This is a BBC podcast.

You can get all our podcasts and our terms of use

at BBCworldservice.com slash podcasts. In Mexico the bloody tentacles of organized crime reach into even the smallest communities.

But one town fought back, the people of Chetan were determined to save their precious forest from the men who came to steal it.

I'm Linda Presley and this is assignment on the BBC World Service.

So where we're driving through now on this rough track through a small

herd of cows, this is where the organized crime and the illegal loggers would

have parked their trucks,

ready to take their booty of wood out of Chelan.

And in those days, this was a no-go area for the people.

This place was very, very dangerous.

Very gross.

Louise Sanchez is my guide along the trails and through the clearings of these ancient pine forests.

We think of Mexico's cartels as primarily making money from drugs,

but they've long since diversified and seek to dominate any lucrative industry, including

timber. Sometimes the bad people kill someone,

like here,

Murillo Tequera's guy,

this place they kill one guy, you know?

One farmer?

Yeah.

So the local farmers, they couldn't come and look after their animals farmers they couldn't come and look after their

...