The gang allegedly kidnapped people to extort large sums of money from the families of their victims for their safe return. The Hogs Head gang got its name by leaving the severed heads of pigs outside businesses and homes of targets to intimidate them.
Police say that the arrests were aided by information gained from a member of the gang who was arrested in February, according to the Associated Press (AP).
The Hogs Head gang is suspected of abducting a business woman in Mexico City last August, as well as the attempted extortion of numerous textile companies.
According to the Latin American Herald Tribune, two of the alleged kidnappers Oscar Sanchez Zuñiga, 40, and Tania Hernandez Ramirez, 25, are suspected of being responsible for calling the victims families and negotiating prices. The other two men apprehended Jose Roberto Garcia Tarinda, 30, and Jose Alberto Nieto Luna, 23, are suspected of collecting the money from the families.
Mexican organized crime has increasingly resorted to kidnapping and extortion over the past 5 years according to a recent government report. The report says that kidnappings have increased by 317 percent since 2006 and that an average of 3.7 kidnappings are reported every day.
A majority of the kidnappings in Mexico occur in the states of the Federal District, Guanajuato, Michoacán, Guerrero, Chihuahua, Baja California and Tamaulipas.
