Detenido Rafael Caro uno de los narcotraficantes más buscados por la DEA / Drug lord Caro Quintero, wanted for killing DEA agent, arrested in Mexico

CIUDAD DE MÉXICO.- El mexicano Rafael Caro Quintero, el fugitivo más buscado por la Agencia Antidrogas Estadounidense (DEA, en inglés) y por quien se ofrecía una recompensa de 20 millones de dólares por información para su captura, fue detenido este viernes en Guachochi, en el norteño estado de Chihuahua.

La detención de Caro Quintero, de 69 años, se debió a que autoridades supuestamente habían detectado que regresó a actividad criminal a mínima escala, según confirmaron fuentes oficiales.

Rafael Caro Quintero, apodado como «el narco de narcos», es recordado por ser el fundador del extinto cartel «El cartel de Guadalajara».

EFE

Drug lord Caro Quintero, wanted for killing DEA agent, arrested in Mexico

MEXICO CITY, July 15 (Reuters) – Mexican military have captured notorious drug lord Rafael Caro Quintero, convicted for the murder and torture of a U.S. anti-narcotics agent in 1985, two sources said on Friday, a major coup for both Mexican and U.S. law enforcement agencies.

The kingpin rose to prominence as a co-founder of the Guadalajara cartel, one of Latin America’s most powerful drug trafficking organizations during the 1980s, and had been among the most prized targets for U.S. officials.

Caro Quintero spent 28 years in prison for the brutal murder of former U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agent Enrique “Kiki” Camarena, one of the most notorious murders in Mexico’s bloody narco wars that led to a nadir in U.S.-Mexico co-operation in the five-decade long ‘war on drugs.’ The events were dramatized in the 2018 Netflix series “Narcos: Mexico.”

Caro Quintero has previously denied involvement in the killing of Camarena.

In 2013, Caro Quintero was released on a technicality by a Mexican judge. He quickly went underground and returned to trafficking, according to U.S. officials, who placed him on the FBI’s Top 10 most wanted fugitives list and put a $20 million bounty on his head, a record for a drug trafficker.

“It is probably one of the most important captures of the last decade in terms of importance to the DEA,” said Mike Vigil, the DEA’s former chief of international operations.

While Caro Quintero is no longer considered a major player in the international drug trafficking world, the symbolic impact of his capture is likely to be significant on both sides of the U.S-Mexico border.

“This will hopefully start to mend the frayed relationship between the United States and Mexico in terms of combating drug trafficking,” said Vigil.

Mexico’s unwillingness to extradite Caro Quintero to the United States prior to his release from prison had always been a source of tension between the two countries and Washington is likely to demand his extradition once again.

Last year, Caro Quintero lost a final appeal against extradition to the United States. By Lizbeth Diaz and Drazen Jorgic