THE OFFICIAL MAGAZINE ABOUT DRUG TRAFFICKING

CHECK OUT THE COMPLETE INTEVIEWS INSIDE

What is happening now

The pros and cons aboutThe pros and cons aboutThe pros and cons about

LEGALIZATIONLEGALIZATIONLEGALIZATION

The life of a teen that isThe life of a teen that isThe life of a teen that is

DRUG ADDICTDRUG ADDICTDRUG ADDICT

The victims ofThe victims ofThe victims of

DRUG WARSDRUG WARSDRUG WARS

Dear reader, This magazine has been made with the purpose of showing you several points of view in terms of drug trafficking, a topic that has thrilled the world nowadays. In these pages you will find interview to people who are inovlved in this in different ways, and they will explain you how they feel about it. As long as you go reading through the magazine, our intervie-wers will give a brief preamble of the person who is being ques-tioned. At the end you may find the conclusion they reached at the end of the interview. With our best wishes for you,

Diego Ramírez Andrés Albarrán

Lizeth Girón Luis Stavros

THE EDITORS

Considered one of the most powerful drug dealers, Enrique “The platypus” Martínez is here with us to answer some questions. Martí-nez was born the 3rd of september in 1978, in a violent family living in Tijuana, BCN. His fat-her left the family alone when he was only 5 years old, and his mother as last resource wor-ked in a brothel. A background like this made Martínez the man he is now, the leader of the “Caguamas” cartel.

Tell me, why did you decide to enter the

drug trafficking business?

Well, because I had the opportunity and I wan-ted to earn some money. During that time, I was really in need and someone told me about it.

How did you involve into the drug traffic-

king business?

A very good friend of mine was already inside, and he told me that I could win a lot of money. In my despair I accepted almost immediately.

How did you rise to your position?

Getting the respect from others in the cartel, and being confident every time. If you want to succeed in this business, you need to be strong.

How much do you earn?

A lot of money. Actually I can’t tell you.

Are you afraid of being captured? Why?

Yes, because I don’t want to be in jail. I know that I won’t be treated very good in there, and all my work and effort in here would be thrown to the trash can.

What would happen if you get caught?

Someone else would take my place, that’s for sure. He should be in charge to continue the business and make the necessary changes to

do so without being caught.

How do you get your products?

I have several providers, not a specific one. In this business everyone collaborates to get what’s needed. You need to be tough enough with other people involved in this.

How often do you need to buy product?

Almost every week. Now we are trying to esta-blish clandestine laboratories so we can pro-duce our own drugs.

About living your life, aren’t you afraid?

Let’s say I’m not scared about it neither calm. But I prefer not going out too much to the stre-ets.

Do you have wife, children or some relati-

ve?

No, I don’t. I would like to do so, but in this job I’m always moving. I can’t stay very long in the same place for security reasons. As we can see now, it isn’t very easy to handle a business like the drug dealing one. Martínez is a tough person, but would you think that you could be able of doing his job? The pressure of thinking that you may be caught or killed in any moment is not easy to be released of. Drug dealers also should receive some credit for the effort they do in their job, although it is not for any good at all.

Daniel Safdeye lives in Monterrey, Mexico. His son was killed because of the drug war on the road. He was only 6 years old when this terrible event took away his life. Daniel is going to explain us the story.

What were you doing that day?

That morning we woke up, went to eat breakfast and we decided to have a day in the U.S. I wanted to have a surprise for my son; I wanted to buy him his first bike.

Can you tell us what happened?

My family and I were having a family trip to the Uni-ted States. We saw that one toll booth was full of cars so we went to the next one. There were 3 guys standing with guns on their hands; they didn’t even looked at us, they just started shooting and a bullet got into my wife’s shoulder and another one got into my son’s head. He died instantly, I didn’t know what to do, so I just moved forward as fast as I could until I couldn’t continue.

Do you know any other cases of deaths produ-

ced by the drug war? Which ones?

I’ve heard of few ones on the news but I didn’t pay much attention to them. I always said that it couldn’t happen to me, that the only ones involved were the drug dealers but now I know that’s not true.

Are you thinking of doing something about your

son’s death?

I will go with the police, I hope they can do somet-hing. Maybe they don’t, because many police men are involved in this on the incorrect side. This can’t continue.

Which are some solutions you would apply to

this mortal war if you could?

I would imprison all drug traffickers and the entire politicians and police men that are helping them. This is insane, many innocent people are paying the price, and people who do not even have tried drugs, children, adults, teenagers, among others don’t care who they kill, we must stop this!

Have they caught those who committed the cri-

me? How did they do it?

No they haven’t. They are still “looking” for the per-petrators of the crime. I don’t know what to think, I don’t know if I can trust in anyone anymore.

Could you see their faces when the murder hap-

pened?

No, everything happened so fast that I didn’t even had time to react or anything. I just moved as fast as I could.

Did anyone else see what happened? Who?

Besides my wife, maybe the cashier man but he was so scared I believe he didn’t realized what was happening.

Do you know anyone who has tried drugs?

I knew one guy when I was a teenager. After him no one else, I prefer to be away from that.

Can you understand how many people react

under drug effects?

I think they act so crazy because they think they are in another world. They don’t understand what’s happening in this world,. I hope that after all the danger they do under drug effects they have some remorse.

People don’t understand what’s happening. They think that it isn’t going to happen to them, but they don’t measure the consequences. We should do something to stop this terrible war, and if politicians aren’t doing anything, we should. We must prevent more tragic stories like Daniel’s one.

Alonso Valencia, a 16 year old teenager lives in Mexico City with his family. He goes to school as many other teenagers, but the diffe-rence is that he is a drug addict. Alonso is here to explain us how is the life of a person that uses drugs.

Why did you decide to use drugs?

I was once in a party, with many friends. Then a guy told me that I should try them. I did it, and I really liked it. The sensation was incredi-ble, I had never felt anything like that before. I decided to continue with it later on.

Where do you get the drugs?

On the streets. You always find someone who is selling them.

How often do you buy drugs?

About two times per week. I have enough with it.

Do you get the drugs always from the same

person?

No, I don’t. Dealers do not have always what I want, so I need to go to another place so I can search for what I want.

Do you feel happy consuming drugs?

Yes, I do. The sensation is incredible. I wouldn’t change it for anything else in the world.

What do you feel exactly?

First I feel happy, like if anything else cares. Then I start feeling like if I was floating, and my weight completely dissappears. Everything se-ems funny, and you really have a good time when you are under drug effects.

Does it make you feel a better person?

No, I don’t feel like a “cool” guy or anything like

that. I just simply like the sensation of using drugs. It makes things easier in life.

Would you tell a friend to use drugs?

It would depend of who I’m telling. You know, I have these kind of friends that always want to try new things and those ones who are quite rigid persons.

Are you conscient it is harmful?

Yes, I am. But I believe people exaggerates of the consequences. It is like smokers, tobacco is a drug too and many people use it. I don’t see any consequences in them.

Which is the drug you consume the most?

I usually consume marijuana. It’s the cheapest and the easiest to get. Whenever I have the possibility I use cocaine.

Now you can see the truth. Many people aren’t conscious of the harm that drugs produce. And I’m not referring only for health problems, but all the process needed to make drugs reach its users. There are many innocent people dying in the middle of wars between drug cartels, and drug addicts aren’t conscious at all of the consequences of having their “happy” hour.

Today I have the big opportunity to interview Andres Quijada, a politician who is against the legalization of drugs. Quijada has been in the house of representatives for 4 years, and now he is giving us his impressions about drugs legalization.

How did you start in government?

Since I was a child I want to be a politician and my uncle worked in the government during se-veral years, so he helped me to work here in government.

What’s your job in government?

I work in the house of representatives, and I can propose a motion to modify any law.

Which are your reasons for not legalizing

drugs?

I think that if we legalize drugs a lot of young people would become drug addict.

We have a lot of advantages if we legalize

drugs, but which are the disadvantages?

There would be more drug addicts. I think the city and community would be a disaster.

It’s proved that if we legalize drugs the drug trafficking would reduce. Don’t you

want that?

Obviously I want to finish with the drug traffic-king but I trust in the police of our country and hopefully one day they may end it.

Don’t you think that organized crime would disappear if the government legalizes

drugs?

No, because all the organized crime is not be-cause of drugs. Maybe it would help but that’s not my business in here.

Don’t you think our economy would raise?

Maybe, but I don’t care. We can’t legalize drugs.

What do you think that would be the long term consequences if we don’t legalize

drugs?

I think there would be no consequences and all would be like today.

If drugs are legalized they could be sold in small portions. Do you have any problem

with that?

Yes because that won’t change anything, they can buy it any times they want.

In conclusion, what’s you opinion about

this topic?

I think it’s better if we don´t legalize drugs and stay as we are now, and trust in our authorities to stop with the drug trafficking.

In conclusion, I believe that the politicians like Quijada have good reasons for not legalizing drugs and I believe he has strong reasons in favor. Legalizing drugs could be more disas-trous because many people can become drug addict easily.

Not everyone is against legalizing drugs. Julio Rodriguez is an example of those ones in fa-vor of legalizing them. He is an active person in terms of politics, and has promoted several campaigns explaining the benefits of legalizing drugs. Julio is going to tell us what is his opi-nion and point of view. Which is the role you represent in the go-vernment? Well, I have been involved in politics for a long time. Actually I’m working with the senators. Which are the advantages of legalizing drugs? The most important one is that drug trafficking would be reduced impresively. The govern-ment wouldn’t need to fight anymore for drug problems or something like that. Would there be only good consequences of drug legalization? Maybe there would be an increase of drug ad-dicts, but the society would be benefitted be-cause drugs won’t be a cause for killing inno-cent people. What does the population think about drug legalization? There’s quite a lot of polemic among the popu-lation. Many people are in favor of legalizing it, because they think they would feel more secu-re with it. On the other side, there’s people who believe that drug legalization would only make worse the situation. How would the society react if drugs are legalized? There would be lots of trouble at the begin-ning. You would see more frequently people using drugs on streets and the society may react in a strange way, because they aren’t used to see things like this. But I hope that wit-hin time things will be normal again. Which kind of drugs are planned to be lega-lized? We are only planning to legalize marijuana by the moment.

Is the government benefitted in any way with this? We would only save the time spent on drug wars and that kind of stuff. But the main purpo-se is to give citizens a better life quality. Personally, do you believe legalizing drugs is a good idea? Yes, of course it is! Legalizing drugs would be a way of taking away a big problema and not for the government only, but for the whole country. Would legalizing drugs stop completely the drug war? Unfortunately I must say no. Since marijuana is the only drug planned to be legalized, dea-lers will find another way to sell illegally anot-her kind of drugs. The importance of it is that the war will be reduced. What do you have to say in favor of legali-zing drugs? Legalizing drugs is good for the nation. Many of our worries will dissappear because we won’t be against the enemy. We will be giving the enemy what he wants so he can leave the rest alone. As you may see, there are several benefits of legalizing drugs. The population is scared of legalizing them because they are afraid of so-mething they don’t even know. However, they are right that dealers will always find the op-portunity to sell and traffic other kind of drugs. Legalizing drugs is a very good option to finish with this drug war.