As 2009 progresses, drug violence escalates in the north of Mexico.  This recent story tells of how more and more women are being killed, and how beauty queens are courted and lavished with luxuries as “narco wives.”  

Mugshot of a former beauty queen and current narco-girlfriend, arrested with her boyfriend who was smuggling guns.

A friend of mine from Ciudad Juarez told me that when she lived there it was an unspoken rule that you didn’t go into clubs or restaurants with a bunch of SUVs out front, and if narcos came in and started throwing money around you left immediately.  One of her stories of having to tactfully accept a drink from an obvious narco reminds me of the girls this story talks about.  

What’s especially striking to me is how little agency the female characters in these stories seem to have.  They are mentioned as property, as dressing, as a canvas upon which rivals can carve their disrespect.