MEXICO CITY — An unsettling revelation emerged this week as prosecutors in western Mexico confirmed the recovery of numerous clothing items and bone fragments at a location previously identified as a cartel training site. This discovery, unveiled by a group actively searching for missing relatives, highlights significant failures in the initial investigation process.
The gruesome find in Jalisco is not unique. Mexico’s official records cite over 120,000 individuals as disappeared. In the past decade and a half, discovering such sites has accelerated, often led by determined families conducting searches themselves due to government inaction.
In the latest incident, the Jalisco Search Warriors group explored a ranch in Teuchitlan, approximately 60 kilometers from Guadalajara. The site was initially unearthed by National Guard troops in September of the previous year. At that time, authorities reported the arrest of ten individuals, the rescue of two hostages, and the discovery of one body. Identified as a cartel training ground, the investigation saw a brief burst of activity involving backhoes, dogs, and equipment to detect ground irregularities before inexplicably halting.
Indira Navarro, leading the search group, revealed they acted upon an anonymous tip. “This location was not only a training ground but also, gruesomely, a place for extermination,” Navarro stated.
Unfortunately, such sites have an all-too-common presence in Mexico’s troubled landscape. Drug cartels frequently use these secluded locations as arenas for making victims vanish. During a 2022 visit by investigators to a site near Nuevo Laredo, adjacent to the Texas border, it was shocking to find a room converted into a crematorium. The floor was littered with bone fragments and ash, with more scattered throughout the property.
Several other incidents have equally shaken the Mexican public:
**’The Stewmaker’ (Baja California):** In 2009, Santiago Meza admitted to making between 150 and 300 bodies disappear by dissolving them in lye for his cartel boss. Known as “Pozolero,” or stew maker, Meza used large oil drums for the process, often burying or discarding the remaining bones.
**San Fernando (Tamaulipas):** Prior to 2011, large clandestine grave discoveries were not commonplace in Mexico. This changed when almost 200 bodies were found in graves near San Fernando, following the massacre of 72 migrants in the area a year earlier. It was revealed that most bodies belonged to Central American migrants abducted from buses and murdered by the Zetas cartel.
**Piedras Negras jail (Coahuila):** In 2017, an investigation by the Colegio de México revealed that the jail across from Eagle Pass, Texas, served as a Zetas cartel base. Reports indicated that up to 20 operatives disposed of victims using diesel-filled barrels, often subjecting them to brutal ends beforehand.
**La Bartolina (Tamaulipas):** Although rumors circulated for years, it wasn’t until the later years that the authorities began to address the site near where the Rio Grande meets the Gulf of Mexico. Upon his first visit, Tamaulipas Search Commissioner Jorge Macías was astonished by the extent of human remains scattered around. By 2022, authorities had extracted around 1,100 pounds of bones, solidifying La Bartolina as the largest of 15 identified extermination sites in the state. Federal teams continue their investigations today.
These bleak discoveries underscore the harsh reality faced by families of the missing in Mexico. As the government fails to meet the challenge, it leaves a void that relatives of the disappeared strive vigorously to fill in their quest for answers and justice.
