Word: francos
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Ludivina García's father fought on the side of the Republic in the Spanish Civil War and was imprisoned in one of Franco's concentration camps before he escaped to Mexico. Now, thanks to a change in Spanish law, the Mexican-born García, 63, is busy compiling the paperwork to obtain the citizenship she feels she has been unfairly denied all these years. García is already recognized as a Spanish citizen through marriage. But having her nationality acknowledged as her birthright is a matter of honor. "It's not redundant," she says...
...During the civil war, which lasted from 1936 to 1939, and the brutal repression that followed, hundreds of thousands of people left Spain because their political sympathies put them on the wrong side of Franco's authoritarian regime. The majority fled to France or Mexico, though thousands of children were also sent to the Soviet Union, Britain and the United States...
...late March, Cobo's unit kidnapped a military officer, decapitated him and stuck his body out on a road, along with several bags of cocaine and about $2,000 in cash. "Franco told me that the officer was from military intelligence and he was getting too close," Cobo said. "The drugs and the money were planted so it would seem like he was involved in narco trafficking." Following the slaying, soldiers arrested Cobo and 13 others, along with semi-automatic rifles and radio equipment. His confession led the military to the suburban house where they dug up the bodies...
...ranking system is based on the Mexican military, which is unsurprising considering that the organization was founded by soldiers from the army's special forces who defected to the gangsters in the late 1990s. Cobo knew his superiors only by aliases, in order to protect their identities. "There was Franco, Tarzan, Texas, and Zorro," he said. "He saw a book with names of dozens of police under the unit's payroll, he said, including officers from many nearby towns and federal agents stationed there. The corrupt police were also given aliases, including Papa and Brother...
...part of that year's biggest prize of 30,000,000 pesetas (about $3 million) went to a garage owner and his mechanics, who had all chipped in 22 cents to gain about $1,600 each. A portion of the fourth largest prize, about $100,000, went to Ramon Franco, the brother of Francisco Franco, who would later become Spain's long-reigning dictator. The game has had its share of critics as well: Spanish households spend about 2% of their budget on lottery purchases and other forms of gambling, one of the highest rates in Europe...