By “El Huaso” for Borderland Beat
In three operations, Mexican security forces captured three criminals who used drones and explosives to extort local lime farmers, and seized a narco camp in Apatzingán, Michoacán. Apatzingán is the municipality with the highest number of IEDs in Mexico.
According to Security Secretary Omar García Harfuch, the three men, captured in Cenobio Moreno, Apatzingán, were members of criminal cell who used drone deployed explosives and extorted lime growers. After a search, authorities found two-way radios, drone controllers, drugs, and a homemade gun.
Just outside Apatzingán, in La Huerta, Secretariat of Public Security forces also located a destroyed a narco camp overlooking lime fields. In addition to finding hammocks, food, and a sack of a granular white material, which appears to be Pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PETN), a powerful synthetic explosive commonly used in mining.