Mexico nabs U.S.-born drug lord 'La Barbie'

Mexican authorities captured a legendary Texan on Monday who is accused of a bloody climb to the top echelon of one of the hemisphere's most powerful drug cartels. Edgar Valdez Villarreal, known as "La Barbie" for his looks, faces a slew of charges in Mexico, but also is wanted in the United States, where he has been indicted for smuggling thousands of pounds of cocaine into this country. The U.S. government has offered a reward of up to $2 million for his capture. In an interview with the Houston Chronicle late Monday, a Houston lawyer representing Valdez, 37, said he fears his client will be tortured or worse before he can be returned to the United States for trial. "I do not think anyone is safe in the hands of the Mexican military" defense attorney Kent Schaffer said. "Something is going to happen."

Most recently, Valdez was indicted in Atlanta on federal charges he imported and distributed thousands of kilograms of cocaine from 2004 to 2006. U.S. prosecutors contend the drugs were often smuggled north through Texas and then on to Atlanta, which is a hub for cartel activity in the Southeastern United States. In turn, millions of dollars in proceeds were sent back to Mexico a similar way, according to court papers. Valdez is said to have been a standout high-school football player in the Texas-Mexico border city of Laredo, where a coach nicknamed him Barbie for his hair and eye color. It is unusual for an American to climb so high in the ranks of Mexican organized crime, but not unprecedented.

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Mexican navy kills top cartel kingpin in shootout

Two hundred sailors raided an upscale apartment complex and killed a reputed Mexican drug cartel chief in a two-hour gunbattle, one of the biggest victories yet in President Felipe Calderon's drug war.

Arturo Beltran Leyva, the "boss of bosses," and three members of his cartel were slain in the shootout Wednesday in Cuernavaca, just south of Mexico City, according to a navy statement. A fifth cartel member committed suicide during the shootout.

Cartel gunmen hurled grenades that injured three sailors, the navy said. An Associated Press reporter at the scene heard at least 10 explosions. During the gunbattle, sailors went door-to-door to evacuate residents of the apartment complex to the gym, according to a woman who said she was speaking by cellphone to her husband inside. She would not give her name out of fear for her safety.

Beltran Levya is the highest-ranking figure taken down under Calderon, who has deployed more than 45,000 troops across Mexico to crush the cartels since taking office in December 2006. Mexico's navy often has been used in the battle as well. The offensive has earned Calderon praise from Washington even as 14,000 people have been killed in a wave of drug-related violence.

• "Mexican Drug Lord: Why Arturo Beltran Leyva's Death Matters", Christian Science Monitor,12/17/09.
  
• "Briefing: How Mexico is waging war on Drug Cartels", Christian Science Monitor, 8/19/09.
  
• "Mexican Drug Cartels: Government Progress and Growing Violence", Stratfor, 12/11/08.
  

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La Familia: Mexican Drug Cartel

At a May 30, 2009 news conference, Mexican Attorney General Eduardo Medina-Mora Icaza labeled La Familia Michoacána (or La Familia) Mexico’s most dangerous cartel. He based this assessment on the bloodcurdling cruelty perpetrated by the shadowy, pious organization; its ability to bribe and threaten politicians; its spectacular surge in producing methamphetamines; and its access to high-powered weapons in Michoacán state, in southwestern Mexico, where 10,311 arms were confiscated last year—more than in any other state in the country.

Several factors explain why La Familia has shoved Michoacán to the brink of becoming a no-man’s land. First, the state is home to Lazaro Cardenas, the seaport that, along with nearby Manzanillo, Colima, provides the entry portal for cocaine from Andean nations and precursor chemicals for producing methamphetamines from China, Holland, Bulgaria, and other countries. Second, it forms part of the Tierra Caliente, an avocado, mango, and marijuana growing region where Michoacan, Guerrero, and Mexico State intersect. Finally, it bristles with hidden super-laboratories for manufacturing meth.

Michoacán has attracted not only La Familia, but other potent, deadly crime syndicates: the Beltrán Leyva brothers, who cooperate with Los Zetas, a paramilitary force created by the Gulf Cartel earlier in the decade; and the Guadalajara and Milenio Cartels, elements of which collaborate with the powerful Sinaloan Cartel headed by the legendary Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera. As of July 31, 254 drug-related deaths had occurred in Michoacan—well ahead of the 233 for 2008 and 238 for 2007.

"La Familia Michoacána: A Deadly Mexican Cartel Revisited", Foreign Policy Research Institute, August 2009.

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Mexican drug smugglers tied to California fire

Wildfire investigators in California are looking for marijuana growers tied to a Mexican drug cartel whom they suspect ignited a blaze that has charred more than 87,000 acres of a national forest.

The La Brea Fire, which erupted August 8 in the Los Padres National Forest in the remote Santa Barbara County mountains northwest of Los Angeles, is believed to be the first major wildfire in the state caused by drug traffickers, U.S. Forest Service spokesman Jim Turner said on Monday.

A joint statement issued Saturday night by the Santa Barbara County sheriff's office and the Forest Service said the blaze was sparked by a "cooking fire in a marijuana drug trafficking operation ... believed to be run by a Mexican national drug organization."

"Although the La Brea Fire started more than one week ago, there is evidence that the unburned marijuana garden area has been occupied within the last several days," the statement said.

Sheriff's spokesman Drew Sugars said investigators found tens of thousands of marijuana plants growing in the area. No arrests have been made.

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Mexican police, soldiers killed in multi-city attacks by drug gang: Part 2

A federal judge ordered 10 municipal police officers from Arteaga to be arrested Saturday in connection with the slayings of 12 off-duty federal agents in southwestern Mexico. The federal officers' bodies were found Tuesday on a remote highway in Michoacan state, where at least 18 federal agents and two soldiers have been killed since July 11 due to drug-related violence. Video from the scene showed three narcomessages left by the killers. They all stated the same thing: "So that you come for another. We will be waiting for you here."

Later, a caller phoned a news show in Mexico and said he was one of the cartel bosses behind the bloodshed. "Our fight is with the federal police because they are attacking our families," the voice said calmly. "If someone attacks my father, my mother or my brother then they are going to hear from me... If they only act against us, then we will respect them."

This call appears to be the latest attempt to take the moral high ground by a quasi-religious drug cartel that has become one of the most dangerous threats to the Mexican security forces. The caller identified himself as Servando Gomez, head of a narcotics mafia calling itself "La Familia Michoacana." The gangsters, who had bought ads in newspapers and given an interview to a leading Mexican magazine, claim that although they traffic drugs, they protect their local community and purport to be devout Evangelical Christians. All members are disciplined to abstain from narcotics themselves and care for their homes and children, La Familia says.

Resources:

• “New escalation in Mexico drug war”, BBC News, 7/19/09.
• “Drug Dealing for Jesus: Mexico's Evangelical Narcos”, Time, 7/19/09.
• “10 Mexican police officers held in killings of 12 federal agents”, Time, 7/18/09.
• “La Familia: Another Deadly Mexican Syndicate”, Foreign Policy Research Institute, February 2009.
• “Cartels now killing at will in Chihuahua”, El Paso Times, 7/15/09.
• “Drug-Cartel Links Haunt an Election South of Border”, Wall Street Journal, 7/3/09.
• “Mexico drug traffickers corrupt politics”, LA Times, 5/31/09.
• “Mexico's Narco-Insurgency and U.S. Counterdrug Policy”, Strategic Studies Institute, 5/7/09.

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Mexican police, soldiers killed in multi-city attacks by drug gang: Part 1

MEXICO CITY, Mexico (CNN) -- Coordinated attacks in at least eight Mexican cities killed three federal police officers and two soldiers Saturday in what officials are calling an unprecedented onslaught by drug gangs. Another 18 federal officers were wounded.

The attacks were in retribution for the capture early Saturday of Arnoldo Rueda Medina, a high-ranking member of the drug cartel known as La Familia Michoacana (The Michoacan Family), Notimex reported.

Rueda is considered second in command to the group's two top leaders, Nazario "El Chayo" Moreno González and José " El Chango" de Jesús Méndez Vargas, acting as a "right arm" to Moreno, the secretary of public security said Saturday in a statement.

Among other allegations, he was arrested for his role in designing the hierarchy of the organization, the production of synthetic drugs and movement of marijuana and cocaine to the United States, said Mexico's secretary of public security.

• "Bodies found in Mexican town", Al Jazeera, 7/14/09.
  
• "Mexican police, soldiers killed in multicity attacks by drug gang", CNN, 7/11/09.

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