A fearless mother who fought against one of Mexico's most feared drug-cartels is being memorialised in her hometown after a bronze plaque was placed in her honour. The courageous mother, Miriam Rodriguez, was shot dead by narcos following her one-woman-war against the criminals.
Miriam, who acted as a vigilante, decided to take on the 'Los Zetos' drug cartel in 2012 after her 20-year-old daughter was kidnapped and brutally murdered. She refused to sit back and allow more people to be killed by the monsters, and used every trick in the book to track down and seek vengeance against all those involved in her daughter's murder.
Miriam's daughter had been kidnapped and held to ransom as they falsely believed that the family was wealthy.
To seek her revenge, Miriam created false IDs and disguises that allowed her to infiltrate the criminal underworld. She then managed to track down 10 members of the gang and have them arrested by police. Many are now serving lengthy prison sentences. In one incident, Miriam, who was 56 at the time, noticed that an associate of the cartel was a man selling flowers in the street. Miriam decided to apprehend him herself and approached. As she neared, the individual realised who she was and tried to flee. Miriam then wrestled him to the ground and held a gun to his throat, threatening to pull the trigger if he dared move.
These acts of vigilantism, while heroic, would eventually cost Miriam her life. She was shot dead in her own home in 2017 by associates of those she had imprisoned, just weeks after she apprehended the final suspect in her daughter's kidnapping. The killing took place on May 10th, the day that Mexicans celebrate Mother's Day.
Tamaulipas Governor Francisco García Cabeza de Vaca stated at the revealing of the memorial that the state:
"Will not allow the death of Miriam Rodríguez to be one statistic more."
As a result of the drug trade, tens of thousands of Mexicans have died in gang-violence as rival cartels battle over who controls the flow of drugs from Latin America to the United States. More people have died in recent years during the Mexican drug wars than have died in Afghanistan during the ongoing war. This shows just how far the society has plunged into violence.
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