Shrine to Santa Muerte, patron saint of cartels, appears roadside in area where 21 bodies have been found in last year near US-Mexico border

A shiner for the patron saint of cartels has mysteriously surfaced in the Mexican city across the street from El Paso, Texas.

It is unknown who built the gray cinder block structure that houses an elaborate altar to Santa Muerte, or the Holy Death, on the Camino Real Highway in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico.

In recent years, U.S. law enforcement has become increasingly interested in the cloaked skeleton woman holding a globe and a sickle in her hands, as images of the figure are increasingly linked to individuals in organized crime, both in the U.S. and Mexico.

The Santa Muerte Shrine in Juarez, Mexico is located not far from the US-Mexico border and the neighboring US city of El Paso, Texas

Seized by the DEA in 2011 from two women transporting more than 700 grams of methamphetamine between Arizona and Minnesota, this statue of the Holy Death was painted gold to represent economic power, success and prosperity

The temple to the female personification of death is located in the westernmost part of the city.

Coincidentally, 21 bodies have been dumped there in the past fourteen months, the newspaper said Border report.

The remains of two men were last found there on Thursday, wrapped in blankets and tied with electrical wire.

Santa Muerte has been denounced by the Catholic Church and bans its worship as blasphemous.

However, the number of cult-like followers has grown in recent years, including within the drug cartel community.

The DEA says members of the drug cartels in the Gulf, Sinaloa and Juarez are known to worship her.

This is highlighted by the recent arrest of a woman wanted in Mexico for cartel murders in which she allegedly dismembered her victims and removed their hearts as sacrifices at an altar of ‘Santa Muerte’.

Michelle Pineda, better known as “La Chely,” is believed to have been involved in five murders and is suspected of playing a role in several other killings in Juárez, the FBI said in a statement.

The 22 year old was who entered the US unlawfully, ran a drug trafficking ring for the ‘Artistas Asesinos’ street gang, an enforcement unit of the Sinaloa Cartel in El Paso.

The FBI and U.S. Border Patrol tracked her to a motel in West Texas, where she was taken into custody last month.

Mexican Michelle Pineda was arrested last Thursday by the FBI and US Border Patrol at a hotel in El Paso, Texas. The 22-year-old is accused of five murders and participating in several other killings with members of the Artistas Asesinos – a gang affiliated with the Sinaloa Cartel – in the border city of Ciudad Juárez.

Federal and local agents raided the hotel where Michelle Pineda was staying and found two guns, knives, machetes and an unspecified amount of drugs, including fentanyl powder and pills.

Francisco Oropesa, a 38-year-old Mexican, is on the run after shooting dead five people in Cleveland, Texas on Friday evening

Oropesa had several tattoos dedicated to the ‘Death Cult of Santa Muerte’. After the massacre, a shrine honoring the sect was found in his room

In another case, a Texas gunman who fatally shot five people, including a nine-year-old, in 2023 had an elaborate altar to the saint in his home.

Francisco Oropesa, 38, opened fire at his neighbors’ home in Cleveland, about 40 miles north of Houston, in May 2023 after they asked him to stop firing the gun in his backyard.

Oropesa, an illegal immigrant from Mexico previously referred to by police as Oropeza, fled the scene as a nationwide manhunt took place.

The shrine in Oropesa’s bedroom stood on glass shelves. The candles in the display were still burning from when the gunman opened fire on his victims.

In addition, Oropesa had a tattoo of the patroness of the death cult on one of his arms.