ABSTRACT
Noticias de Michoacan reports on organized crime, corruption, and drug trafficking. The US government called it "the largest single drug cash seizure the world has ever seen". Drug honchos owned posh, waterfront homes, dined at luxurious bistros, frolicked in the ocean with their wives and children, and assiduously avoided drawing attention to themselves. In early December 2008, the Calderon administration appointed General Javier del Real Magallanes, commander of the Army's Fourth Region that embraces Nuevo Leon, to serve as the Secretary of Public Security's undersecretary for strategy and police intelligence. Guillermo Valdes Castellanos, another Calderon confidante, heads the Center for Investigation and National Security, a Mexican version of the Central Intelligence Agency that falls under the legal rubric of the Interior Ministry but is a de facto dependency of Los Pinos. Calderon's naming Gomez Mont as interior minister helped bring discipline to this fractious entourage.
