Mike rimer calls himself a ‘Cactus Cop’, much to the chuckle sometimes of those he meets. But in this region of the country and to those who sanctify succulents, busting poachers who thrive on saguaros for example, can be as important as catching thief nabbing a diamond necklace. You see, they can stand nearly 50-feet tall and in other cases, hug the arid sands of the Sonoran Desert that stretches from southwest Arizona into Mexico. Each one of these cacti, a prickly testament to a life without much water. But while thriving in some of the most difficult conditions on earth, cactus now face something more dangerous than urban sprawl…poachers who dig them out of the ground for prices into the thousands of dollars.

According to Rimer, these modern day rustlers wrap the cacti in carpet or heavy rugs/blankets to protect themselves and the dig up the roots and walk away with the whole thing. Across the border, stealing ocotillos , saguaros, barrel cacti among others has become an epidemic, with some areas of the desert nearly picked clean. Mexico has cracked down by stopping all exportation, but that’s if you catch the thieves. And the people buying these stolen succulents aren’t just Americans looking to spruce up the front yard, but more often foreigners from as far away as Japan and Germany. Here’s a behind the scenes video and a picture I snapped last night. The video is with Tony Apricella of Cherry Landscape here in Tucson. He is an artist in the yard and he knows his cacti!

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We are now down along the border south of Tucson for a couple of stories. I will expand on each story as we present it live, with the first one on cactus wranglers airing all day Wednesday. It is warm here per a normal June day and the desert is a arid and beautiful as ever. Meantime, I get a regular update from Customs and Border Protection Tucson Sector and they had a couple of interesting pictures from a recent rescue and bust. It seems marijuana smuggling is only getting bigger and I’ll ask agents about this on Thursday for our Friday live reports. This SUV was packed with 100-bundles of dope and the driver was caught as he attempted to take a back road and avoid a checkpoint. The rescue came as illegal immigrants try to cross the desert at the most dangerous time of the year. Temperatures here are consistently triple digits and the land is unforgiving. This man was carried out of a canyon by agents and then flown to a hospital. Both photos were taken by Agents in the Field and show some of the good work being done on our southern border. 

As a reminder and as we have reported recently, the United Nations High Commissioner on Human Rights has been lobbying Mexican President Felipe Calderon to pull his troops out of Mexican cities in favor of police forces, many of which have either been corrupted by the drug cartels, or depleted due to fear. Now this..Seventeen Mexican drug gang members were killed near the U.S. border on Saturday, their bodies scattered along a road after one of the deadliest shootouts in Mexico’s three-year narco-war.

Rival factions of the Arellano Felix drug cartel in Tijuana on the Mexico-California border battled each other with rifles and machine guns in the early hours of the morning, police said.

Fourteen bodies were lying in pools of blood on a road near assembly-for-export maquiladora plants on the city’s eastern limits. The corpses were surrounded by hundreds of bullet casings and many of their faces were destroyed. Keep Reading …

As many of you know, we have interviewed the Mexican Attorney General on two occasions in the past 6 months or so. He has always expressed the concern about drug cartels and the power of corruption in the northern border areas. I got the impression as President Calderon and his administration battles to win back security in the country, the last frontier of the fight will be the northern border areas where violence continues to rage. Now we see the very clear example that the cartels are snubbing their nose at the Mexican President. According to the AP, hitmen tied to Mexico’s Gulf cartel appear to be boldly seeking recruits by posting help-wanted signs in the border city of Nuevo Laredo, including a giant banner hung across a thoroughfare. I have been to Nuevo Laredo in the past and the place isn’t one of the safest.
The banner appeared over the weekend and said “Operative group ‘The Zetas’ wants you, soldier or ex-soldier. We offer a good salary, food and benefits for your family. Don’t suffer anymore mistreatment and don’t go hungry.” While some people are criticizing Calderon, using this example, I take a different view. I think the Mexican government is making some headway and now cartels are having to fight and now even advertise to gain recruits. By the way, I took this picture during our undercover operation with Mexican drug officials. This man is a drug lookout.

EXCLUSIVE INFO AND DETAILS: THIS INFO JUST IN FROM A PRODUCER I WORK WITH IN MEXICO….JORGE. HE WAS AT THE PRESS CONFERENCE. This picture was taken by Jorge as he obviously stood in front of the suspect. Another picture follows the link. Jorge tells me Laurean spoke very slowly, unnatural when asked questions. He was wearing jeans and a shirt and looked like he was in a bit of a trance

The fugitive was arrested at approximately 7:00 pm in San Juan de Vina, Municipio de Tacambaro, in the State of Michoacan. Jorge took down this quote… “Strong cooperation between Mexican and U.S. authorities increasingly ensures that those who commit crimes in either country will ultimately face capture and prosecution no matter where they might try to hide.” Also Jorge tells me that Laurean

MORE EXCLUSIVE DETAILS ABOUT THE CAPTURE He was just walking down the street at 7:00pm Thursday night in a town outside of Morelia, Mexico. The area is called Tacambaro and I am told by my contacts in the region that police officers were doing a routine inspection of a neighborhood. That’s where officers walk the beat and talk to people. When they approached Cesar Laurean and said hello and asked him a routine question or two, he didn’t respond. That was suspicious, so they asked him again. This time he responded in english, which isn’t normal for a neighborhood not associated with tourism and he told them his name, the officers didn’t put two and two together at the time. However, they did take him into custody because suspicions were now obviously high and when they got him to the station, they matched the wanted picture on the wall. Laurean only had 10 pesos on him at the time of his arrest and he was eating an avocado. Keep Reading …