BRIAN WILLIAMS, anchor:
Regular viewers of our broadcast know we've been running a series of reports we call
THE WAR NEXT DOOR
about the violent
drug war
in
Mexico
, just across the US border. Tonight, there's word that the
Mexican military
is looking for a suspected
drug cartel
hit man who is 12 years old. Our chief foreign correspondent
Richard Engel
went to
Mexico
and saw for himself an entire generation, really, getting swept up in this
war next door
.
Unidentified Man #1:
RICHARD ENGEL reporting:
14, 15, 16 years old, desperate, vulnerable, and preyed upon by the
drug cartels
. Living at a highway intersection, we meet a dozen children.
Under the bridges and behind the bus stations in Mexico City you'll find them:
They're so high, they're difficult to understand, except when they tell us they're hungry.
Unidentified Man #2:
ENGEL:
Stoned on rags soaked in paint thinner or
PVC
cement.
Edward
is 16, but won't say how he got here. He's guarded and confused.
Unidentified Man #3:
ENGEL:
'The situation is great, fantastic,' he says. 'I love to drug myself and see other people destroying themselves. It's what I like best.'
EDWARD:
ENGEL:
When I ask
Edward
about the future, a blank. There are 20,000
children living on the streets
just here in
Mexico City
. Almost all of them are locked into a cycle of
drug addiction
and prostitution, and they're also extremely vulnerable to be recruited by the
drug cartels
.
ENGEL:
Sofia Almazan
works at a center called
Casa Alianza
to help
Mexico
's
street children
. Is the problem growing? But she says she has to compete with
drug dealers
who use children as runners, messengers, or just customers.
Ms. SOFIA ALMAZAN:
ENGEL:
'There are kids growing up to be assassins,' she says, 'because they have nothing else to lose.'
Twenty-five
-year-old
Avalini
knows how that can happen. At a
rehabilitation center
outside
Mexico City
,
Avalini
says she became addicted to cocaine by dating a boy in a gang.
Ms. ALMAZAN:
ENGEL:
Now shaking uncontrollably in withdrawal,
Avalini
she says the gang, linked to a powerful cartel, used her to seduce a rival so it could kill him.
AVALINI:
ENGEL:
'I loved the feeling of adrenaline, to be in
the thick of it
, the power. I went in too deep,' she says. 'Do other young people like you want to be
drug dealers
?' I ask.
AVALINI:
ENGEL:
Si.
AVALINI:
'Yes,' she says.
ENGEL:
In therapy,
Avalini
sits next to 17-year-old
Daniella
.
Unidentified Man #3:
ENGEL:
Daniella
, also an addict, involved in gangs, is on tranquilizers because she cuts herself with her fingernails and glass.
DANIELLA:
ENGEL:
But she defends the
drug cartels
, here called "narcos."
DANIELLA:
ENGEL:
'They create jobs,' she says. 'It's dirty money, but at least they give work to the poor farmers.'
DANIELLA:
ENGEL:
In her room,
Daniella
keeps a journal. At the bottom of a page is her sad self-portrait. As the
drug war
here, social workers worry, is creating a lost generation.
Richard Engel
, NBC News,
Mexico City
.
DANIELLA:
ENGEL:
“ ”