Global Courant
They called it “El Impenetrable”, and not because it had a majority of residents from Chaco. The Los Pumitas neighborhood of Empalme Graneros, in the north of the city of Rosario, was known that way because the Santa Fe Police “found it impossible to enter.”
But there was an event that would change the neighborhood completely. On March 5, Máximo Jerez (11) was walking with two of his cousins. They were going to a kiosk; They wanted to buy a soda.
Everything seemed normal until the driver of a black Honda Civic stopped and at least one passenger started shooting, in the context of a drug shootout. The balance was tragic: Máximo was assassinated. His two cousins (13 years old) and a 2-year-old baby ended up hospitalized with injuries.
Hours later, the three houses that would belong to Cristian Carlos Villazón (26), arrested for a triple crime and identified as the leader of the “Los Salteños” gang, which managed the sale of drugs in Los Pumitas, were looted and vandalized by neighbors. Everything was broadcast live by the big national media.
Máximo Iván Jerez, the 12-year-old boy murdered in Rosario.
Now it is three in the afternoon on a Tuesday and there are only a few days left until the three months of the murder of Máximo have expired. The panorama is antagonistic: Los Pumitas seems like one of the quietest neighborhoods in a city that has accumulated 135 crimes so far this year.
The nickname “El Impenetrable” seems to have been left behind. There are gendarmes on the field, in several corridors, at some entrance and in front of the looted houses. It is estimated that about 10 thousand people live in this neighborhood.
A boy plays ball a few meters from the court. The floor is dirt. Next to him, a woman rests on a deck chair. She is an aunt of Máximo. She says: “So far everything is calm. The boys are alone, they play on the field and there is no time to go inside like before. But I want to see you when the gendarmes leave…”.
Gendarmes in one of the bunkers destroyed by the neighbors. Photo Juan Jose Garcia
That is the fear of the neighborhood. They all talk about the same thing. “I’m selling calmly. That’s what’s important,” answers a greengrocer when asked if sales have improved since the arrival of the Gendarmerie, a few meters from one of the houses where drugs were sold.
“The neighborhood belonged to them (because of the drug traffickers),” says a woman at the entrance to a corridor. “Let’s hope the gendarmes continue.” Another neighbor curses not having played 92 in the pool. Him until he gets into the conversation: “They are going to stay until the elections. At least that’s what I think.”
One of the gendarmes says that there was no news from the “Los Salteños” gang, which operated until Máximo’s murder, and from whom another group would have wanted to gain control of the neighborhood. “I imagine that someone must have been sent to test the situation. As long as the cat is there, the mice don’t come near…”.
One of the corridors of the neighborhood. Several houses were sold or the neighbors moved. Photo Juan Jose Garcia
Los Pumitas, or rather the one that was “El Impenetrable” from Rosario, had a characteristic: it was one of the last neighborhoods in which the houses functioned as drug bunkers. The addicts walked from Monday to Monday, during the 24 hours.
If the drug traffickers did not serve one house, they sold in the others. They had “security”: gunmen who prowled the area and lived pending strange movements. Now the favorite modality for the sale of drugs is delivery. The gangs use motorbike drivers to make the deliveries. The change began to be noticed four or five years ago.
A little court in the middle of the neighborhood. The neighbors say that there is more security with the gendarmes. Photo Juan Jose Garcia
“It was a jungle. They did what they wanted. At first they were Esteban Alvarado’s ‘people’. His drugs were sold there and he got labor for the jobs he needed,” explains a source with knowledge of the local drug world.
What he explains, according to his theory, is that the Alvarado clan supplied cocaine and marijuana to “Los Salteños.” And that from there he selected hitmen and “shooters” (perpetrators of shootings in front of houses) for his organization. Although at one point, it is said, there was a break in the relationship. And “Los Salteños” went on to buy the drugs from another “capo” in the city: Julio Rodríguez Granthon, a Peruvian drug trafficker who is being held in Complex 1 of Ezeiza.
The Pumitas, at night. A police mobile guards the neighborhood. Juan Jose Garcia
So profitable was the business that a band dared to confront them and dispute their place. According to the investigation, the group led by Alex Ibáñez, detained in a provincial prison, was the one that arrived at the scene and began shooting. The rest is already known.
Clarín continues with the tour of Los Pumitas. In its streets you can also see some patrol cars from the Santa Fe Police. “Justice for Máximo” and “Enough of insecurity” say the flags that hang from the work that functions as a shelter from the sun and where Máximo’s family cooks and distributes plates of food for the neighbors.
Through the corridor behind one of the arches, there are several doors with padlocks. The only sound is a stereo that plays Sergio Torres and Coty Hernández, two exponents of cumbia from Santa Fe. “You have people who chose to sell their house and return to Chaco,” lists a neighbor who came from that province in search of work and “better quality of life.” “And you have those who shut everything down and left for a while. They were traumatized by what happened.”
Posters in the neighborhood asking for security and justice for Máximo. Photo Juan Jose Garcia
Another of the gendarmes who runs through the area agrees to speak with Clarín. The question is what was the craziest thing he heard from the neighbors, from the time when drugs were sold: “The shootings at the houses of neighbors who were accused of having talked to the police. Maybe they greeted them or talked about whatever thing. But they (because of the drug traffickers) assured that they had given them information.”
That fear still persists. It is difficult for the neighbors to talk to the gendarmes. They do not let go of the information, despite bringing them water or something hot at night.
The tour ends in one of the three looted houses. It is located one hundred meters from the chicken shop that “Los Salteños” also managed. When the Clarín photographer takes pictures, a young woman begins to scream. She takes her cell phone and claims to be recording. Memories often make her mistrust even a journalistic team.
Rosary beads. Special delivery.
EMJ
