Cartels employ extreme and psychologically devastating torture methods to extract information, intimidate rivals, and assert control

. These acts are often performed with theatrical brutality and sometimes filmed to be disseminated as psychological warfare. 

Methods documented in reports and testimonies include:

• Physical Beatings: Routine and severe physical violence.
• Waterboarding/Simulated Drowning: Brutal variations of waterboarding to induce panic and a state of near-drowning.
• Electrocution: Applying electric shocks to sensitive body parts such as the testicles, tongue, or soles of the feet.
• Mutilation: Involves various forms of cutting and dismemberment, which can be slow and prolonged to maximize suffering. Specific examples include using corkscrews on flesh and yanking them out.
• Branding/Tattooing: Marking victims with insignia to signify ownership and serve as a warning to others.
• Forced Consumption: Forcing victims to eat unpleasant, harmful, or degrading substances, including their own body parts or those of others.
• Sensory and Auditory Assaults: Techniques such as the “telephone” (striking both ears simultaneously to cause pain and potential permanent damage) and sensory deprivation.
• Use of Animals: Employing animals like rats or insects to inflict distress and exploit phobias.
• Psychological Torture: Includes threatening or harming family members, mock executions, and the use of demeaning slurs and actions to break the victim’s spirit.
• Chemical Assaults: Applying hot chili peppers to open wounds.
• Forced Combat: Forcing captives to fight each other to the death, with the “winner” potentially being forced into the cartel as a hitman.
• Body Disposal Methods: Dissolving bodies in acid or lye (“pozole” treatment).
• Public Display of Remains: Dumping mutilated bodies in public locations with accompanying messages to instill fear. 

These methods have evolved to be increasingly brutal over time, largely influenced by groups like Los Zetas who utilized extreme violence as a primary tactic for territorial control and psychological warfare. The extreme nature of the violence is used to reinforce organizational cohesion internally and project a fearsome image externally.