6.2 Extortion in Everyday Life in Mexico

Abstract

Social relationships in Mexico can, in many ways, be considered to be “extortionary social relationships.” This is not, unfortunately, a trivial generalization but an empirical observation that reveals that the offense of extortion is a common and normalized practice in everyday interactions – although its visibility in the public is virtually zero. The same applies to its judicial prosecution due to ambiguous, contradictory, and anachronistic laws. Public prosecutors and judicial administrations are corrupt and bureaucratic. Victims prefer not to turn to the police authorities or to public prosecutors because of apathy, disbelief, distrust, and fear – including the fear that the authorities are accomplices of the criminals, or corrupt, or merely inept. One truism fueled by the rhetoric of high-ranking officials and politicians – whose vision of power focuses on a so-called punitive populism – supposes that it is mainly criminal organizations that are engaged in blackmailing. However, it is not that simple. There are many documented cases of children who blackmail their schoolmates, or of municipal police forces, as in Tapachula, on the southern border, who sexually blackmail children from Chiapas and Central America. There are couples who revert to extortionary practices to gain advantage in a divorce or maintenance claim case – for example, bringing unsubstantiated charges against the other person for domestic violence or sexual aggression against children. There are relatives, colleagues, cellmates, neighbors, tenants, partners, police and military officers, and public prosecution officers who “select” persons who will then be blackmailed by others. There are police and military officers, prosecutors, and judges who are involved in extortionary networks or who allow for the impunity of such networks. There are extortionary journalists, civil servants, and entrepreneurs. There are corporate conglomerates with financial branches that attract extortionary money, and there are organizations, such as The Knights