texasmonthly.com: How did you find people such as Lydia who were willing to talk to you?



texasmonthly.com: When you first interviewed Alejandro Domínguez Coello, did you plan to write on violence in Nuevo Laredo?


texasmonthly.com: How did it change your story to have one of your subjects murdered?





texasmonthly.com: Is Nuevo Laredo a safe place for an American tourist?


texasmonthly.com: Popular tourist stops such as Señor Frog’s have shut down. Are these closings due to the drug violence?


texasmonthly.com: Who is to blame here? Corrupt Mexican cops? Indifferent border patrols on both sides?


But as a resident of the border, I am shocked by how freely people who are involved in the trade roam on both American and Mexican soil. I would argue that when it comes to drugs, there is a good measure of impunity in the United States, too, to the extent that the U.S. government doesn’t have the manpower or resources to profile everyone who is suspected of drug involvement. And, of course, there’s the larger question of how markets work. In this age of advanced capitalism and the global movement of goods, it’s difficult to expect the Mexican government alone to stem the flow of drugs when those drugs are worth so much as soon as they cross the border into the United States.

texasmonthly.com: What can be done to help fix this problem? Are Vicente Fox’s initiatives working?

CB: President Fox’s most recent operation, Safe Mexico, resulted in federal police raiding various homes in Nuevo Laredo and rescuing 44 kidnapping victims. They also found a ranch where it is assumed that some victims of the cartel had been killed and cremated—a tip that emerged when prosecutors questioned the rescued kidnapping victims. I believe these are signs that the Mexican government does have the capability to obtain and use drug intelligence for the better.

But there is still a question of will. This was the fourth time that President Fox had sent the army to Nuevo Laredo in six months, and the previous times he hadn’t achieved anything long-term or tangible. And even when the federal government’s top administrators have the willpower to combat the cartels, there is the bigger question of how they can keep the rank-and-file loyal and clean.

texasmonthly.com: What do you think is a realistic timetable for returning control of Nuevo Laredo to state and local Mexican police?

CB: I don’t know. This depends on many factors, including most importantly how well the federal government learns to work with local and state police and how the governor of Tamaulipas and the mayor of Nuevo Laredo manage to clean out and re-staff their state and municipal police forces. The Mexican Congress is also in the process of changing federal law so that state governments have more power in directly fighting organized crime, which could be an important move. Right now, all crimes that are connected to the business of drugs fall strictly under the authority of the federal government.

texasmonthly.com: How is this violence affecting the average citizen on both sides of the border?

CB: I think people live with a sense of fear and instability. Their movement is restricted. Few residents socialize at night in Nuevo Laredo, and even sitting in a bar on the American side, you have to be cognizant of who’s around you. Laredo is definitely not a place right now where one can feel absolutely free. But at the same time, life does go on.

texasmonthly.com: Do you think the media sensationalizes the problem in Nuevo Laredo?

CB: In some ways. The crimes are serious enough that they have to be reported. There is no way to get around the fact that the newly named police chief was murdered six hours after his swearing-in ceremony. But there are some news stories that do take the crimes out of context and do little to help the reader understand the complexity of the border and the implications of the crimes for its residents. The San Antonio Express-News published an excellent article on June 26 that described how it is possible that the people of Nuevo Laredo continue to live their lives while being constantly aware of their increasingly circumscribed spaces of safety. This, to me, is something the media should explore a little more.

texasmonthly.com: What in your reporter’s notebook couldn’t fit in the story?

CB: There was so much, I had many anecdotes that described how crime happens on both sides of the border. I also had a large, interesting section of notes about how the instability caused by drug crimes produces a whole economy of rumors on both sides of the border, that then influences how people live and how they understand what’s happening to their cities.