
The Sinaloa Cartel's 90-Year-Old Drug Mule - benbreen
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/15/magazine/the-sinaloa-cartels-90-year-old-drug-mule.html
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girvo
_> In Detroit, officials say that their busts have helped raise the street
price of a kilogram of cocaine to roughly $43,000 from about $30,000. “When
you spike the price by one-third, I think you’ve hit the right vein of where
it’s coming from,” Graveline said._

I wonder how much extra (probably petty) crime that price spike caused?

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dmix
Besides increased theft, it also means the cocaine that is available will have
more adulterants, people who can't get it will turn to other drug such as
methamphetamines or dangerous pills, dealers who do have supply will
temporarily become wealthier creating new conflicts or power plays, the cartel
will have to recruit more vulnerable people to become mules, etc etc.

But most likely, within a month or two prices will probably stabilize again.

And the state is left with an expensive prosecution, judges, lawyers, public
defenders, paid police witnesses, forensic experts. Not including the whole
cost of catch the guy in the first place.

And the drug war theater continues on and the law enforcement and legal
industries continue to line their pockets.

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sriram_sun
"Prosecutors are less interested in what caused Sharp to go into business with
the cartel." Guess that's business as usual.

Also reminds me of a scene in Little Miss Sunshine. Son catches his ~80 yr old
dad snorting cocaine. Dad's response basically is "what are they going to do
to me at this age?"

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Zigurd
The pointlessness of all this effort is just gobsmacking. What was made
better? At what cost?

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veb
"In Detroit, officials say that their busts have helped raise the street price
of a kilogram of cocaine to roughly $43,000 from about $30,000."

As another user pointed out, what's the end goal here? Why is that a good
thing? I don't know. I definitely think hurting the pockets of the poor-er
drug addicts is a bit... pointless as you said.

Imagine how much money was spent on this entire operation... it must be a
bloody lot, and from what we can see, not a lot of gain either. As a guess,
maybe they got some better intelligence, new informants.. which they can use
to further their "war on drugs".

In reality, "took down * drug runners who spent * years evading us and
supplying * with amount of drugs over * years" looks really good on someone's
CV than "Did an undercover bust and put a drug dealer in jail". All comes down
to politics in the end doesn't it?

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brazzy
> what's the end goal here? Why is that a good thing?

Less supply means less consumption, period. Increased price is just a
mechanism that determines who still gets to consume how much.

Of course, it also incentivizes getting the supply back up.

~~~
crpatino
> Of course, it also incentivizes getting the supply back up.

I think you answered yourself, didn't you?

One thing I've observed about (legal or otherwise) markets with inelastic
demand is that temporary supply shortages tend to translate into permanent
price increases.

So, what DoJ has accomplished is a pretext for dealers to hike their margins,
and an incentive for desperate addicts to rely on more violent means to
support their usage.

Basically, Merry Christmas and a Fucked-up New Year...

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sosuke
"In Detroit, officials say that their busts have helped raise the street price
of a kilogram of cocaine to roughly $43,000 from about $30,000."

Doesn't that just make the risk / reward proposition even more appealing to
new recruits?

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veb
What I took from this was someone else has probably taken over and raised the
prices for no real reason other than "they can". (if people complain, they can
point to the DEA -- making addicts hate them further! /s)

Mind you, it's an interesting thing about the old man. Logic says he probably
was very much in control, had no dementia etc when he started out. Probably
thought "I'm old now, what do I have to lose?" and turned out to be excellent
at what he did. It makes me wonder though... why did they keep him running,
when they _knew_ something was wrong with him, and that they _knew_ his memory
was deteriorating?

From everything I have read about the Sinaloa Cartel, they're not that
silly... but I guess they were this time. (they strike me as the sort of
people who are not sentimental and would "get rid" of someone who was putting
their local operation at risk...

~~~
IndianAstronaut
>they strike me as the sort of people who are not sentimental and would "get
rid" of someone who was putting their local operation at risk...

"the cartels hired unskilled laborers to dig the tunnels, executing them
afterward to preserve secrecy."

[http://www.gq.com/news-
politics/newsmakers/201401/marijuana-...](http://www.gq.com/news-
politics/newsmakers/201401/marijuana-railroad-mexican-drug-cartel-tunnels)

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jonathanp12
I don't like the idea of animals being able to determine whether a person gets
their 4th amendment right or not. Also getting "caught" with $350,000 is
irksome but theres probably been enough comments on here about civil
forfeiture lately.

EDIT: reason for my opinion:
[http://youtu.be/w-WMn_zHCVo?t=3m49s](http://youtu.be/w-WMn_zHCVo?t=3m49s)

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meesterdude
Couldn't even finish reading the blurb before i got an uncloseable popup with
"Thank you for visiting NYTimes.com If you are already a subscriber log in
here. To see subscription options click here."

Lame.

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udev
The guy reminds of a certain character from Breaking Bad.

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alayne
The DEA website lists "not less than 5 years" for first time offenders. This
guy got three. If you're black they choke you out for selling cigarettes
improperly.

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defen
It's not really possible to engage with a comment like this - I feel like it's
trolling for a response in order to jump on the replier and attack him/her as
a racist. I also don't think it's in good taste to argue the finer points of
the circumstances of Garner's death. But I would like to point out that the
DEA wasn't responsible for what happened to him.

~~~
veb
Yeah. That guy was being rather offensive in the way he tried to communicate
his thoughts but there definitely is some racial and gender discrimination
that comes into play. I was not expecting this very old, ill-health man to get
much prison time as that would be rather inhumane, given his dementia.

I was preparing myself for no prison sentence. In New Zealand, he'd probably
go to prison for a month or so and then be let out on close supervision, or a
house on prison grounds). At that age, and with those medical problems, I do
not think he will be living for much longer -- which is sad. I'm not
empathising with what he did, but rather, as a human being.

Prison is to... stop criminals being criminals, right? I know here, Prison is
about rehabilitation however, I think we can all safely know that if this old
man went home on home detention, he'd pose no risk to society. It's not like
he'd be able to get back into his old "job". (but this poses an interesting
question: would he be harmed by someone in the cartel if they could reach him
at home? -- but I'm sure they can reach him in prison too).

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thisjepisje
> _or a house on prison grounds_

How would that work?

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veb
Like a half-way house, but on the prison grounds, so ... literally a half-way
mark between prison and the outside world.

I know in NZ it has been used for sex offenders and such. People that have
done their sentence, but the Parole board/public outcry hasn't deemed them
rehabilitated enough for society.

