abuse education in the schools, you know, starting from elementary school, to teach our kids, you know, not, you know, about the evils of using drugs. Well, you know, I totally agree with you there, you know, and Mike, you were in San Diego for quite some time.

You were in charge of that office. Is that a major route for drugs coming into this country through California? Absolutely right. Absolutely right. Because San Diego is the hum for a lot of the fentanyl, a lot of the drugs that are coming into the United States. Because the busiest land port of entry along the U. S. Mexico border is in San Diego. And then as you well know, in Otay Mesa, you have a lot of warehouses. So some of the cartels, especially the Sinaloa cartel, have built tunnels and they, they funneled drugs through the tunnels into those warehouses and then from there they have easy access to major roadways to move the drives throughout the United States.

But I’ve always said that if you take a Look at the 2000 mile Mexico border and you took a giant knife and you cut it all the way across, it would look like a block of Swiss cheese because it’s riddled with tunnels. And most of the drives, about 90% of the grants come in through the legitimate ports of entry, not between the ports of entry, through, you know, through the ports of entry. Guess who transports it? Primarily Americans. And the thing is that up until a few years ago, customs was only able to search 3% of passenger vehicles and only about 17% of commercial trucks.

Why? Because of a lack of technology, you know, like these X ray machines that can quickly, you know, you know, X ray trucks and see if they have any secret compartments and what have you. They’re starting to put, put, you know, more technology, but, you know, a lot more is, is also needed. And then keep in mind that we have common border with Mexico on the Caribbean side or Atlantic side, and then also on the Pacific side. So there’s many ways of getting it through, but 90% of it comes through the legitimate ports of entry. Wow.

You know, Mike, this kind of a personal question because being visiting Puerto Vallarta so much, you know, there’s a, as you know, there’s a pharmacy on just about every corner and we’re told that it’s really the cartels that own all of these pharmacies, is there any truth to that? Some of them, yeah, they do own legitimate businesses because they have to launder their money. But I remember it was about a year ago that the cartels were going to the pharmacies and saying, you are going to sell our drugs. They’re going to sell cocaine for us, you’re going to sell fentanyl for us, you’re going to sell methamphetamine to the tourists, but we’re going to use your business, the pharmacies.

And they were intimidating them and if they didn’t do what they wanted, they would send like a team of hitmen and they would kill them to send a message to other pharmacy owners. Very true. Wow. You know, it’s unbelievable. So it seems that the only way we’re going to really make a dent on this and you, you hit on it, number one, is obviously stop the demand here as much as we can in the United States. And by doing that, we have to educate our young people at an early age, you know, and then do as best we can to control the border enforcement, stop the flow of weapons from the United States to the cartels.

It’s a combination of things and that’s the only way we’re going to really defeat it to a great point. I have another question. Fentanyl is something I don’t understand. I’ve been personally impacted by this. My youngest daughter’s soon to be fiance was living in our house in a guest room, and one night he took an Adderall. These kids, you know, sometimes to stay awake for testing, they take an Adderall. He wasn’t a drug addict and it was laced with fentanyl and he dropped dead in my bathroom. Within five minutes he was dead. It was an unbelievable impact on our family and my poor daughter.

But this Fentanyl being so potent, doesn’t it almost defeat their purpose? Because they don’t want to kill people. They’re trying to make people get hooked on drugs. And fentanyl is so powerful, I’m at a losses. Why do what? What’s the advantage of them? Obviously there’s a money advantage, but if it’s killing people to the degree that it is, and I’m understanding it’s taken a lot of lives here every year in the United States, what’s the advantage to them of selling this stuff? One, the thing is that about seven or eight of 10 pills that people buy, and you’re right, you know, a lot of times they market it like Percocet, Adderall.

And the people that are taking the Adderall, you know, like you said, you know, you know, studying, you know, pulling these what they call midnighters and what have you, they don’t even know that it’s laced with fentanyl. And As I indicated, 2 milligrams of that stuff can kill a regular person. But they don’t look at it in terms of losing clients because cheap and mine, that it’s a conveyor belt. And every year here in the United States, we have millions of births. So it goes from one generation to the other. So they’re never going to lose their clients.

One generation comes up, another one comes up. So they have a steady stream of clients. What would be the advantage of lacing an Adderall with a little bit of Fentanyl? Let’s say it didn’t kill somebody. But what would be the advantage? Just a bigger high. A bigger high. A bigger high. And like I said, you know, they lace it with just about every drug. Methamphetamine, heroin, even marijuana, cocaine, just to give it a little more of a punch. And, you know, there’s Narcan, which is a drug to counteract the effects of opioids like heroin, or even the synthetic opioid, which is fentanyl.

And when it does, it blocks the brain’s receptors and it can reverse an overdose. So therefore, it’s always very important for law enforcement, for the community, for firefighters, first responders to have Narcan or naloxone, as they call it, so that they can reverse the effects of, like a. Like an opioid overdose. And then they’re also distributing these test strips so that addicts can and test their drug of choice to make sure that it’s not laced with fentanyl. And that’s preventing some drug overdose deaths. Over a year ago, you know, they were starting to lose about, you know, 115,000 people to drug overdose and everything, but about 70,000 of them or as a result of fentanyl.

And then they started to put out these test strips, they started to put out the Narcan, and that started to save lives. And the drug overdose Deaths dropped by 27%. Wow. I’ll tell you, it’s really frightening. It really is. You know, Mike, I have to ask you this, and this is obviously an unofficial position of yours either way because, you know, you’re retired after all the service to our country. Would you. Would you now advise American travelers to stay out of Mexico for a time, at least until. Until we see what the lay of the land is, because I know, I’ve been reading the Sinaloa cartel may now try to establish themselves.

There’s going to be internal strife. There could be some internal, independent, smaller little groups that are trying to now move in on the j. I forget the name of it. The cartel that Metro had. So there’s going to be some unrest in the country. Would you advise American tourists or visitors just to hold still for a while? I would. I definitely would. Because I think it’s very important that they wait until, you know, we see what. What happens. But to go to Mexico right now, you’re running a great risk. You may be able to go there and come back safely.

But then what happens if you get caught? In the shootout? There was a. An individual that was staying in a hotel now that they were putting all these narco blockades and what have you. And then the hotel ran out of food. So he went out into the street to find a restaurant or a taqueria or whatever. And guess what happens? He gets caught in the crossfire between the military forces and the cartel members. It’s very dangerous. So you’re right. I would not recommend that they go there now. Well, I appreciate that, Mike, and I have to say this.

You know, I’ve had a lot of interviews with people. This is probably the most informative interview that I’ve ever had or conversation that I’ve ever had with anybody about the cartels and what’s going on there. So I really appreciate it. I know my viewers are really going to appreciate it. And really thank you so much for coming on and sharing the knowledge that you have. It’s tremendously helpful. Well, thank you so much. And I know that you’re in the wine business. I’m going to buy a few bottles of your wine because I don’t drink a lot, but, you know, the only thing that I drink anymore is wine, and I really enjoy a glass of wine once in a while.

Well, I’ll tell you what I’m going to do. I don’t want you to buy anything, and I would love to send you a couple of bottles. I know you’ll enjoy them, and that’s my gift to you for really helping us out here. Well, thank you so much. I know I’m going to enjoy it. All right, Mike, people, I don’t know about you, but, man, I. I was stunned with some of the things that I’ve heard. This is real information. This is real insight into the cartels cannibalism. No value for human life. And I’ve told you many times, you can’t compare the mafia and the cartels.

Let me explain something to you. The cartels in Mexico are their own army. They’re a paramilitary group. They control so much of the company they’re now into legitimate business with. Also, they’re smart. They’re diversified, okay? And Mike said the only way to stop these people is to stop the demand, stop the flow of munitions and arms into that country. Because they’re bringing us drugs, we’re getting them more powerful in a way. Now, it’s not the government that’s doing that. It’s the black market, but it’s happening. So what do we do here in this country? We educate our young people.

Have to educate them about the dangers of drugs from early on, from the time they’re in elementary school. We got to put it in there. You know, it’s good. I’ve said this many times, to have a healthy fear of things that are no good for you. Drugs are no good for you. Stop. We got to educate these kids at a young age. No question about it. We got to stop the demand in America. That’s the main way to stop these cartels or at least to stop the problems that we’re having in this country because we have a wealthy country.

They can’t export their drugs to places that don’t have money to buy them. That’s why they depend on the United States. We got to step up our efforts in educating people. Closing the border. Thank you, Donald Trump. Closing the border and really being, you know, so. So on our mark when it comes to this, it’s so important. But, man, I couldn’t believe some of the things that he was saying. Cannibalism. When people have no regard for human life, you got to watch it, man. They’ll stop at nothing. So, please, if you’re thinking about visiting that country, I hate to tell you not to go to.

I love Mexico. I love it. I visit there quite a bit. People are wonderful, wonderful people. But you got to be careful. You got to face reality. It’s not. You got to be careful. So I’m not discouraging you. I’m just telling you, pay attention. You know, I’m sure they’re going to get things under control, and they’re going to calm things down. Just pay attention. This has been going on forever. It’s not something new. But then things get, you know, they get highlighted at times, and, you know, things happen like this. And did you hear about this El Mencho? Smart Guy, very, very smart guy.

Tried to stay undercover. Very smart. But I want to bring out again, what did he say about the mafia here? No issues whatsoever with drugs. I’ve been telling you that for how long? There’s a DEA agent, 31 years on the job. If the mafia was big into drugs, he’d be. He doesn’t know of any cases of it. So please don’t dispute me when I tell you we weren’t big drug dealers and we’re not even. You shouldn’t even mention us in the same universe as the cartels. So listen, I hope you really paid attention to this. I love sit downs like this with somebody that was just so knowledgeable, just so informative.

I like to keep my viewers abreast of things and, and this is hot. Now this is going to be going on for a while so pay attention please. Pay attention and don’t do anything stupid. That’s all I can say. Great interview, Mike. Thank you very, very much for coming on. I’m sure I’m going to have you back again. Whenever any question comes up, we’ll bring Mike Vigil on. He’s that astute and that knowledgeable and informed about all of this drug business in the cartels. And please, the fentanyls, do you hear what they said about fentanyl? You can produce a 24 hour a day, seven days a week, fentanyl, all the methamphetamines, you can produce them around the clock.

That’s why they’re so into it. They’re not, they’re not concerned about growing, growing the plants increase their business God knows how many fold. Unbelievable. People. It’s scary. Drugs are scary. Educate your kids, please. How do I always leave you people? Same way. Never going to change. Be safe. Be safe. When it comes to drugs. Be healthy. It’s all fits together. Safety, healthy. It’s all together. And yes, God bless each and every one of you. Families, neighborhoods, communities, your loved ones. And God bless America. Please. God bless America in every facet of everything that’s going on in this country.

We need your blessing. And people, I will see you next time. So be sure to stay tuned. Sa.
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