Gunman by Order

In Mexico, criminal groups also act as power and pressure groups. When they want something, they get it no matter what, even if that something is a person.

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"Many times, you don't want to kill, but you don't want to die either. Sometimes, other people's blood has to be shed so that yours or your family's doesn't," says Adrian as he puts a handful of peanuts in his mouth.

Adrian is a 22-year-old young man who stands at about 5'7". He is very thin, to the point that his ribs can be seen through his clothes. He has straight, black hair, tiny, black, squinting eyes that make it seem like he doesn't trust what he is being told. His thin lips blend in with the rest of his skin. He has thick, unkempt eyebrows and is wearing faded light-colored jeans, worn low on his waist, almost halfway down his buttocks, revealing his white and tattered boxers. He is wearing a red polo shirt.

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Two years ago, Adrian was one of the over 4,000 missing people in Jalisco. Today, he is a hitman, one of the people responsible for the over 16,000 drug-related deaths in Mexico in recent years.

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On September 3rd, 2016, Adrian had the devastating privilege of being chosen by a criminal group. Two weeks later, he was also chosen by the basic forces of a soccer club. He couldn't choose which of the two options he wanted, but he did choose. He joined the team, the hitman team of the criminal group. He chose life, no matter how terrifying it would be.

It seems that no one is ever safe in Mexico, not even while sleeping. Adrian was recruited into the drug trade while he was asleep.

 

On September 3rd, a couple of years ago, at about 2:30 in the morning, two men entered the family's home. They entered through the front door as if they knew the place perfectly. They even had time to go to the kitchen to drink a glass of water before entering the young man's room. With a hair pull and a resounding and violent "get up," Adrian stood up and opened his eyes only to realize that he had a black cloth bag over his head. Later he would discover that he would have preferred them to leave the bag on and thus avoid seeing all the blood he has seen.

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Adrian's mother did not realize that her son was missing until the next morning. Adrian's disappearance case became one of the two cases out of 15 daily cases that are not reported to the authorities. The difference is that this time, it was not out of fear or distrust, but because Adrian's mother knew perfectly well where her son was, and she also knew that she would probably never see him again.

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Oblatos is a neighborhood in Guadalajara, Jalisco, where Adrian and his family had lived all their lives, also the site of multiple forced disappearances, the difference being that they had a determined destination from the moment they occurred, and everyone knew it: the drug trade.

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Oblatos played the role of a shopping center for organized crime. They went to look for men with the potential to work for drug trafficking, and when they found one they liked, they took him away, no matter what. Soon, this conflict became a way of life, and just as the nose gets used to foul smells in 15 minutes, the habitants of the place got used to violence and losing their young people almost as quickly as the nose does, to the second or third disappearance.

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"When I woke up and saw that my son wasn't in his bed and everything was scattered on the floor, I knew, I knew they had taken him away. I also knew they had taken him to the narco, and I don't know what I would have preferred, for them to kill him or to know he was with the narco," says Adrian's mother with anger in her voice.

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Many people might think that those who work for drug trafficking do so because they choose to, but no, this is not always the case. Many of the people who become involved in this business do so because they have no other option, or to prevent their loved ones from being killed.

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The only reason why the community of Oblatos knew the fate of their disappeared was because in many cases, these young people returned years later to visit their families and tell their stories. In other cases, they would threaten the families of the chosen young person so they could take them away without any problems.

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"Here, one is at the disposal of those criminals. One cannot say or do anything, the smart thing to do is to stay quiet. One of my neighbors had her son taken away in broad daylight, and when she tried to do something, they threatened to kill her entire family, so she stayed quiet and without a son," says Gloria, one of the neighbors of the Oblatos neighborhood.

 

This phenomenon of forced disappearances with the destination of drug trafficking has been reported to the authorities on several occasions. However, nothing has been done about it, and the only advice the habitants of the neighborhood have received from them is, "better wait for your son to come back, it is not advisable to get angry."

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Like Adrian's case, there are many in the Oblatos neighborhood, and the conflict is so normalized and ignored that there are no data or figures on how many young people are in the same situation.

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Adrian was one of the lucky ones who could return years later to visit his family. As the Oblatos community explains, many times they let the young people go, but they do not know why. Some say it may be because they no longer need them, and others think it is because they are not good enough for the shooting, whatever the reason, some return.

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The worst part is that I was about to start playing professional soccer. Atlas soccer club had already signed me, and I couldn't even respond. Who knows who they put in my place. From a soccer player to a gunman, who would have thought, huh?" says Adrian while thinking about what his life could have been.

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The curious thing about this type of recruitment is the conditions in which they are made. One would think that anyone who works for drug trafficking becomes someone with power and money. However, this is not always the case. In the case of these young people, for example, they simply become young people with a gun and instructions to follow.

 

"I never met any boss. Would you believe that I never knew who I was working for? I only had contact with the two guys who took me, and they were the ones who told me what to do, and I did it. They paid us only 2,000 pesos a week. One day they came and told me they didn't need me anymore, so I left."

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In Oblatos, there haven't been any cases like Adrian's for a while. However, violence remains a daily problem, the ease of obtaining drugs, and multiple thefts have made the habitants of the neighborhood live in fear and a certain air of conformity.

 

Two years ago, Adrián was a missing person, then he became a gunman, and today he is a student. That's how fast life goes when you live in Mexico and are a victim of violence. Crimes happen just as quickly, and forgetting happens just as fast.