Local Cops in Mexican Border State Strike over Alleged Extortions from Bosses

More than 250 police officers from one city in the Mexican border state of Coahuila went on strike. The cops claim their bosses force them to pay daily extortion fees. This has left the town of Saltillo, Coahuila, without a police force, forcing federal and state police to take over security for the region.

The strike began this week when Saltillo municipal police officers took to the streets, claiming that their supervisors and the city mayor, Roman Alberto Cepeda, were extorting them and pressuring them with unfair rules. Some of the female police officers claimed to have been victims of sexual harassment as well.

During the protests, a group of about 60 local cops claimed to have been detained inside the police headquarters building and had their phones taken away by state police forces. State and federal officials were forced to deploy teams from various law enforcement agencies to take over Torreon’s security.

The strike comes at a time when Torreon has seen an ongoing rise in crime, which, according to local news outlets, prompted the local state congress to subpoena Cepeda to a political hearing, Zocalo reported.

The state of Coahuila is one of the last states in Mexico that the MORENA ruling party does not control. MORENA is the party led by President Claudia Sheinbaum, who has been on the receiving end of criticism and threats from the Trump administration over the country’s “intolerable relationship” with cartels, Breitbart Texas reported.

Ildefonso Ortiz is an award-winning journalist with Breitbart News Foundation. He co-founded Breitbart News Foundation’s Cartel Chronicles project with Brandon Darby and senior Breitbart management. You can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook. He can be contacted at Iortiz@breitbart.com.