Three Members of Mexico’s New National Guard Arrested for Kidnapping

Mexican National Guards (GN) stand on the bank of the Suchiate River during a press tour o
AP File Photo/Idalia Rie

Police arrested three members of Mexico’s newly formed militarized National Guard police force for the alleged kidnapping of a 14-year-old teen in the state of Guerrero. Authorities took the three National Guard members into custody along with an adult civilian male. The arrests came during a joint operation by investigative anti-kidnapping personnel from the state prosecutor’s office of the states of Mexico and Guerrero.

Anti-kidnapping personnel arrested a kidnapping gang composed of three members of the newly formed National Guard Police and a civilian during a joint operation in the municipality of Huehuetoca. Authorities identified the three active-duty National Guard members as Captain Everardo Sánchez Rodríguez and Diana Paola Medina Meléndez, military police assigned to the 20th National Guard Battalion in San Miguel de los Jagüeyes (State of Mexico) and Jorge Luis Barrón Graciano, motorcycle patrol corporal of the 20th National Guard Battalion in San Miguel de los Jagüeyes (State of Mexico). The civilian arrested was identified as Atilano Meléndez Martínez, 26. The arrest came after investigators secured the safe release of the teenager, according to a press release from the Attorney General’s Office from the State of Mexico

The kidnapping of the 14-year-old victim allegedly occurred on the June 18 the small community of La Molonga located in the municipality of Petatlán, Guerrero. Police arrested the three guardsmen and the civilian shortly after developing intelligence information pertaining to the identity and location of the kidnappers, according to a Breitbart law enforcement source.

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, formally inaugurated in late June, created the National Guard — a militarized police force aimed at cracking down on the country’s growing crime rate and securing its borders. Lopez Obrador indicated that the initial 70,000 members would be deployed to 150 regions across Mexico. Eventually, 150,000 personnel will cover most of the country.

Breitbart Texas reported on the deployment of approximately 1,800 Mexican National Guard personnel to the border state of Sonora which started on July 1. The deployment is expected to help fight the escalating violence attributed to cartel and gang turf wars. The state mostly located south of Arizona.

Breitbart Texas also reported that Mexican officials recently announced plans to deploy approximately 6,500 of its National Guard troops at 12 checkpoints near the country’s southern border. The move comes in response to nearly 400,000 Central American and other migrants who entered the nation in the last three months on journeys to the U.S.

Robert Arce is a retired Phoenix Police detective with extensive experience working Mexican organized crime and street gangs. Arce has worked in the Balkans, Iraq, Haiti, and recently completed a three-year assignment in Monterrey, Mexico, working out of the Consulate for the United States Department of State, International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Program, where he was the Regional Program Manager for Northeast Mexico (Coahuila, Tamaulipas, Nuevo Leon, Durango, San Luis Potosi, Zacatecas.)

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