Mayor Carlos Alberto Manzo Rodríguez was assassinated during a Day of the Dead celebration Nov. 1 in the main square of Uruapan, in the violence-torn Mexican state of Michoacán. He had been an outspoken opponent of the drug cartels and their reign of terror in the state, and his death sparked protests across Michoacán. At a demonstration in state capital Morelia the day after the murder, protesters demanded the resignation of Gov. Ramírez Bedolla, of Mexico's ruling MORENA party; one faction broke into and vandalized the Government Palace. President Claudia Sheinbaum has announced a new "Michoacán Plan for Peace & Justice" to finally pacify the lawless state. 

Mexican naval forces in the oil port of Tampico, Tamaulipas, on Sept. 13 arrested Jorge Eduardo Costilla Sánchez AKA "El Coss"—notorious leader of the Gulf Cartel—along with five cohorts, apparently without resistance. Authorities hailed it as a major blow against the cartel, coming just a week after the arrest of another Gulf kingpin, Mario Cárdenas Guillén AKA "El Gordo" (Fatso), captured by Mexican marines in Altamira, also in Tamaulipas—the brother of Osiel Cárdenas Guillen, who led the cartel until he was detained in 2003.