@ioangrillo.bsky.social
Journalist based in Mexico, focused on crime, drugs and gangster politics. Author of El Narco trilogy and CrashOut on Substack. Time, NYT, HBO++ Still doing it. www.crashoutmedia.com
Mexico's Worst Narco Massacres
Mexico has suffered slaughters like war zones.
San Fernando - 72 executed
Allende - 400+ murdered or disappeared
Agujas - 290 bags of body parts found
How should a country reckon with these atrocities?
Read free below↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/mexicos-wo...
Truth About "Canadian Chapo" Ryan Wedding
It's nice to see them go after an Anglo narco but claims made by US officials, media about Wedding as an Escobar are big exaggerations. Bondi says he runs one of most violent gangs in world.
I clear up the BS:↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/the-truth-...
Secrets of Noriega and the CIA
Panama's dictator led a crazy life as a CIA and DEA asset also working with Medellín Cartel, playing off Washington and Cuba, before US military took him out. His right hand man and enforcer revealed his secrets.
Watch: ↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/secrets-of...
Extortion is now so widespread across Mexico’s farmlands that it has pushed up the price of goods including limes and avocados, a phenomenon so widely acknowledged it’s now referred to as narcoinflation. www.nytimes.com/2025/12/05/o... @ioangrillo.bsky.social
05.12.2025 13:28 — 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
The confession by Joaquín Guzmán López that he kidnapped El Mayo brings that saga towards its end. Yet it's still unclear what role was played by Iván and by US federal agents. And the war it sparked in Sinaloa rages on.
Watch the free video report↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/joaquin-gu...
Trump pardoning Honduran pres. Juan Orlando Hernández of his cocaine conviction undermines his own war on drugs. The argument it was a Biden political conviction or it will win election doesn't add up. But follow the money from the lobbying.
Read here:↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/honduras-a...
Gracias y saludos querido Carlos
01.12.2025 20:49 — 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
portada del libro "Sangre, armas y dinero. Cómo se arman los cárteles y pandillas", de Ioan Grillo.
Ya lo tengo, @ioangrillo.bsky.social, pero no puedo ir a Guadalajara a que me lo firmes, así que cuando regreses, unas chelas!
28.11.2025 01:00 — 👍 3 🔁 2 💬 2 📌 0
El Chapo was the hardest narco to deal with. El Mayo treated him like son. Arturo Beltrán Leyva moved more cocaine than either. El Mencho tried to prove himself with violence.
Read the CrashOut story for free on The Chicago Cocaine Twin, J Flores, below↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/interview-...
Estoy muy feliz de estar este año en la FIL de Guadalajara con mi libro "Sangre, Armas y Dinero", y con Jesús Lemus, uno de los mejores periodistas sobre narcotráfico en México. 29 de noviembre, 19:30, Salón 8, Área Nacional, Expo GDL. Ven a saludar!
26.11.2025 04:21 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Cartels Versus Environmentalists
De @ioangrillo.bsky.social
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/cartels-ve...
Psyched to be at Guadalajara book festival with my book "Sangre Armas y Dinero" about the iron river of guns from the US to cartels in Mexico in this crazy tense moment - I'll be with Jesus Lemus, one of best journos on narcos, and talk is open to all issues. Sat, Nov. 29, 7:30
24.11.2025 20:12 — 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
There's a hell of a lot more to Russia's perception and cognitive outreach in Mexico and Latin America than RT and Sputnik and the main vectors are WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter/X, YouTube, TikTok, and of course Telegram
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/24/w...
CrashOut went to France's crime capital to talk to the activist whose second brother was just murdered. This report breaks down France's new gang wars - and the DZ Mafia and Yoda.
Read here:↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/gang-murde...
Cartels Versus Environmentalists -
Gangsters in Mexico kills those who stand in their way to fell timber, run wild cat mines, or clear forests to run meth labs. But mining companies who pay off cartels are also nervous.
Read the report:↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/cartels-ve...
Here is my full video report on the protests and riots yesterday in Mexico City - looking at who was behind them, how they escalated, what the response was, what the implications are.
Click here below to watch it free on my Stack↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/inside-the...
The use of a 17 year old sicario to assassinate Mayor Carlos Manzo shows the urgent need for a real prevention campaign to stop kids as young as 12 being recruited into cartels in Mexico. About 40% of them will be murdered, a study estimates.
Read here (free)↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/applied-ma...
My Reader, “The Punisher” Duterte
I sat down twice with the Philippine president during his war on drugs that has put him before the ICC. It was one of the most challenging situations I've had as a journalist and I only now tell the story.
Read it here: ↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/my-reader-...
@ioangrillo.bsky.social me acaba de derrumbar un viejo mito: "ver quemar cannabis no produce ningún efecto psicoactivo; no se ha secado y el humo asciende directamente a las nubes". Yo juraba que los milis se ponían unos pasones históricos (envidia, sí). Aquí su reportaje.
07.11.2025 16:50 — 👍 3 🔁 1 💬 1 📌 0
US marijuana legalization smashed Mexico's weed exports north (controlled by cartels) as intended.
Marijuana seizures on the border fell by 97.5% between 2013 and 2023. But I was wrong. It didn't, as many of us hoped, weaken cartels. (Link to story below↓)
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/us-marijua...
Mexico: Time for heroes?
Michoacán has long commemorated its martyrs and with murders of mayor Carlos Manzo and defender of lime farmers Bernardo Bravo, it seems to bequeath new martyrs in the fight against cartels.
Will their deaths spark something. Story: www.crashoutmedia.com/p/mexico-tim...
The new Trump doctrine to missile boats that are allegedly carrying dope opens up a whole new phase in the war on drugs. But it is also entwined with a different conflict: the attempt to get regime change in Venezuela...
29.10.2025 19:16 — 👍 0 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
Mexican Watchdogs (Journalists) Under Fire
De @ioangrillo.bsky.social
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/mexican-wa...
Since Calderón launched an army offensive on cartels in 2006 the total homicide count in Mexico has now topped 500,000! An intel unit estimated 60% of deaths were by cartels or security forces "fighting them."
How can we frame this hybrid armed conflict↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/what-are-t...
The murder of Bernardo Bravo Manríquez, a lime farmer leader in Michoacán who stood up to extortionists is a true tragedy. But it reflects how deeply cartels have gotten into extorting so much of the Mexican economy and causing "narco-inflation."
Read:↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/mexicos-so...
Carlos sold top end single-edition Swiss watches (for $100,000s to $1 million+) to narcos for 8 years. The Swiss companies loved him.
"They fucking love you. You have no idea. You are making their budgets. You become a hero”
Read how cartels wash cash↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/narco-blin...
Chalino Sánchez, father of narco corridos and icon in Sinaloa and LA
He avenged his sister at 15, went to prison in Tijuana for a shooting, then in the US for drugs. The attack on him in Coachella was likely a hit.
Read full true story of Chalino here:↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/chalino-ki...
Did you ever hear about the time a splinter from the Tijuana Cartel dissolved bodies in acid in California and carried out a series of murders in the U.S. as far away as Kansas City, Missouri?
Thought not. So be informed by reading the full story here:↓
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/when-los-p...
Thanks there friend and all best there
26.09.2025 17:20 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Ayotzinapa’s Narco Witnesses - The Mexican government gave dubious benefits to major narcos, incuding delaying extradition of El Cuini, to help on the case of the 43 disappeared students. But what did they give in return? Read special report:
www.crashoutmedia.com/p/cuini-and-...
