Reform the Mexican Judicial System

Posted: December 21st, 2016

By Dwight Dyer

Dwight Dyer has worked for the Mexican government and currently is an Natural Gas Intelligence Correspondent and an independent consultant on political and security risks related to Mexico's energy sector reform. He also publishes Power Play MX, an analytical newsletter on energy-related issues in the country. Previously, he was the Energy and the Environment editor at ElDailyPost.com, an English-language online media focusing on Mexico. Before that, Dyer served as associate director and senior analyst for Mexico at Control Risks' Mexico City office, delivering analysis of political, security and integrity risk issues in Mexico for consulting projects, including a great variety of energy reform-related ones, as well as leveraging his experience in Latin American affairs for pan-regional projects. Dwight Dyer holds a Ph.D. in political science from UC Berkeley, a Masters in Asian Studies (China) also from UC Berkeley, and a B.A. in International Relations from El Colegio de Mexico.

The increase in violence over the last year has spread evenly across Mexico (as shown in Figure 1 below) which compares state-level intentional homicide rates per 100,000 residents for the first ten months of 2015 (X axis) and 2016 (Y axis). There are a few states where homicide rates have declined, year-on-year, such as Coahuila, Chiapas, Durango, Querétaro Quintana Roo, and Nayarit. These states represent every region in the country. However, nearly every other state has seen an increase in its murder rate in 2016, compared to 2015. (It should be noted that Mexico continues to register an intentional homicide rate, 15.4 per 100,000 residents, that is much lower than Brazil’s, close to 24 per 100,000 residents, or Colombia’s, nearly 30 per 100,000 residents.)

Colima, Zacatecas, Michoacán, and Veracruz have seen dramatic increases in their murder rates over the last year. Guerrero, Chihuahua, and Sinaloa have registered very high murder rates consistently over the last three years. Although Chihuahua and Sinaloa, in contrast with Guerrero, had seen consistent declines in their high murder rates from 2012 to 2015, this year they reversed course. Guerrero has seen a steady increase in its murder rate since 2011.

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