Recently, a case that few forget resurfaced on social media: the death of the Pirate of Culiacán. With the confirmation of El Mencho’s death this year, people started talking again about Juan Luis Lagunas Rosales, that young man who went viral online before turning 18.

For those who don’t remember, the Pirate of Culiacán was a content creator who exploded on social media with videos of parties, alcohol, and Mexican regional music. He managed to gather nearly 800,000 followers on Facebook and over 300,000 on Instagram while still a teenager. His story is quite heavy: abandoned by his father before he was born, raised by his grandmother, he worked washing cars until he was 15, then moved to Culiacán and started recording videos that quickly went viral. Even artists like Noel Aragón and Último Escuadrón dedicated corridos to him.

What changed everything was a video from November 9, 2017. The Pirate of Culiacán uploaded a recording where he directly insulted El Mencho, leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel. The phrase was strong and instantly went viral. He didn’t react afterward; he continued his normal life on social media as if nothing had happened.

A week later, on December 18, 2017, everything ended at the Menta2 Cántaros bar in Zapopan, Jalisco. The Pirate of Culiacán had done a live stream inviting his followers to come to the place that night. When he arrived, he was with a couple of friends. According to testimonies, just a few minutes passed when four armed men entered directly toward where he was. He received at least 15 gunshot wounds to the head, arms, and chest. His friends described the scene like this: everyone threw themselves to the floor because of the gunfire, no one saw the attackers’ faces, everything happened very quickly. The bar owner was also injured and died later.

The obvious question everyone was asking was: was it retaliation for the video? The Jalisco Prosecutor’s Office never officially confirmed this. The prosecutor at the time said that multiple lines of investigation were being pursued, including the content he had posted, but they couldn’t confirm a connection. However, later reports mentioned that Ricardo Ruiz Velasco, a lieutenant of the CJNG, might have ordered the revenge.

The case of the Pirate of Culiacán became one of those moments that marked the relationship between influencers and the reality of organized crime in Mexico. A young man seeking virality, playing with fire on social media without understanding the consequences, and who ended up being a victim of violence that surpassed any internet game.