HOUSTON, June 13 (UPI) -- Mexican drug gangs are forcing captives into gladiatorial fights to the death, a trafficker claims.
A man identified only as Juan told the Houston Chronicle, in an interview in Texas published Monday, the Zetas' brutality revolted even a hardened criminal like him, who helped push worth $5 million to $10 million worth of cocaine a month into the United States.
"Like everybody says, it is out of control now. We have to put a stop to it," he said.
He said the Zetas are kidnapping bus passengers on roads and forcing them into fights where the survivors are turned into new assassins and the losers end up in mass graves.
Outside the Mexican city of San Fernando, nearly 200 bodies recently were dug up, and most seemed to have died of blunt force to the head.
Borderland Beat, a blog tracking drug cartels, reported a story in April of bus passengers brutalized by Zeta gangsters and taunted into fighting.
"The stuff you would not think possible a few years ago is now commonplace," said Peter Hanna, a retired FBI agent who fought Mexico's cartels.
