Mexico's Deadliest Town. Mexico's Deadliest Year.

Israel Cisneros, 20, died instantly in his father’s one-room house. By the time the police arrived at the crime scene, their second homicide of the night, the blood seeping from the gunshot wound to his left eye had begun to harden and crack, leaving a skin of garish red scales over his face and throat.
 

Last year, the town became the deadliest municipality in all of Mexico, with a homicide rate similar to a war zone’s, according to an independent analysis of government data. This year it is on track to double that figure, making it perhaps the most glaring example of a nationwide crisis.

Mexico is reaching its deadliest point in decades. Even with more than 100, 000 deaths, 30,000 people missing and billions of dollars tossed into the furnace of Mexico’s decade -long fight against organized crime, the flames have not died down. By some measures, they are only getting worse.

The last couple of months have set particularly ominous records: More homicide scenes have emerged across Mexico than at any point since the nation began keeping track 20 years ago.

Some of the crime scenes, like the room where Mr. Cisneros was found dead in his chair, had only one victim. Others had many. But their increasing frequency points to an alarming rise in violence between warring cartels. 

Criminal  groups  are  even sweeping into parts of Mexico that used to be secure, creating a flood of killings that, by some tallies, is surpassing the carnage experienced during the peak of the drug war in 2011.

“What is happening here is happening in the entire state, the entire country,” said José Guadalupe García Negrete, the mayor of Tecomán, a coastal community of roughly 100, 000. “It’s like a cancer.”

For President Enrique Peña Nieto, the torrent is much more than a rebuke of the government’s efforts to fight organized crime. It is a fundamental challenge to his guiding narrative: that Mexico is moving well beyond the shackles of violence and insecurity.
  

Long before he took office, Mr. Peña Nieto made it clear that he would reshape Mexico’s international image, transforming it from a nation sullied by its deadly reputation into a globally recognized leader in energy, education, telecommunications and trade.

For a while, it worked. His economic changes sailed through Congress. Even as the grisly reality of violence reared its head, like the mass disappearance of 43 students in 2014, tourism climbed and homicides fell, a fact the president often mentioned in speeches.

But the numbers are overtaking the plotline. Homicides are soaring. Violence is also stalking places like Baja California Sur, home of the resort town Los Cabos, pushing Mr. Peña Nieto’s image of Mexico toward a breaking point.

Not one for silence, Mr. García has opted to make a fuss. Cowboy hat in hand, he has made the rounds in Congress and among the political elite in the capital, landing help for his town. Not that it has done much for Tecomán.

Last year, the federal government sent in the marines, the military and the military police. Operations soared in the early months of 2017. But the grand result was the same: Homicides climbed even higher.

“You can’t attack a fundamental problem like this by pruning the leaves, or dealing with the branches,” says Mr. García, who often uses farming metaphors. “You have to go to the roots.

So he has decided to take his message to the young. On a recent afternoon, dozens of school children lined up in the sweltering heat for their elementary school graduation. The mayor adjusted his hat and dived into his speech.

Tecomán was losing its values, the traditions that kept families intact and the criminals at bay, he told them. He mopped his brow and continued. Forces from outside were tearing at the fabric of the community, and citizens needed to redouble their efforts to stay strong in the face of it all.

“We celebrate life, not death, here in Tecomán,” he said. “We must be the architects of our own lives and futures.”

The government’s monthly statistics, which date back to 1997, suggest a hard road ahead. The data tracks crime scenes, where one, two or ten killings may have occurred. May and June, the latest months available, set consecutive records for the most homicide scenes in the last 20 years.
 

The total number of homicides in Mexico is also climbing quickly. According to the government’s monthly tally, which goes back to 2014, May and June also set consecutive records for the most total homicides. This year is on pace to be the deadliest yet.

It is an indictment of the drug war. The strategy of the United States and Mexico to relentlessly pursue high-ranking cartel leaders has not dampened the violence. To the contrary, some experts believe, the extradition of Mexico’s most notorious drug baron, Joaquín Guzmán Loera, known as El Chapo, to the United States this year helped generate the latest wave of violence as various factions look to fill the power vacuum left in his wake.

A sudden brazenness prevails on the streets of Tecomán. Late last month, a red Volkswagen barreled through the congested streets at 80 m.p.h. Four patrol cars gave chase before an officer shot out the back tire.

The driver struggled with the police. Handcuffed, he stared at the officer straddling him and promised they would see each other again.

“You already know how this ends, and what happens to you,” he said before screaming out to a friend: “Come and kill them all right now. Kill them!”

For many, a dull familiarity with the violence has settled in. Restaurants still teem with patrons. Families host festive baptisms for newborns. On a recent evening, young and old swarmed the central square, the children playing soccer while elderly residents sat on benches, enjoying the sunless warmth.

Angela Hernández brought her 5-year-old son for an ice cream. When she moved to town 10 years ago, there were hardly any murders. Still, she doesn’t feel frightened.

“It really only touches those involved in the world of crime,” she said. She knows her child is growing up in an environment where violence is stitched into the rhythm of life, but in the end, she’s O.K. with that, she said.

“It’s better he gets used to it,” she said as her son climbed a gazebo railing nearby. “This is not going to change. None of it.”