Flying Under the Radar: Low-Profile Drug Dealers in a Mexico City Neighborhood

• DOI: 10.1177/0022042619829426
• Date: 01 April 2019
• Author: Roger Guy,Piotr A. Chomczyński
• Published date: 01 April 2019
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/0022042619829426

Journal of Drug Issues

2019, Vol. 49(2) 308 –323

© The Author(s) 2019

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DOI: 10.1177/0022042619829426

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Article

Flying Under the Radar: Low-Profile

Drug Dealers in a Mexico City

Neighborhood

Piotr A. Chomczyński1 and Roger Guy2

Abstract

This study examines a relatively obscure group who occupy a unique position in the overall

structure of drug distribution: low-level independent dealers. Using ethnographic methods,

fieldwork, and interviews in several Mexico City neighborhoods, we discuss the activities,

strategies, and characteristics of what we designate as low-profile drug dealers. Working as

freelancers, they exploit their community connections to operate relatively autonomously.

They are socialized to function on a subterranean level of narcotrafficking avoiding the attention

of drug trafficking organizations and law enforcement. They manage licit (front businesses) and

illicit (back businesses), and tend to be in their late twenties with past experience in riskier

criminal pursuits. Because their proceeds from the sale of drugs supplement household income,

their activities expand and contract according to financial need.

Keywords

differential drug markets, drug dealing, narcotrafficking, ethnography, Mexico City

Introduction

Drug trafficking is a multifaceted and complex criminal activity that is often analyzed vis-à-vis

transnational drug trafficking organizations (DTOs).1 In the end, however, the final destination

for illicit substances are local communities where street-level dealers play a major role in the

daily activity of distribution (Potter, 2009). Before our research, we assumed that all street-level

dealers were, in some way, the end point of an uninterrupted DTO distribution network. Our aim

was to analyze the social context of street-level drug dealers in Mexico City through direct con-

tact with them in their daily routines. Eventually, our interviews and ethnographic work revealed

a distinctive group that were unlike other small-scale dealers who were under the control of

DTOs, or their local representatives. We chose the term low profile to distinguish this group

because of their modus operandi. We became interested in the characteristics, motives, and tech-

niques for avoiding the attention of cartels. As we discuss below, they are covert, independent,

embedded, and operate with the implicit consent of friends and family.

1University of Lodz, Poland

2State University of New York at Oswego, USA

Corresponding Author:

Roger Guy, Department of Criminal Justice, State University of New York at Oswego, 7060 State Route 104,

Oswego, NY 13126, USA.

Email: roger.guy@oswego.edu

829426JODXXX10.1177/0022042619829426Journal of Drug IssuesChomczyński and Guy

research-article2019

Chomczyński and Guy 309

Drug sales occupy a significant portion of the illicit economic activity in the Mexico City

neighborhood that was the setting for this research (Davis, 2013; Hollander, 2004; Martinez,

2005). Our research suggests that social bonds and historical factors sustain the sale of ille-

gal drugs in Tepito. Dealers are also aided by a unique structure of protection that exists

within the community that allows them to carry on their business, and makes it difficult for

law enforcement to dislodge them. The proceeds from illicit drugs are an important supple-

ment to legal sources of household income. Selling drugs is part of daily life, and children

are initially exposed to the trade through primary socialization by parents or kin who are in

the business. Later in adolescence, secondary socialization shapes the entry and participa-

tion in drug dealing. Low-profile dealers avoid attracting the attention of DTOs who would

require that they sell greater amounts of the product, and expose them to much more personal

risk. In short, there is a constant tension between earning more money while not becoming

too successful and, therefore, more visible to DTO, or the gangs that they employ.

Gaps in the Literature

Traditional social science literature is replete with work on drug dealing primarily in terms of

deviant activity, an individual deviant lifestyle, or as a neighborhood social pathology (Adler,

1993; Becker, 1953; Bourgois, 2003; Cloward & Ohlin, 1960; Currie, 1993; Venkatesh, 2008;

Williams, 1989). Viewing drug dealing as deviance, or as a social problem, might be influenced

by a dominant sociocultural view in most Western countries, where it involves conceiving of

drug dealing and consuming illicit drugs in moralistic terms. Others hold the position that the

moral condemnation of drug dealing stems from the fact that illicit markets are, by definition,

illegal and, therefore, undermine or otherwise impede the normal functioning of political, legal,

and economic institutions (Priest, 1994).

However, there is also some evidence suggesting that the use and presence of illicit substances

is perceived differently in Latin America than in Western countries such as the United States

(Coomber, 2015; Konecki, Kacperczyk, Chomczyński, & Albarracín, 2013). Therefore, a differ-

ent cultural reference rooted in the historical presence and use of psychoactive substances has led

to more tolerance of them (Campbell, 2009; Paris, Pérez, & Raquel, 2013; Rodriguez & Martinez,

2012). Therefore, Holmes and Marcus (2005) noted that researchers designing field study in

culturally different backgrounds often unconsciously adopt their “politics of knowledge” in rep-

resenting and reproducing a dominant standpoint (pp. 521-522). We sought to approach dealing

as integrated into the community fabric in a social, cultural, and occupational sense rather than

as immoral behavior.

The low-profile dealers who we studied were well aware that their activities were illegal, but

considered it simply as a means to generate additional income. Therefore, we approached their

dealing in occupational terms by exploring the daily lives, activities, and socialization of those

involved in it. Our position and findings are consistent with previous research, suggesting that

low-level drug distribution involves small-time dealers who sell their goods primarily to friends

and trusted acquaintances (Belackova & Vaccaro, 2013; Coomber & Turnbull, 2007; Jacques &

Wright, 2008), and that there is great variation in drug markets, and the social milieu of distribu-

tion (Coomber, 2015). We also argue that underemployment is a central motivation to enter drug

dealing, in addition to the business having intergenerational ties to family members and signifi-

cant others (Macit, 2017).

The literature specifically surrounding drug trafficking in Mexico has rarely addressed

local street-level dealers who proffer marijuana, cocaine, or crack to a clientele made up of

trusted friends, or neighborhood residents. Instead, the preponderance of research has cen-

tered on the activities of transnational DTOs or threat they post to the United States (Grayson,

2013; A. Hernández & Saviano, 2013; Morris, 2013). One recent work suggests that violence