Mexican Navy Says It May Have Killed Wanted Drug Lord

The New York Times, 10/9/12

The Mexican Navy said Monday night it believed it had killed a man who it thinks may be a founder and the principal leader of the Zetas, one of the most violent criminal gangs to terrorize the country in years.

The navy said in a statement that in a battle Sunday afternoon in northern Mexico between marines and men armed with guns and grenades, two men were killed, one bearing “strong signs” of being Heriberto Lazcano, known as El Lazca and the main leader of the Zetas.

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Americans Shot in Mexico Were C.I.A. Operatives Aiding in Drug War

The New York Times, 8/28/12

The two Americans who were wounded when gunmen fired on an American Embassy vehicle last week were Central Intelligence Agency employees sent as part of a multiagency effort to bolster Mexican efforts to fight drug traffickers, officials said on Tuesday.

The two operatives, who were hurt on Friday, were participating in a training program that involved the Mexican Navy. They were traveling with a Mexican Navy captain in an embassy sport utility vehicle that had diplomatic license plates, heading toward a military shooting range 35 miles south of the capital when gunmen, some or all of them from the Federal Police, attacked the vehicle, Mexican officials have said.

Eric Olson, an expert at the Woodrow Wilson Center’s MexicoInstitute in Washington, said the shooting could only sow some doubts about the police, and at best pointed to a lack of communication among Mexico’s military and the police.

“This seems to suggest there isn’t better communication between the various elements of the Mexican government,” he said. “One fundamental issue is the lack of trust.”

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Believed Regional Zetas Leader Arrested [in Spanish]

El Universal, 7/27/12

The Navy announced that they captured the Zeta in charge of the Southeast plaza (Mauricio Guizar Cardenas aka El Amarillo), who is also believed to be a close associate of “Zeta-42.” They encountered  Cardenas heavily armed, he had 20 hand grenades, a light anti-tank rocket and a submachine gun, and had crystal in a hotel room in Huejotzingo.  The Navy believes that he participated in the murder of four members of the military and say that his capture will contribute to the undoing of the Zetas.

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Mexican Navy seizes apocryphal uniforms [In Spanish]

Reforma, 5/24/2012

The Mexican Navy found a workshop in Piedras Negras, Coahuila, where apocryphal Marine uniforms were being tailored, informed the Navy Secretary.

The report indicates that the seizure occurred on Monday at the Colonia FSTSE, thanks to a citizen report.

Inside the workshop the Navy found 225 vests, 170 camouflage shirts, 151 camouflage pants, 280 gun carriers, 71 handcuff carriers and 5 sewing machines, among other similar false items.

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Mexican Drug Violence: Zetas Gang Suspect Leads Navy To Mass Graves With 10 Bodies

The Huffington Post, 2/8/12

A suspected member of the Zetas drug gang has led Mexican authorities to a mass grave site at two ranches in the Gulf coast state of Veracruz, the navy said Wednesday.

The navy says its personal detained suspect Francisco Alvarado Martagon Tuesday as he attempted to drive past a military checkpoint near the city of Acayucan in a vehicle without license plates. Once in custody, Alvarado Martagon confessed to being a head lookout for the Zetas, it said.

Under questioning, the man mentioned two sites at local ranches that the Zetas allegedly used to dispose of bodies, including rivals or members of their own gang who had been executed.

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Mexican navy seizes huge haul of precursor chemicals

BBC News, 1/17/2012

The Mexican navy says it has seized 195 tonnes of chemicals which can be used to make the drug methamphetamine.

The navy found 12 shipping containers full of the precursor chemical in the Pacific coast port of Lazaro Cardenas.

They said the chemical had been shipped from China and was destined for Guatemala and Nicaragua.

The authorities said that Mexican drug cartels have been expanding their methamphetamine operations to Guatemala.

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Mexico finds 2 tons of marijuana in the ocean

Associated Press, 11/2/11

The Mexican navy has recovered two metric tons of marijuana floating in the Pacific Ocean near the resort town of Cabo San Lucas. The navy says people on a boat reported recovering some packages of pot from the sea.

Sailors mounted a search in the ocean and on beaches around Cabo. The search Monday and Tuesday yielded more than two tons of marijuana in 178 packages 24 miles east of the port. The navy statement Wednesday does not speculate on the origin of the packages.

Mexico’s army, meanwhile, says troops have seized five metric tons of marijuana and 32 rifles in raids in border cities of Tamaulipas state. It says two people were killed and 10 were arrested. The army does not say when the raids happened.

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Mexican navy recaptures Gulf Cartel’s alleged fugitive financier 9 years after he escaped

The Washington Post, 9/12/11

Mexican marines recaptured a fugitive suspected trafficker who had been arrested 13 years earlier along with the man who was to become the Gulf Cartel’s top leader, authorities said Monday. Manuel Alquisires Garcia is the cartel’s alleged finance officer, the Mexican navy said in a statement. He was captured by marines Saturday in the city of Tampico.

Alquisires, aka “El Meme,” was originally arrested in June 1998 along with Osiel Cardenas Guillen. Cardenas later escaped and went on to become the Gulf Cartel’s leader before being recaptured in 2003. He was extradited to the U.S. in 2006 and sentenced last year to 25 years in federal prison.

Alquisires escaped from a prison in Matamoros, across the border from Brownsville, Texas, in 2002, three years after his arrest, prosecutors said Monday. Zetas hitmen, who at the time were still allied to the Gulf Cartel, allegedly orchestrated his escape.

He had evaded authorities until Saturday.

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Mexican navy says 3 marines, 1 cadet apparently kidnapped by drug gangs

The Associated Press, 8/15/11

The Mexican navy says three marines and one naval academy cadet have apparently been kidnapped by drug cartels in the Gulf coast state of Veracruz.

The three marines have been missing since Aug. 1, when they were snatched from a car.

The gangs may be holding them as prisoners. Mexican military personnel have been captured by drug gangs before, but usually quickly turn up dead. Marines and other navy personnel play an increasing role in the anti-drug effort.

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The Failed Rescue of Beltran Leyva (in Spanish)

Reforma, 7/12/2010

Arturo Beltrán Leyva, “El Barbas”, drug trafficking capo, made a final attempt to avoid his capture and death as he was surrounded by federal forces last December.

But his final and desperate move failed.

On December 16, at approximately 2:15pm, twenty five members of the Navy Special Forces descended by rope from helicopters hovering above the towers of the Altitude residential complex in Cuernavaca.

Fifteen minutes later the Navy brought the Army into the operation, asking for military assistance in order to establish a perimeter around the neighborhood, although they would not disclose any further details regarding their objectives…

“El Barbas,” the most violent capo of recent years, had at his side Jesús Nava Romero “El Rojo,” the young Gonzalo Octavio Araujo Zazueta, son of the deceased trafficker Gonzalo Araujo Payán, “El Chalo,” and another four loyal companions…

At 6:00pm, when the buildings had already been taken and occupied, “El Rojo” called one of his bodyguards, nicknamed “El Tuntún,” who was drinking beers with some friends in Chilpancingo.

With “El Gusano” and Ricardo Antonio Pérez Soto, the assasin climbed into a black suburban and drove at high speed to a secure house in Tepoztlán, where they loaded an arsenal of weapons and immediately headed to Cuernavaca.

Another call made that afternoon went out to Jesús Basilio Araujo “El Pollo,” perhaps the bloodiest executor that the Beltran Leyva Cartel had in Morelos and Guerrero.  Basilio was relaxing at his house in Jiutepec.

His men were the first to arrive at the residential complex, two hours after the call, and through grenades from a property owned by the Red Cross.  It was the beginning of the battle.

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