Photo: Sedena

Taking a page from the A-Team, drug cartels of Mexico are creating their own DIY, Mad Max (Mad Mex?)-styled armored vehicles. This one above was captured in a metalworking shop:

The completed versions were bigger than what has been found before. Built on three-axle truck beds, they had room for 20 armed men, one official said. They were covered with inch-thick steel, which could withstand 50-caliber fire, and each had been equipped with insulation.

The Mexican Army wasn't impressed, though that may not be the point of these monsters-on-wheels:

The Mexican Army officials do not seem particularly intimidated. They have criticized the machines for being difficult to maneuver, noting that they are designed to frighten rivals.

But for most Mexicans, the mere sight of the seized narco-rhino monsters in military photographs offers a stark reminder that in the battle against crime here there is no place more dangerous than Mexico’s roads.

Link | More Narco Tanks at Telstar Logistics

Past articles have included the gruesome tale of drug boss dissolving the bodies of his enemies in vats of lye and the tale of a legendary kingpin who picks up the tab of everyone dining at the restaurant he happens to eat in.

In the latest article of the series, Tracy Wilkinson writes about Yudit del Rincon, an anti-drug crusader and state legislator from Sinaloa, who had a brilliant idea:

Yudit del Rincon, a 44-year-old lawmaker, went before the state legislature this year with a proposition: Let’s require lawmakers to take drug tests to prove they are clean.

Her colleagues greeted the idea with applause. Then she sprang a surprise on them: Two lab technicians waited in the audience to administer drug tests to every state lawmaker. We should set the example, she said.

They nearly trampled one another in the stampede to the door, Del Rincon recalled.

Link

(Photo: Don Bartletti/LA Times)