To put matters lightly, the supposedly resolved case of three film students kidnapped in Tonala last March was, is, and remains murky at best.
One element in particular of the investigation raises more questions that it resolves, that of the alleged involvement of 20-year-old Youtube rapping sensation QBA, identified in official reports as Omar “N.” According to Lizette Torres, who lead the probe, QBA dissolved the bodies in barrels of acid on order of the Cartel Jalisco Nuevo Generacion (CJNG). Furthermore, this wasn’t, if official sources are to be believed, the first time QBA had acted in this capacity for the notoriously violent cartel, members of which it is thought mistook the students for constituents of a rival cartel.
But who exactly is QBA? Why, if his claims of substantial compensation for rap videos posted online are true, would he bother cleaning up the CJNG’s grisly messes on a regular basis – and for just 3,000 pesos a week? His posts regularly chalk up between one and five million views. And he was able to parlay his fame on Youtube into payed appearances. Prior to his arrest, QBA was scheduled to headline Rap Fest 664, an event that, had it not been canceled, would have been held April 29 in Tijuana. He was also set to play a show in Mexicali the day before, April 28. Perhaps the CJNG wouldn’t take no for an answer.
Is QBA, in fact, involved with the cartel or is he just a convenient patsy who fits neatly fits the profile – in the public’s perception – of someone who would blithely liquify the bodies of three human beings in large plastic containers?
One thing is for certain: QBA confessed to the deed. But confessions can be easily extracted under duress, as anyone who has studied Mexican justice over the years will tell you.
Fiscalia agents also claim to have obtained from the detained rapper a rough outline of his career in crime, which, according to the report, he began when still a minor, robbing people at gunpoint on his own until he was absorbed into the CJNG. One of his first jobs for the cartel, the state Attorney General’s Office (FGE) investigation asserts, was to dissolve the bodies of two men tortured and killed by gang members. Per the report, QBA subsequently moved up the ranks to become a sicario, or assassin, for the group.
The FGE further reports that the gang members involved in the March kidnapping are being systematically eliminated by their own capos; one of the abductors, known only as El Cazón, was gunned down on April 19 in a Guadalajara neighborhood.
The seemingly hapless rapper may, in fact, be safer in the hands of the police than loose on the streets, at the mercy of a criminal organization not above cannibalizing its own rank-and-file in order to avoid unwanted attention from law enforcement. Then again, maybe not.