They ask criminal group to shoot extortionists; “We have been with one foot on top and crouched down”

Fishermen from the Upper Gulf of California and people who are dedicated to processing products caught in the Sea of ​​Cortez asked the Sinaloa Cartel that families dedicated to legal activities stop being extorted, after for several years they had to pay a floor for alleged protection, to plaza bosses of La Chapiza, who have been displaced by Los Rusos.

In mid-March, a convoy with more than 30 artillery trucks crossed with impunity from the Mexicali Valley, Baja California, to the Gulf of Santa Clara, in Sonora, to confront the criminal cell led by Samuel Ibarra Peralta, The Piousleader or head of the plaza for La Chapiza, who used to charge “a tax” for all economic activity that took place in the region, but he was killed in the confrontation against the faction that operates on the border to May Zambada, as confirmed by sources from the Prosecutor’s Office.

Given the death of El Pía, who was the son of Jesús Aurelio Ibarra, Commander Aurelioarrested in June 2023 in Sonoyta, the fishermen, merchants and families of Santa Clara took the opportunity to send a message through social networks to May Zambada and ask him to stop the extortions that affect good people.

“We hope that with this incursion of the new group into the Gulf of Santa Clara there will be a change, since for years we have been oppressed with one foot on top and our heads bowed for fear of being murdered by the local criminal group under the command of La Chapiza, the “which has imposed on us a payment for each kilo of fish, a payment for each task carried out in our daily lives,” dictates the message confirmed by Excelsiorwith producers from the region.

“The result has been that those who oppose paying a flat are disappeared, killed or exiled, so we are not happy that other people have arrived in our town El Golfo, but we do want a change and that they allow us to live in peace, without so much oppression and tax collection, so much so that we have been forced to have to exchange fish for groceries in order to survive when our land is productive and self-sustaining and La Chapiza, mainly Commander Aurelio and The Pious “They came to end everything, and most importantly, our dignity.”

Among the legal fishing activities in this region are the cannonball jellyfish, the olive ridley curvina and the blue shrimp, which is highly valued in the US. There are more than 17 fishing activities among 131 species, but there is also illegal capture such as totoaba, seahorse and sea cucumber.

The faction of the Sinaloa Cartel that came to strip the Plaza del Golfo de Santa Clara from Commander y The Pious and his forces, who operated for La Chapiza of the children of Chapo Guzmán, was the faction of Los Rusos led by Juan José Ponce Félix, to May Zambada.

The incursion of Los Rusos in the Gulf of Santa Clara, Sonora, has set off alarms in San Felipe, Baja California, which would be the last bastion of La Chapiza as a maritime route for the transfer of drugs and exotic species of animals in danger of extinction. .

Currently, Los Rusos control the border towns in Baja California for El Mayo, but with blood and fire they have been extending their territory towards the Sonoran Desert, where La Chapiza, represented by the Los Pelones criminal group, began a battle against their former allies. Los Salazar, Los Deltas and Los Cazadores, but, in addition, they have another open front against the Caborca ​​Cartel, which is historically controlled by the relatives of Rafael Caro Quintero, returning to the border with Arizona in a true war zone that has displaced hundreds of families in Altar, Pitiquito, Tubutama, Atil and Oquitoa.