I think this case is about "snitching". It took a while for the cartel to learn who disrupted their business, but once they figured out the Rhodens were involved the cartel put a hit on the family. Stoners get sloppy and love to show off. I can picture the youngest victim getting too stoned and showing off the grow operation to a friend, who told a friend, who told a friend. Having a competing grow operation just doesn't seem like enough of a grievance to take out a family. The Rhonden family had to have wronged the cartel and the most logical connection is through alerting the authorities about their competing grow. Sparing the children can be attributed to the hitman/men simply having cold feet, in my eyes it does not rule out the cartel.
Cannabis violence disturbs me. It does not stem from users; rather the shady people taking advantage of the black market. There is no room for a cartel in Colorado or Washington.
"More than 22,000 marijuana plants were seized in Pike County in 2010, and while authorities made no arrests, they said they found two abandoned camps where Mexican nationals apparently stayed. In 2012, another 1,200 plants were seized in Pike County in an operation connected to a Mexican drug cartel, the Attorney General's office said. Seizures continued in 2013 and 2014 in the county."
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2016/04/2...ohio-family-massacre-scene-state-ag-says.html