Recruiting minors into the criminal life
Mexican drug cartels have reached mythical status in the media, so much so that sometimes it becomes difficult to separate myth from fact. But one thing remains true: organized crime groups are changing the ways they operate. Members are becoming increasingly social media savvy. Drug cartels from Latin America are all over TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook (and the same is true for some groups in Italy), attempting to spread their scope of influence and recruit new members. This isn’t news. While drug related violence has wreaked havoc throughout Mexico for decades, leaving paths of destruction and death in their wake, children remain victims…but in a very different way.
Children, when not lured into the gangster lifestyle via social media, are recruited off the streets. It’s no secret that low quality of life often lends itself to deviant behavior. These children are the most vulnerable, and some as young as 10, end up in the clutches of organized crime groups. According to the Associated Press, 30,000 Mexican youths had been recruited by drug gangs by 2019. Their starting roles often consist of standing watch while drug sales take place on street corners. Then, they may be tasked with carrying out the sales themselves. In other cases, children are hired and trained as assassins. Teens like Juan – recruited at the age of 15 – started off with drug sale assignments before he was asked to kill a member of a rival cartel. Allegedly, he was $250 weekly and would receive bonuses for carrying out assassinations.
Though as minors, they can’t be tried for their crimes, youths end up in juvenile detention centers. It is often hard to leave that lifestyle, and for some, it’s not even a choice. In the end, the likelihood that they continue leading a criminal lifestyle are significantly increased, feeding into an endless cycle of crime. In recent years, the Mexican government has initiated projects to aid children who have been exploited by organized crime groups. For one, the state government of Baja California has found a solution in a military-style academy for at-risk teenagers. However, activists have criticized this method, claiming that it would only reinforce the idea of militarization. Consequently, non-profits, activists, and policy makers have turned to tackling the problem from the root. Providing children with access to basic resources, employment, and education to reduce their sense of relative deprivation may help in decreasing the appeal of working for a gang. Of course, the problem is more nuanced. Fear or the desire to fit in may leave some children with little to no choice.
The most alarming aspect of this issue is that it is not confined to Mexican or Latin American cartels. This continues to be a worldwide problem. In Naples, the Camorra uses similar methods of social media recruitment to find members among at-risk youth, and, in the UK, children face similar issues.
I have often heard about the issue of child soldiers throughout the Middle East, and it is so sad knowing that it is only expanding in other crime realms as well. I think your notion about juvenile detention is very interesting because it is the same issue that we face with prisons. You can take someone away from the crime for a period, however, if they are not given the ability to do something else, or be something better, they will just go right back. Also, I thought it was very interesting that the cartels/mafias are utilizing social media so heavily. I can only imagine how hard it is for an AI to differentiate true criminals and people just “expressing themselves and their rights”. Very interesting post!