What’s Behind Tijuana’s Violence?

Thursday, January 31, 2019

Credit: Associated Press

Above: A police vehicle blocks a street near the crime scene where a man was killed by gunmen in Tijuana, Mexico, Monday, Feb. 1, 2010.

Aired 1/31/19 on KPBS Midday Edition

GUEST: Kate Linthicum, reporter, Los Angeles Times

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Transcript for audioclip 43315

"A new kind of drug war has made Tijuana one of the deadliest cities on Earth." That’s the headline of a new Los Angeles Times investigation that examines the unprecedented levels of violence in Tijuana.

More than 2,500 people were killed there last year, a record high and nearly seven times the total in 2012. Meanwhile, San Diego recorded 34 homicides in 2018.

Kate Linthicum, a Mexico City-based reporter with the LA Times, reports that while feuding drug cartels were the source of Tijuana's violence in previous years, today's carnage is being fueled by competition in the local drug trade for methamphetamine.

Linthicum joins Midday Edition Thursday to talk about how 9/11 and the capture of Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman have contributed to the recent resurgence in violence.

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