Kidnapping in Mexico City

Here is the synopsis of a few different news stories related to Mexico this week.

Kidnapping in Mexico and in particular Mexico City, with 8.7 million inhabitants, has been big business for years. According to Reuters, kidnappings climbed 40% between 2004 and 2007, ranking Mexico with conflict zones such as Iraq and Colombia. Officially, 751 kidnappings took place last year however since many abductions go unreported, the crime research institute ICESI estimates it could have been well over 7,000.

The recent kidnapping and murder of Fernando Marti, 14, the son of a well-known businessman, has sparked a widespread outcry and promises of change.

The Mayor of Mexico City, Marcelo Ebrard, has created a new police investigative agency to completely replace the old corrupt detective force that is believe to have been involved in the abduction of Fernando Marti. He also wants to enlist 300,000 citizens as neighborhood law-enforcement representatives who would evaluate local law-enforcement efforts. The federal government has vowed to start five national anti-kidnapping centers along with Interior Secretary Juan Camilo Mourino offering to help clean-up local and state police forces.

This very old problem with it's recent increase has compelled the wealthy and middle-class to begin to purchase crystal-encased chips that are injected usually in the arm between the skin and the muscle. This chip has a GPS locating beacon that the kidnap victim can turn on with the press of a panic button on an external device.

President Felipe Calderon is coming under a great deal of pressure to do something about the violent crime in Mexico, especially in Mexico City. These kidnapping rings with police involvement have run rampant for far too long at the cost of thousands of lives, nearly all children. This is a good outrage that the citizens of Mexico have.

Why does it take us so long to get outraged against evil whether in our own lives or in the world we live in. Let us be OUTRAGED and not lulled to sleep by the beat of the world's ways.