Mexican YouTube star, 17, found dead after insulting notorious cartel boss.
Juan Luis Lagunas Rosales, was recently found dead, riddled with at least 15 bullets at a music venue in Culiacan, in the northwestern Mexican state of Sinaloa.
Weeks before he was allegedly murdered, Rosales insulted Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, also known as “El Mencho,” who is one of Mexico’s most wanted men, with a $6.4 million bounty on his head.
Thousands of murders have been associated with his cartel, called the New Generation Cartel of Jalisco.
In a video, posted some time before his death, Rosales can be seen telling El Mencho to “suck my d***.”
It’s believed the teenager, who was infamous for his drinking habits, was inebriated when he made the video.
Rosales had more than a million followers on Facebook and over 300,000 on Instagram.
“He opted to make a career as a broken toy of cyberspace, a path he carved out drink by drink and that left him with enemies of flesh and blood,” Fernando Mexía, a Univision reporter, wrote in an article titled “The poisoned fame of ‘El Pirata.’”
2017 has been called Mexico’s bloodiest year on record. In the first 10 months, 20,878 murders were counted nationwide. It is an average of 69 murders a day, according to Reuters.
In addition, at least 12 journalists were killed this year in the country, with many of the murders associated with the wave of drug-related violence.
Mexico is the world’s most dangerous country to be a journalist outside of active war zones.
