#kidnappingmexico

According to the National Register of Missing Persons (RNPED), from 2007-2015, nation-wide, nearly 28,000 people are officially missing in Mexico, or in other words: dead, kidnapped or enslaved.  At least 6,000 of those bodies - and thousand others that remain officially unreported - are the result of crime, violence and corruption in the state of Tamaulipas.  Several other states in Northern Mexico like Nuevo León and Baja California also rank high.  At least 2,500 missing are of unknown nationality, meaning both foreigners and nationals alike.

Currently, armed confrontations between rival drug cartels - along with dead and injured bystanders - keep going strong.  Kidnappings, extortions and assassinations are steady.  Most alarmingly, however, is the fact that public government officials hold a close-knit relationship not just with members of organized crime but also with individuals known to be involved with money laundering.  

Many have noted that under Egidio Torre Cantú’s term - the state’s governor since 2011 - Tamaulipas social climate resembles a war-zone.  In May of 2015, there was no doubt that such a comparison is not unreasonable at all: two explosive artifacts were indeed detonated outside the National Electoral Institute (INE) and the Municipal Police headquarters of Matamoros respectively.  The event was reminiscent of 2012’s car bomb that killed several police officers just outside the mayor’s office in Nuevo Laredo.  

In Reynosa, just last week, armed federal police forces engaged in a public confrontation against an unidentified group of armed criminals - in all likeliness belonging to drug cartels - that attacked a PGR headquarters by ramming a bulletproof vehicle against its garage doors and opening fire at police officers.  The event escalated in a high-speed persecution - and shootout - across several areas of the city, leaving a toll of dead and wounded.  It is not unreasonable to believe it was retaliation for a deal gone wrong between drug dealers and police forces.  

It is definitely an ongoing problem.  Many homicides in the state indeed come with the struggle for drug trade and territory control.  We must remember that notwithstanding continued military presence and the advent of the Tamaulipas Coordination Group (GTC) - a specialized unit made of both state and federal security and armed forces - since 2014, authorities have been unable to stabilize, much less eradicate violence and the generalized sense of insecurity in several sectors of the state, as we’ve previously reported.  

In fact, days after the PGR attack that took place in Reynosa, in the neighbor city of Matamoros, federal police forces seized - in different spots of the city - three vehicles loaded with weapons.  Seven assault rifles, 30 magazines, and nearly ten thousand rounds.  Interestingly enough - and such is not clear in the police reports - the drivers got away by foot.  

Their escape cannot be taken entirely as a surprise: it actually speaks loudly about currently existing accords between organized crime and police authorities.  It must be said: along with homicides and disappearances, corruption in the police force is another nation-wide problem that has recently become very visible, particularly in the Northern states of Mexico.  Baja California is another example of both: 1,300 missing in 2015 as well as the assassination of several police officers in the beginning of December.

As we’ve mentioned, in Tamaulipas, however, part of the issue can be explained through the continued - and continuously re-shifting - struggle for power and territorial control between rival drug groups Los Zetas and the Gulf Cartel.  Their confrontations - a kind of urban war - have not ceased to leave a trail of bodies in their midst.  

Early December, for instance, several newspapers received information about the kidnapping and murder of Rogelio Rolando González - known as “Kelin” or “Z-2”, who is one of the original founding members of drug cartel and organized crime group Los Zetas.  The Gulf Cartel is allegedly responsible for the incident.  

The problem arose when González - shortly after his prison release - set out to dispute control over the Matamoros area and threatened to dispose rival Gulf Cartel leader Odon Azua Cruces, known as “El Gordo Cereza”.  The latter had González - along with wife and family - kidnapped and killed.  Though the bodies haven’t been found, they simply add on to the vast list - and counting - of disappeared bodies in the Mexican territory.  In 2015, 5,700 bodies in Tamaulipas alone have been officially reported missing.

Azua Cruces has come to be known precisely for kidnapping and ransom.  His group is but one of example of the 300% increase in kidnappings over the past three years in the state of Tamaulipas. 694% higher than in the rest of Mexico.  In January and February of 2015: 40 reported kidnappings.  The actual number is unknown since a considerably large number are never reported to authorities, for fear of repercussions and because of law enforcement’s notoriety for being unable to attend kidnappings - or making the situation worst.    

Part of their inability to attend the issue can be explained as a lack of interest by part of authorities.  Actually, the Specialized Attorney’s Office for the Search of Disappeared Persons declared they only count with 120 public servants that currently work in the search of missing bodies.

In fact, an ex municipal president of Matamoros, Alfonso Sánchez Garza, was nearly kidnapped in August of this year.  His lack of trust in authorities to attend the problem was such that after managing to escape from his assailants - who attempted to stop his vehicle in the middle of the road - he simply went home and made a public call through social media about the incident.  Such a maneuver has become considerably safer than an official report.

In May of 2015, 47 hostages - 18 foreigners and 29 Mexican nationals - were found in a safe house after an anonymous call supposedly alerted authorities.  Last month, in November, 19 kidnappers were apprehended by authorities in the city of Matamoros. Along with two hostages, weapons and drugs were found.  

Two of the kidnappers were actually underage. Again, it should be noted that Tamaulipas is the state with a larger amount of underage criminal activity: authorities arrest children for carrying guns, assault rifles and grenades more so than any other place in Mexico.  Over 200 children were sanctioned in 2014.  Over 30% of disappearances nation-wide indeed account for underage persons from Guerrero and Tamaulipas.  

Moreover, streets and roads are increasingly a real danger to travel through.  Francisco Rivas, spokesman or the National Citizen Observatory, has accurately explained that traveling the roads of Tamaulipas may very well result in “the entire vehicle” being seized.  In the Matamoros-Reynosa highway particularly, robberies and kidnappings have increased since September.  

Another recurring issue in the city of Reynosa, in fact, is the theft of gasoline. On the 15th of this month, 3 members of a group were arrested in the vicinity.  They were seized along with 65 grams of heroine and 7 thousand dollars in cash. 157 thousand liters of gasoline were also taken from the group.  Such events are yet another symptom of crime and corruption in the vicinity.

Yet, Governor Torre Cantú continues to announce the advent of police groups with the declared aim of bettering the situation while simultaneously undermining the issues by saying the wave of violence is merely a “rumor”. But what is there to be done of the daily kidnappings, shootouts, murders, and disappearances?

The relationship between drug cartels and the state’s government is not just known through Torre Cantú’s current term but it has been known through his predecessors’ terms: Tomás Yarrington Ruvalcaba and Eugenio Hernández Flores, for instance, both who have been known for previously held accords and money laundering activities with organized crime.

For instance, the U.S. government is currently investigating Hernández Flores - with whom Torre Cantú holds a public, open relationship - for money laundering and other related offenses.  Over 30 million dollars and several assets are in dispute.  

From 2005-2010 he collaborated with drug cartels and contributed to laundering their assets.   Torre Cantú - during his government's last State of the Union - expressed that he “really appreciated the company of our state’s ex Governors” Cavazos Lema and Hernández Flores, who were sitting in the audience.  

And even though merely two days ago authorities managed to capture regional narco leader Leonel Hernández Bautista – along with weapons, ammo and drugs – in the Valle Hermoso area within Matamoros, both the governor and police forces alike have been unable to curtail criminal activity coming from that particular area in Tamaulipas.

It is undoubtedly one of the most heavily impacted by organized crime.  The recent attack on the PGR headquarters, the weapons and ammunition recently seized, the territorial dispute between Los Zetas and the Gulf Cartel, as well as the alarming amount of disappeared people in the region make Matamoros one of the most dangerous and unstable vicinities for both nationals and foreigners alike.  The recent kidnapping bust confirms Matamoros’ reputation as one of the hottest spots in the state – and the nation – for kidnapping and extortion.

Authorities, civil society and newspapers alike have all expressed serious concern upon the deaths of 3 policemen in the city of Tijuana that took place during the concluding week of November and the beginning of December.  They bring the number of killed policemen in the city to 6 during this year.  It is an alarming way to finish this 2015 as well an invitation to reflect upon what’s at stake in the coming times.  

Public shootouts between authorities and organized crime over disputes of narcotic merchandise, dead policemen, bloody corpses laid out on the street, basically: it’s a crime scene much too reminiscent of the notorious wave of violence that dominated public life and shut down business in the northernmost border city of Mexico during the 2008-2012 lapse.  

In fact, Tijuana’s ex-police chief from that period, Julián Leyzaola released a video - through local newspaper agencies - titled A message for Tijuanenses, in which he expresses concern for the murdered policemen and warns authorities and civil society about a return to the insecure and volatile times recently overcome.  

Leyzaola made another interesting point made well-worth considering: “when an off-duty policeman is attacked it entails a personal issue, mostly related to things he did or got involved with…when violence is executed against an active policeman, the attack is against the corporation”.  

Yet, when attacks - both against off-duty policemen as well as the Tijuana police as an institution - become a trend - as it did in these three recent murders -, there is no question that it’s worth investigating because, in all likelihood they are probably related.  Though the cases are not necessarily intertwined - after all, the attackers are all different individuals - they are undoubtedly connected in that they speak loudly about police involvement with organized crime.  

Indeed, that is an issue that transcends the personal issue related to a single member of the institution: it is also telling of a general problem of corruption - involving many other actors - in various sectors - and areas of city - within the Tijuana police department.  

Motorcycle officer José Iván Hernández Contreras, for instance, who was shot to death by four individuals outside his home  - while off-duty - was actually actively involved, presumably, with narcos from the Arellano Felix Cartel (CAF) currently operating in Tijuana.  

In the beginning of November, Hernández Contreras, along with seven others - 6 of them police officers - breached a CAF safe house and stole a white van filled “unknown” content, meaning: a large amount of drug merchandise.  Because everything was filmed, members of the faction - whose current leader is “El piloto” or “the pilot” - sent authorities the surveillance video in which Hernández Contreras and other officers are seen during the robbery.  

Precisely because it was not an isolated incident, drug dealers simply requested the merchandise to be returned but neither authorities nor police officers responded or complied.  At the time, before the video information had been released, several police authorities declared on the matter, speculating on Hernández Contreras’ “possible involvement with organized crime”.  

But it wasn’t just a possibility; it was an actuality that authorities were well aware of.  Hernández Contreras, in fact, for years had been actively involved with drug dealers since the time of Eduardo García Simental - “el Teo” - and was presumably well-acquainted with Filiberto Parra Ramos, “La perra”.  After becoming a police officer, in all likelihood, he continued to have a relationship with cartel members, hence why his death is a merely a hiccup or communication breakdown, a consequence of an unfortunate decision.  

Yet this becomes not just an issue of the authorities’ lack of interest in reviewing and properly running background checks on police officers but of currently existing accords - an illegal business contract of sorts - between organized crime and police authorities.  

The deaths of officers Victor Manuel Insunza and his patrol partner Janeth Cocolam Almeda, for instance, are telling of such agreements between certain police sectors - commonly organized in neighborhoods or zones  - and corresponding active criminals that work in such vicinities.  

They were basically killed because of a misunderstanding, so to speak.  After stopping a suspicious black sedan - in Mariano Matamoros, a seemingly unrelated sector of the city - the officers were shot to death after they found the two suspects had an assault rifle in their vehicle.  

The assailants were the Castro Aguayo brothers - two firearm traffickers, active in the area - who for over a year had been retrieving, transporting and selling illegal firearms for the Cartel de Jalisco Nueva Generación (CJNG), from the U.S. through Mexico to Guadalajara.  

They were well-known in the neighborhood: members of the community declared they were often seen in company of police officers and that it was obvious that local authorities were aware of their activities.  In fact, they had been recently arrested and later released - along with the confiscated weapons -, as described by neighbors who noted the incident.

That explains why immediately after killing officers Insunza and Cocolam, the Castro Aguayo brothers went back home, where police authorities retrieved them.  They knew exactly where to find them precisely because they had a previous arrangement - a permit to operate, basically -.  

The problem was that Insunza and Cocolam were not in on the deal - or had refused to participate - so when they stopped the black sedan they did not what was at stake.  Similarly, the assailants of José Iván Hernández Contreras - who shot him nearly a block away from the police station - were never apprehended.  

Initial reports note that a vehicle matching the one of Hernández Contreras’ shooters was found along with an individual who operated it, yet nor the vehicle nor the man were brought in to the station.  Again, that could be indicative of either a previous arrangement or of the reluctance of other police officers to get involved with something they’d rather not.

Fidel Armas García, on the other hand, - a policeman classified as a commercial officer - was killed in what was presumably an armed robbery to a private company vehicle.  He worked for a dairy processing company and was on route to deliver two envelopes with approximately two-thousand dollars cash each when he was approached by attackers, taken to the back of the van and shot.  Interestingly enough, only one of the envelopes was taken, along with company documents.  

Another interesting fact is that Armas García actually worked as a bodyguard for Jorge Hank Rhon during the 8 years he was the Mayor of Tijuana.  Needless to say, the possible connections to organized crime there are definitely vast.  His murder is indicative, again, of a connection between police authorities and organized crime.

Though after the wave of violence that for Tijuana began in 2008 – and coincided with the presidency of Felipe Calderon and his war on drugs – police authorities presumably installed a trust and control evaluation mechanism meant to prevent officers to participate in corrupt activities, it is evident that this system has not rendered the necessary results.

Though it is hard to gauge to what degree corruption in the police department today relates to corruption in 2008, it is undeniable that it is still a relevant issue, perhaps now more so than before.  According to government data, only 16.5% of police officers nation-wide has actually been subjected to an evaluation.  We have to remember, though, that corruption runs not just locally but statewide and in federal terms.

What’s at stake for the coming months? In trying to answer that question we must consider that previous drug cartels have been reconfigured, along with their territories.  New factions entail new alliances, new areas, new modes of operation and renewed as well as severed relationships with police authorities and government representatives.

It is also quite interesting that General Augusto Moisés García Ochoa, commander of Baja California’s second division Army, announced last week that over 100 army officials would be working with police authorities in the coming months.  

1. Recent History: differing trends

For nearly a decade, kidnapping has been an endemic issue in the Mexican territory.  Though kidnapping, as a criminal activity in the region has existed for a long time, in recent times, it has undertaken specific developments influenced by the trajectory of the drug-trafficking business.  Reflecting upon the country’s previous presidency - that of Felipe Calderón - and its transition to the current (Peña Nieto) one, for instance, easily reveals a decisive shift in kidnapping activity in Mexico.  

In the 2006-2012 period, killings and kidnapping principally took place as a by-product of the outright civil war between competing drug cartels and the Mexican army.  Alongside public shootouts, executions, and mutilated bodies literally thrown on the streets, kidnappings took place at alarming rates between enemy cartels and their corresponding allies, whether they were politicians, professionals, business owners, or family members.  

Though the infamous War on drugs or the Anti-narco war emphasized by the U.S. and the Mexican government initially intensified the bloody turmoil, the Mexican military succeeded, to a certain extent, at appeasing rival cartels and calming the situation.  It did not, however, eradicate the drug-related violence.  In fact, it contributed to the intensification of a previously existing trend: profit-specific kidnapping.  The notable difference is that kidnap perpetrators were now better equipped not only with high-caliber weapons but also with armored vehicles and explosive weaponry. 

So, even though large drug cartels, after pressure from the Mexican military, broke up into smaller factions and certain territorial boundaries were, to an extent, re-drawn, opposing groups remained at odds with each other.  What took place, then, was only inevitable: an oscillating, re-shifting drug market lead to new market ventures for newly formed players.  Drug traffickers, unable to securely rely on the drug business for profit, began to innovate their criminal practices, looking for different, faster methods of acquiring large amounts of cash in the least amount of time, via the most effective - and violent means.  After the trend of bank and ATM robberies wore down, kidnapping proved to be the crime of choice for fragmented as well as emerging drug-trafficking factions.   

Different types of kidnappings developed over time.  Drug traffickers began to kidnap not only high-ranking businessmen and their family members, visiting foreign businessmen and unaware traveling tourists, but shop owners, small-business owners, bank employees, etc.  They also began the practice of express kidnapping, which was aimed at acquiring low-amount ransoms and minimizing the risk of being caught by law enforcement.  

Simulated or virtual kidnappings are also worth mentioning.  They are false kidnappings that follow a relatively simple method of intimidation or extortion yet often prove to effective and lucrative.  As of 2013, the extortion trend has sky-rocketed precisely because the actual kidnapping threat is so apparent that victims are easily convinced that a close family member or somebody they know has been kidnapped.  Currently, virtual kidnapping is no longer exclusively practiced by drug traffickers but has moved into other kinds of criminals, who are often only dedicated to kidnapping and who have no previous drug-trafficking history.  

Kidnapping in its various forms, then, has become a widely practiced crime not only by different kinds of criminals but in different areas of the country. Though the northern part of the territory ranks highest in the kidnapping rates, central and western Mexico also significantly suffer from kidnapping. 

2. Infidelity of official reports and unsuccessful attempts to combat kidnapping 

The incapacity of Mexican authorities to provide accurate kidnapping statistics sheds light on the seriousness of the issue.  Alejandro Martí, the president of Mexico SOS, a civil organization concerned with kidnapping in Mexico that has been active since 2008, reported that neither federal nor local authorities have responded accurately to the alarming kidnapping problem partly because they claim a false, less frequent rate of occurrence.   Other organizations such as the National Citizen Observatory (ONC) and the Alto Secuestro (Stop Kidnapping) organization, interested in similar objectives: the curtailing and eradication of kidnapping as well as finding and identifying victims and perpetrators, have also expressed almost identical concerns about the relation of the government’s reported numbers and its unsuccessful attempts to reduce kidnapping.

In fact, Francisco Rivas, ONC’s director as well as Isabel Miranda, president of Stop Kidnapping, publicly urged the federal and local Mexican government, as well as the National System of Public Safety, to successfully inform the public, in accurate number and extensive detail, about currently reported kidnapping cases and ongoing investigations.   Though not everything officially reported is completely inaccurate, there are a lot of kidnapping cases that are coincidentally left out.  For instance, according to official state reports, from January to Feburary of 2014, 132 kidnappings took place nation-wide.  Stop Kidnapping, however, announced that it registered 588 cases: the contrast is noteworthy.  

Isabel Miranda suggests that the statistical discrepancy is due to authorities’ evident failure to attend the kidnapping issue, to combat against perpetrators and to locate and rescue victims.  Likewise, ONC’s analysts stated: “kidnapping continues to rise” and "to extend to more and more cities and counties” because "federal, state, and local authorities have not provided with necessary results” in its curtailing.  They carefully added that “the alarming growth rate previously mentioned” could “be larger than the one reported by authorities.” 

The fact is that Mexican law enforcement is yet to find an effective mechanism to successfully confront, contain and if not eliminate, at least reduce the issue of kidnapping.  So much so that the kidnapping rates of 2013 and 2014 thus far are alarming. 

3. Kidnapping, now

From January of 2013 to March of 2014, there were 3,600 reported kidnapping cases in Mexico.  Alto Secuestro estimates that 4,051 is a more accurate number.  This is a 592% increase from the figures of 2011-2012.   Among the list of victims are professionals, business owners, students, workers, businessmen, rural workers, housewives and even unemployed individuals. 61% of the cases took place in Estado de México, Guerrero, Tamaulipas, and Mexico D.F.  30% of kidnap victims were killed or mutilated.  During 2013, 349 counties were prone to at least 1 kidnapping case. 

From December 2011 to June of 2012, 878 kidnappings took place.  Yet, from January to February of 2014 over 600 kidnappings were reported in Mexico.  For two-months’ time, this is an alarming rate. During Enrique Peña Nieto’s presidency, kidnapping cases have tripled in comparison with the two previous presidential terms. 

In August of 2014, the ONC reported that Mexico ranks first place globally in terms of kidnapping.  Reynosa, Cuernavaca, Ciudad Victoria, Morelia and Villahermosa were amongst the cities with the highest kidnapping cases. The state of Tamaulipas, alarmingly, had a rate of kidnapping 465% higher than the rest of the country.  

Alejandro Martí, president of Mexico SOS, said that “neither federal nor local authorities have responded accurately to kidnapping” and that it was “unfortunate that there is no single acceptable anti-kidnapping unit” in the entire country.   A lot of kidnapping cases, in fact, never make it on record, even when reported.  If authorities don’t succeed in locating the victim or following-up on the case, they simply dismiss it.  In turn, the Mexican population has ceased to trust authorities: from public officials to law enforcement.  The overwhelming feeling is that they cannot attend the issue at hand and, much less, address their own failures.  

In the city of Tijuana, for instance, kidnappings have increased by 300% in 2014 when compared to 2013.  From January to July of 2014, over 100 kidnappings have taken place, according to official reports, which do not amount for the unreported cases or those ignored by authorities.  The increase is in correlation to considerable increase in homicides, also in 2014. From January to August: 300 in Tijuana.  

The problem is that as many as 9 narco factions currently operate in Tijuana.  They’re active and spread across different parts of the city, with overlapping territories.  In July of 2014, several key members of Los Erres, for instance, were released from prison and already became involved in a murder incident that took place this last August.  Los Erres are linked to drug traffickers active during Tijuana’s 2007-2010 period, when the city went through a never-before-seen wave of drug cartel related violence: public shootouts in broad day light and mutilated bodies thrown on the street on a daily basis.  

4. Conclusion 

In the last couple of hours, various U.S. and Mexican news sources have heavily published on the recent capture of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, the supposedly billionaire drug lord and seemingly legendary leader of the Sinaloa Cartel (currently known as El cartel del Pacífico), whose complex drug-network extended from Northern Mexico to Central America, through Colombia, South America and recently even as far as Europe and Australia. 

El Chapo had been at large since 2001, when, while serving a 20-year sentence, he escaped a maximum security Mexican prison hidden within a laundry container.   Yet, since 1995, the U.S. federal government issued an official indictment that condemned him for drug trafficking conspiracy as well as money laundering activities.  Up until two nights ago, there was a pending $7 million USD reward for his detention.   

The combined work of U.S. anti-drug agencies as well as Mexican law-enforcement and military across the Baja California, Sonora and Sinaloa states led to his now-official capture at a hotel located in Mazatlán, Sinaloa.  It is the culmination of a 10-day-long heavy operative that also gave fruit to the apprehension of several crucial leaders of the Cartel del Pacífico.  The event is in fact relevant in the 2-year-long effort that in 2012 resulted in the arrest of over a dozen upper-rank cartel members and collaborators and in El Chapo’s almost-capture in a luxury resort of Cabo San Lucas during the visit of former U.S. head of State Hillary Clinton on February of that year.  

Through such efforts, there is no doubt that the inner structure Cartel del Pacífico has been definitely disturbed; a fact that, should be noted, does not necessarily mean that substance trafficking, export and other cartel-related activities will decrease.  Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada himself has officially reported to Mexican newscast, Proceso, that “replacements are ready” upon the death or capture of top-leaders such as El Chapo. The most reasonable - or perhaps, likely - outcome is that such a replacement or reconfiguring process will result in a temporary or lasting fragmentation accompanied by a definite increase in violence -as it has previously occurred.  A dangerous, violent forecast should not be surprising: it is quite possible that an internal power struggle as well as an external clash with rival cartels, both marked by violence, lies ahead.     

It must be remembered that at certain point, the Cartel del Pacífico under El Chapo dominated numerous substance trafficking networks along the U.S.-México border in states such as Baja California, Sonora and Chihuahua and in crucial cities such as Tijuana and Ciudad Juárez.  A large number of the 70,000+ death toll that marked the regime of Felipe Calderón involved the military’s involvement and contribution - precisely in those two cities - in the territorial struggle between local cartels and the expansion attempts of the Cartel del Pacífico.  The former is in fact currently entrenched in a power struggle with one of Mexico’s most ruthless cartels, known as Los Zetas.   

It is not unlikely that Los Zetas, now recently consolidated under the leadership of Omar Treviño Morales, who took reign after his brother Miguel Ángel Treviño Morales was captured last year, will attempt to move into the territories previously controlled by the Cartel del Pacífico.  Cities like Tijuana and Ciudad Juárez, particularly, could be heavily impacted.  The former is particularly vulnerable due to its currently fragmented drug business landscape.  There are as many as 9 active narco factions that are spread across the city in overlapping territories.  Already, the city is exposed to violent exchanges (public shootouts, kidnappings, etc.) between such groups. The possible increase of the presence of the Zetas - and perhaps even the Knight Templars or the Beltrán family - could definitely contribute to the volatile context of Mexico’s northernmost metropolis. 

Tijuana was already swept by a four-year bloodbath from 2007-2010.  During that time, clashes between rival cartels led to an alarming halt of public activity.  Local law enforcement agencies were unable to stabilize the disturbingly violent struggle that ensued.  Not only did robberies rise, but also, there was a considerably increase in extortion activities as well as kidnapping cases.  Sales dropped, business closed down and moved out.  Citizens across all sectors were heavily affected; in fact, frequently, city streets were quite literally empty.