TIJUANA, Mexico -- In Tijuana, police officers are now defending themselves with slingshots.

The police department has issued about 60 slingshots and bags of ballbearings to officers still on patrol.

Two weeks ago, Mexico's president Felipe Calderon sent more than 3,000 soldiers and federal police to Tijuana to hunt down drug gangs.

In the process of doing that, police officers were ordered to turn in their guns amid allegations some of them were helping drug traffickers.