<b>Photos:</b> Drug cartels’ young foot soldiers

Near a small statue of “Santo Muerte” -- Saint Death -- a girl who says she’s 17 breathes fumes from a solvent. Dozens of young people at the encampment begged motorists for food and money.  (Don Bartletti/Los Angeles Times)

A young man sleeps at the base of a neglected monument to 19th century Latin American hero Simon Bolivar in Mexico City. Dozens of young men and women have turned the monument into a squatter’s camp where they buy, sell and inhale chemical solvent to stay high.  (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

Marijuana and crack cocaine are the drug of choice among Mexico’s youth, but the poor sometimes turn to highly toxic solvents like paint thinner. One user said that type of drug “makes you see things and hear voices.”  (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

JIUTEPEC, MEXICO. In his son’s room in Jiutepec, Mexico, David Jimenez holds a news photo of his 14-yr-old son Edgar taken the night the boy was arrested by the Mexican Army on Dec 2, 2010. Little Edgar, born in San Diego, CA told reporters he slit throats and beheaded 4 men for the Beltran-Leyva drug cartel operating in nearby Cuernavac. He was on their payroll at $200/week. Dad says,“He hasn’t done the barbarous things they say.”  (Don Bartletti/Los Angeles Times)

A young man lies nearly unconscious in downtown Mexico City, clutching a can of plastic pipe-cleaning solvent.  (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

Youths openly smoke marijuana in a park on Paseo de la Reforma in the heart of Mexico City. “It’s legal here and only costs $2.50,” one of the teens said.  (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

Reformed teenage drug dealers play guitars in a Mexico City halfway house. Its director, Miguel Barrera says “These kids are victimizers, but they are also victims.” The virtually endless supply of young foot soldiers keeps Mexico’s drug cartels well-stocked with thugs, gunmen, mules, peddlers and lookouts, undermining the government’s drug war. As vulnerable youth fall through the cracks, Mexico risks losing part of a generation.  (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

Jose Andres Mendoza, 15, clutches his most treasured possession, a statue of St. Jude Thaddeus, the saint of desperate causes. It was given to him by a girlfriend two weeks before she was shot dead at a party in November. With the help of his parents, drug counselors and mentors, he’s trying to abandon his history of robbery, drug use and addiction.  (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

Youths hang out in a northeast Mexico City neighborhood where you can buy drugs “like a stick of gum,” dealers with shaved heads fight for corners, and gunfire punctuates the night.  (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

Jose Andres Mendoza, a.k.a. Tulo, 15, watches another teen smoking marijuana as he cruises through Mexico City. “We’d pistol-whip the guys on buses to get their money. I like money. I like the clothes. I like having good tennis shoes. The name brands,” Tulo said of his criminal past.  (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)

In a quaint Jiutepec plaza, Jibran Barrera and Yamilett Gil, both 17, say their high school friends can make $500 a night selling drugs.  (Don Bartletti / Los Angeles Times)