Teen guilty of beheading at least 4 in Mexico
A 14-year-old suspected hit man was captured near Mexico City in December.
July 26th, 2011
04:55 PM ET

Teen guilty of beheading at least 4 in Mexico

A 14-year-old born in the United States has been found guilty in a Mexican court of torturing and beheading at least four people and kidnapping three others.

The teenage hit man was sentenced to three years in a correctional facility, the maximum allowed under Mexican law. He also has to pay a 4.5 million Mexican peso fine ($387,500 U.S.).

The defendant, known as "El Ponchis" ("The Cloak") is a 14-year-old boy from San Diego. Because he is a minor, his trial in Cuernavaca, Mexico, was closed to the public.

He was captured near Mexico City in December. In an on-camera interrogation by Mexican military authorities, the youth admitted to brutally killing people - the victims all were beheaded. The video shows a military interrogator asking the slim teenager with curly hair several questions.

"How many have you killed?," he asks.

"Four," he responded calmly.

"How did you execute them?"

"I slit their throats."

A YouTube video that circulated last year purportedly showed the teenager beating a man with a two-by-four while the man was tied at the wrists and hanging from the ceiling, as other young people watched.

The teen was accused of of crimes related to drug trafficking - specifically cocaine and marijuana - illegal possession of military weapons, and violations against federal organized crime law "with the objective of committing kidnappings and aggravated murder," juvenile court spokesman Juan Carlos Castro said before the trial.

"El Ponchis" is not the only minor in Mexico allegedly involved with drug cartels. Social media pictures have surfaced in the last year showing teenagers and young men holding high-caliber assault weapons and wearing masks.

Six youths were captured last October in a town about 30 miles south of Mexico City. Graffiti in the house where they were hiding linked them to the so-called South Pacific Cartel, a splinter group that formed after cartel leader and drug lord Arturo Beltran Leyva was killed in a shootout with the Mexican military in December of 2009.

 Post by: ,
Filed under: Crime • Mexico
soundoff (449 Responses)
  1. saveone

    three times i tried to post this is a consp trick that is easier to spell.The kid is a product of mexico who happened to be born in the U.S.A . the end

    July 26, 2011 at 9:44 pm | Report abuse |
  2. el americano

    Funny how 'european americans' think they're the sole owners of the United States of AMERICA. They're ancestors massacred all the native Americans; it was a genocide but because it happened so long ago everything is OK and now they don't want the 'foreigners'who happen to be more American because latinos have indian blood. Read your history, many of your European ancestors didn't have freedom in their lands,the were looking for a better life so are immigrants. Europeans came to the new world called America which is comprised of North and South America, made their way by killing all the real Americans. And this happened all throughout the western hemisphere called America; the british, portuguese, french and the spaniards did it. Punish all criminals regardless of their race. Stop generalizing and saying racist comments. Give educated comments instead of being based on hatred or racism...this country is made of immigrants...and punish anybody with the harshest of punisments without looking into race. Trust me our race makeup is changing rapidly. In 30-50 years this country will be totally racially mixed and we should get along...there's good and bad in every race...

    July 26, 2011 at 9:51 pm | Report abuse |
    • saveone

      survival of the fittest (Mr. The American) Those white devils also brought english and modernization and slavery but lets just learn to get along
      P..S yes i said slavery and yes it was wrong and yes it was the spaniards who well you know the rest

      July 26, 2011 at 9:57 pm | Report abuse |
    • Kicker

      Yeah – everyone should get along? I don't think so. Work ethic, food smells, tastes, understanding of life and the purpose of our existence is so personal to people that people won't tolerate any cultural differences for their own personal life – which means same races and culture will build their own communities. Look at Canada – It's almost a melting pot now – but none of the cultures actually interact unless they have to (like at work or something). Every group gathers into their own little corners. This whole idea of a one world kind of gets on my nerves. I bet you some of the third world country kids that are being helped by Americans now through charities will grow up to be the generation that gives the white race revenge for what they did to Natives. Y

      July 26, 2011 at 10:16 pm | Report abuse |
    • Ollie

      *their

      July 27, 2011 at 11:19 am | Report abuse |
    • Playjojo

      Extremely well put. Unfortunately, we are an incredibly arrogant people who have select hearing and reading skills.

      July 28, 2011 at 7:26 pm | Report abuse |
  3. asche

    you say Beck is dangerous for speaking his mind but in the same sentence suggest nobody should be able to speak their mind? you should think about that one long and hard. actually, don't. probably will not help if somehow you're too dense to understand the value of free speech.

    July 26, 2011 at 10:00 pm | Report abuse |
  4. zrock

    When I was 14 I was in a gang and I was pretty bad. I didn't kill anyone but I got in a knife fight and some other pretty scary situations. I definitely ran with a really bad crowd and I knew several young people who died. I did a lot of hard drugs and got in a lot of violent situations. I ran with those people because I lived in those neighborhoods and you were either with them or against them. I didn't have a choice of where I lived when I was 14 and I didn't have a choice to be born a white girl. I felt like I needed the protection and – in a lot of ways – I did. Now I'm an adult and I don't live in a bad neighborhood and I don't need anyone elses protection but my own. I work in customer service and public relations and am currently going to nursing school so I can join the Red Cross. I'm not a bad person and I don't deserve to go to prison for the rest of my life because I was desperate and scared as a teenager growing up in the projects. I did what I felt I had to do to survive and that's all. I realize what I went through isn't exactly the same, but no 14 year old who does those things did it because they wanted to. They do it because they feel trapped and scared and the gang gives them a false sense of security. I'm sure he's an extremely troubled and traumatized CHILD but he should be treated as such. No one that young is unable to change. In fact, the only thing we do at that age is change and change all the time.

    July 26, 2011 at 10:14 pm | Report abuse |
  5. Stauche

    @zrock:

    You are to be commended for you determination to better yourself. Well done.
    That being said, there is no way on God's green earth that the kid can be perceived as a "child", and thus, be treated as one. That kid is a sociopath. Did you not read where he killed and beheaded 4 people? To imply he was a scared little ragamuffim and that he committed these atrocities against his will is ridiculous. One, maybe...four? That's a routine.
    Hopefully, after he gets out of prison, he will stay put in Mexico, because we have enough sociopaths roaming around the US as it is.
    This kid is a killing machine, and I doubt any amount of therapy is going to change him.

    July 26, 2011 at 10:22 pm | Report abuse |
    • kit

      it's bigger than that...parents behind it and
      or other ruthless killer adults, and you are right the kid at 14 hell at 7 knows the difference He is responsible and is a killer, a monster, and so are the sick twisted evil adults that created him.

      December 13, 2011 at 10:27 pm | Report abuse |
  6. KarneySA

    What's wrong with you people! What does his race religion have to do with what the child did! Obviously he was brought up wrong blame his parents! Not his country, race or religion! Come on people are you really so full of hatred that your blinded by it! The world is becoming a scary place especially with all these children who are killing! Ask yourself what went wrong in those kids lives that they resort to these things! Bring your children you properly & try to help others do the same! Unfortunately some people are mean an bad and there children will turn out like them its a choice!

    July 27, 2011 at 3:18 am | Report abuse |
  7. Jose Cravo

    Is there not one person there with balls enough to give this trash what he needs to teach him a lesson?

    July 27, 2011 at 10:15 am | Report abuse |
  8. David

    Even though the suspect is a minor, three years for four murders seems grossly insufficient jail time. Where is the justice here?

    August 6, 2011 at 8:15 pm | Report abuse |
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
« Back to main