The Zetas, Mexico’s most feared and violent criminal organization, have moved operations to Guatemala, penetrating local police forces and the military. They have made alliances with locals and are redefining organized crime in Central America.
Investigation Chapters
Part I: The Incursion
On Tuesday, May 12, 2011, some 10 SUVs and pickups with tinted windows pulled up to a local gasoline station in Coban, the capital of Alta Verapaz state, north Guatemala. The men were heavily armed and flaunting the fact. The gasoline station is about a half block from the national police headquarters in Coban. They…
Part II: The Modus Operandi
It is not a fancy video production. It begins, Horse Races Coban, Guatemala September 15, 2010. Two men — one wearing a jockeys uniform, the other in street clothes — ready their horses behind a metal starting gate on a dirt track. Norteña music plays in the background. The camera scans the crowd: spectators wearing cowboy hats,…
Part III: A Guatemalan Response?
On December 18, 2010, a local soccer league in Coban held its championship match. One team featured Alta Verapazs governor at the time, Jose Adrian Lopez. The other team featured Horst Walther Overdick, one of Guatemala’s most powerful drug traffickers. Overdicks team won, but as a local newspaper said, the governor got…
