Michael Root, a supervisory special agent for Drug Enforcement Administration Metro Narcotics, worked on the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas from 1996 until 2002. At first, there was hardly any violence, he said.
"Everyone knew you were going to cooperate if you get caught," he said.
By the time he left in 2002, however, there had been six murders-for-hire that year. It was the start of the violence that would eventually explode into what it has become today.
That violence has crept into the United States, mainly in cities and towns next to Mexican border. And although Root, who currently works out of the DEA's Salt Lake office, doesn't believe Utah "will ever be a major distribution point" for drug trafficking, the residual effects of violence on the border may already be showing up in the Beehive State.
Root says that in Utah's drug culture, there has also been a noticeable increase in violence in recent months.
In February 2007, two men were left to die inside a burning vehicle in a remote area of Tooele County. One died, the other was found crawling through the desert with burns over 54 percent of his body. Drugs were believed to be the motive behind the fire.
In October 2008, DEA and Salt Lake City SWAT rescued a man who had been kidnapped and tortured and who was found bound and gagged in the trunk of a car and about to be killed by men linked to drug trafficking.
That same month, another man was beaten and kidnapped from his West Jordan apartment before being dumped in a shed in West Valley. The man later died from his injuries. A drug debt was believed to be the motive for the kidnapping and beating.
Although investigators don't have any information directly linking those incidents to the drug cartels in Mexico and the violence associated with them, Root said it wouldn't be unreasonable to assume that the violence in Mexico would spread north along with the drugs being smuggled.
"The philosophy of the organization down there is to intimidate and use violence. It's not hard to fathom that philosophy is going to carry on," Root said. "It's only inevitable you're going to have spinoffs."
The more the cartels take over, the more they will use intimidation, Root said.
"Those tactics go right along with it. It changes the face of drug trafficking," he said.
Utah has never been a major drug hub, Root said. But the Beehive State does have its share of drugs being shipped either directly to the state or passing through on its freeways en route to another area.
I-70, I-80, I-15 and U.S. 191 out of Arizona all have reputations for being major transportation routes for drug traffickers. The Utah Highway Patrol seizes an estimated 3,000 pounds of marijuana annually from those four roads, up to 100 pounds of meth and 50 to 150 pounds of cocaine.
"The majority of that is destined for another state, another part of the country," said UHP Sgt. Steve Salas, the agency's drug interdiction coordinator.
It's a safe bet, Root said, that the drugs Utah organizations are receiving from Mexico, like methamphetamine, have some tie to the cartels. And those cartels will want to protect their turf, he said, meaning there is little room for independent drug dealers.
"If you're doing something in their area of responsibility, they will be involved somehow," Root said.
"It's absolutely the same folks," Salas said of the drug traffickers pulled over in Utah and their link to the cartels. Salas says the cause of battles among other cartels is territory.
Both Salas and Root said the drugs coming into Utah from Mexico typically come from the Tijuana and Baja California areas and then through either San Diego or Arizona before coming to Utah. The cartels battling near the El Paso, Texas, border typically have their drugs shipped east toward Atlanta, Root said.
The UHP said although their troopers are trained to always prepare for the unexpected, typically there is little violence in Utah when law enforcers stop suspected drug traffickers.
"Ninety-eight to 99 percent of them are unarmed. They are a hired courier," Salas said.
When there is drug-related violence in Utah or the U.S., such as the more than 700 kidnappings reported in Arizona over the past year, the victims have drug ties and are not chosen at random. But the more the violence increases, the greater the chance of it spreading outside drug circles.
"There's always a chance of an innocent bystander (being hurt)," Root said. "As far as border towns, usually it's drug traffickers and drug trafficker (violence) trying to send a message."
E-mail: preavy@desnews.com