Luis Alberto Cabrera Sarabia, alias “The Architect,” was killed Friday during an air and ground operation in Canatlan, Durango state. The action began with a firefight at a ranch, army spokesman general Ricardo Trevilla announced at a news conference.

According to Trevilla, he was “one of the main lieutenants of Joaquin Guzman Loera alias ‘El Chapo.’”

Another gunman died in the raid and 11 others were arrested, Trevilla said. Three soldiers were also wounded.

The army said Luis Alberto Cabrera Sarabia took over as assistant to the fugitive head of the Sinaloa drug cartel after his brother, Felipe Carbrera Sarabia or “The Engineer,” was detained in December.

The northern states of Durango, Sinaloa and Chihuahua are known as the “Golden Triangle,” a key area of production of Mexican opium and marijuana.

The Americas Post - The Tijuana cartel leader got off with a lighter sentence than his underlings

Former drug capo Benjamin Arellano Felix pleaded guilty this week to federal racketeering and money-laundering conspiracy charges, putting an end to a long case against Mexico’s formerly most powerful organized crime group.

Arellano Felix, 58, the former leader of the Arellano Felix drug cartel, converted Tijuana into a major trafficking route to the U.S. during a 16-year run before his arrest in Mexico in 2002.

His group, also known as the Tijuana cartel, funneled tons of drugs into California, terrorized rivals, bribed Mexican law enforcement officials and financed luxurious lifestyles that became symbolic of Mexican organized crime.

According to the plea deal with federal prosecutors in San Diego, Arellano Felix admitted making hundreds of millions in profits, exchanging weapons for drugs from a rebel group in Colombia and training teams to assassinate competitors and witnesses.

Extradited from Mexico in April, he now faces a maximum penalty of 25 years in prison, according to the agreement.   Under terms of the extradition agreement with Mexico Arellano Felix was not subject to the death penalty, but many expected him to receive a life sentence.

His organization introduced paramilitary tactics, including .50-caliber machine guns and armored cars with oil and smoke dispensers to evade arrest.
The cartel regularly used chemicals to dispose of enemies, dissolving bodies in vats of acid.

As part of the plea agreement, four of the five original charges were dismissed. Arellano Felix pleaded guilty to only two counts: racketeering and conspiracy to launder monetary instruments. He also agreed to forfeit $100 million, according to the agreement.

The U.S. attorney for San Diego, Laura Duffy, called the case historic.

“Arellano-Felix led the most violent criminal organization in this part of the world for two decades. Today’s guilty plea marks the end of his reign of murder, mayhem and corruption, and his historic admission of guilt sends a clear message to the Mexican cartel leaders operating today: The United States will spare no effort to investigate, extradite, and prosecute you for your criminal activities.”

The Americas Post - Plane? What plane? Oh, you mean THAT plane...

An American military aircraft helped monitor the deadly 2010 raid by Jamaican security forces to capture a fugitive crime boss, that country’s prime minister has admitted, in spite of earlier denials by his government.

The U.S. P-3 Orion provided aerial surveillance of the operation to arrest Christopher “Dudus” Coke, Prime Minister Andrew Holness told reporters on Thursday.   The raid ignited a vicious battle in a West Kingston slum that left over 70 dead.

Holness insisted that the U.S. played no other role in the raid in the Tivoli Gardens neighborhood.  ”We would want to reaffirm our position that the U.S. Government or its military did not participate in the operations in West Kingston,” he said.

His statement came just one day after National Security Minister Dwight Nelson claimed that the U.S. had not provided any surveillance of the raid, in spite of a report in The New Yorker magazine.

Holness said that Nelson made the statement in error because he was unaware of the U.S. assistance. Prior official statements had also denied any U.S. role in the raid. The prime minister said the surveillance was coordinated between the Jamaican Defense Force and the “relevant government agency” in the U.S.

“The United States Government initially made an offer to provide surveillance and technical equipment,” he said. “We accepted and followed the normal protocol of exchanging diplomatic notes to provide the government-to-government cover for such assistance.”

Ocsar Derby, director of Jamaica’s Civil Aviation Authority, said Friday that officials with the island’s Defense Force had notified him the U.S. craft would carry out a surveillance mission.

“We made sure to keep other aircraft away from the area,” he said.

The hunt for Coke in his West Kingston slum stronghold provoked fighting that killed 73 civilians and three security officers over the next four days. He was finally arrested by Jamaican authorities and extradited to the U.S., where he pleaded guilty in August to racketeering and assault charges. Coke faces up to 23 years in prison when he is sentenced.

The Americas Post - Another former president heads off to jail. Photo Credit: Prensa Libre

Guatemalan President Alvaro Colom announced Tuesday approval of a U.S. extradition order for former president Alfonso Portillo, who faces money laundering charges for the alleged embezzlement of $1.5 million in foreign donations.

Colom said Guatemalan courts have already approved Portillo’s extradition and that he will respect those rulings.

“The president should not get mixed up in the decisions of judges and justices,” Colom said. The nation’s  supreme court approved the extradition request in August.

Portillo is charged in a New York federal court with money laundering and embezzling $1.5 million donated by Taiwan to buy schoolbooks for Guatemalan children. He allegedly deposited the money in Miami and transferred it to a Paris account in the name of his ex-wife and daughter.

After leaving office in 2004, Portillo fled to Mexico where he was granted a work visa to serve as financial adviser for a construction materials company.

He was extradited from Mexico to Guatemala in 2008 to face the embezzlement charges at home and remained free until his arrest on Jan. 26, 2010.   Portillo was captured at a beach preparing to flee Guatemala by sea.

Colom did not specify a date for the extradition. The remaining administrative processes could take several months.

The Americas Post - We've been seeing more group pictures like this lately. Photo Credit: AP

Mexican soldiers have arrested Ovidio Limon Sanchez, a top lieutenant of the Sinaloa Cartel and one of the DEA’s highest profile targets.

Captured in Culiacan, the capital of Sinaloa state on Mexico’s Pacific coast, Limon Sanchez was described by that country’s Defense Ministry as being on the ten most-wanted list and “one of the most important operators in the Guzman Loera criminal organization”.  That name refers to Sinaloa Cartel leader Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, who is Mexico’s most sought-after fugitive.

Limon Sanchez has been identified by the DEA as responsible for the purchase, transit and distribution of cocaine routed to Los Angeles, and is under an extradition order from US federal district court in California.  The US government had offered a $5,000,000 reward for his capture.

The Americas Post - Calderon doesn't want so many crooks back

Mexican President Felipe Calderon this week accused the United States of dumping criminals at the border to avoid the cost of prosecuting them, and claimed the practice has increased violence in Mexico’s border region.

US officials have reported a record number of deportations in fiscal year 2011, and said the number deported with criminal convictions had nearly doubled since 2008.

“There are many factors in the violence that is being experienced in some Mexican border cities, but one of those is that the American authorities have gotten into the habit of simply deporting 60 (thousand) or 70,000 migrants per year to cities like Ciudad Juarez or Tijuana,” Calderon said at an immigration conference.

Among them “there are many who really are criminals, who have committed some crime and it is simply cheaper to leave them on the Mexican side of the border than to prosecute them, as they should do, to see whether they are guilty or not,” Calderon complained. “And obviously, they quickly link up with criminal networks on the border.”

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director John Morton said Tuesday his agency deported nearly 400,000 individuals during the fiscal year that ended in September, the largest number of removals in the agency’s history.

Morton released the 2011 figures in Washington, saying about 55 percent of those deported had criminal convictions. Officials said that number was up 89 percent from 2008. The majority of US migrants, and deportees, are from Mexico.

The U.S. embassy did not comment on Calderon’s speech.

When undocumented Mexicans finish prison terms in the United States, they are transported to the border and released.  Both the United States and Mexico are experimenting with new communication channels for deportations, and U.S. officials said that they do warn Mexico when former inmates are considered particularly dangerous.

Mexicans with U.S. criminal records cannot simply be detained in Mexico if they have not violated the law there.  Officials in some Mexican border cities have complained about their inability to run criminal background checks on deported inmates to check for pending charges.

One famous deported convict, Martin Estrada Luna, is accused of becoming a cell leader for the Zetas drug cartel in the border state of Tamaulipas just over a year after being deported from the United States. Estrada, who had a long criminal record in Washington state, is now in custody in Mexico City, where he is accused of planning the murders of over 250 people.

Jamaican druglord Christopher 'Dudus' Coke faces 23 years in a U.S. prison

Christoper “Dudus” Coke has pleaded guilty to trafficking three tons of marijuana and 30 lbs of cocaine into the US, as well as ordering the stabbing of a New York drug dealer.

A prominent supporter of the ruling Labour party, he was…READ MORE HERE

Mexico and Italy signed agreement on security issues.

Mexico City.- Marisela Morales Ibáñez , attorney general of Mexico,  signed an extradition treaty with Italy and a Treaty on Criminal Legal Assistance to fight against organized crime.

The mexican Attorney Gral also held a meeting with the Italian Anti Mafia Director Mr. Piero Grasso.  Both parts will collaborate in technical asssistance on Organized Crime, illegal drug trafficking and Witness Program.

The mexican official said that organized crime is a phenomenon of our times that do not recognize borders, and its combat requires international cooperation. Hence the importance of expanding and improving international legal instruments, like the agreements with Italy.

The Minister of Justice of Italy, Francesco Nitto Palma, welcomed the new treaties since, he said, is a top priority of the Italian Government to combat crime, so that international coordination is essential to share experiences and improve processes .

The Mexican official explained that it is precisely the spirit of the Palermo Convention of 2000, which Italy and Mexico are signatories, which inspired the new criminal laws against organized crime in Mexico.

This is the most extensive legal reform in nearly a century. Strengthening the rule of law, the guarantee of the presumption of innocence, respect for human rights and effective protection of people and goods, are the main objectives of this reform, said the Attorney’s Office.

In a press conference in the Italian Ministry of Justice, the Attorney General’s Office of Mexico stressed that the signed Extradition Treaty is a tool that allows mexicans to close the spaces to criminal activities. “With this Extradition Treaty, we may use electronic means to act in real time and accelerate the delivery of justice,” she added.

Money laundering and drug trafficking in small scale, are crimes that are expected, which may occur more often initially, hence the importance of being prepared to act efficiently and promptly.

About the Criminal Legal Assistance Treaty, the Attorney Gral  said that it binds both procedural systems to efficiently research, seizures, searches and testimony of witnesses, among others. It provides the possibility of forming a solid barrier between the two countries to address transnational organized crime.

Today it is possible to carry out investigations in which the distances have shortened with the use of new technologies. One example is the use of videoconferencing in cross-examination of witnesses, cross-examination, sufficiency of expert evidence and judicial processes that accelerate results, while protecting the victims.

These treaties are also, said Marisela Morales, a clear and strong message to criminal organizations all over the world that Italy and Mexico are firmly resolved to close their space of action.

Mexico police present Jesus E. Aguilar alias El Mamito. Allegedly connected to killing of U.S. ICE agent, he was member of Mexico Army and Zetas cofounder. Photo Credit AP Alexandre Meneghini

Mexico: The alleged Zetas drug cartel leader suspected of killing a U.S. customs agent has been captured. His name is Jesús Enrique Rejón Aguilar, alias “el Manito”. He is believed to be the third in command of the criminal organization founded by former elite soldiers.

Over the course of a decade, it went from being the military arm of the Gulf Cartel to its own drug-trafficking organization. Now, the Sinaloa cartel and the Zetas are the two most powerful cartels in Mexico. The Zetas control the east of the country, and the Sinaloa gang controls the west and center.  The west and center of the U.S. Mexico border is controled by the Sinaloa group, and the east border by the zetas and also by a weakened Gulf cartel.

Rejón was one of Mexico’s most-wanted men and the U.S. State Dept had offered a $5 million reward for information leading to his arrest. There is a possibility that the U.S. wants to extradite Rejón, but it will take time.

Mexican federal police said he was captured “without gunfire” outside Mexico City in the town of Atizapan on Sunday, on his way from Guatemala, which is now the center of all Zetas strategy in the south.  Rejon Aguilar was detained as he was traveling to visit his mother in his home state of Campeche, according to Mexican authorities.

Rejón is allegedly culpable of the killing of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement ICE  agent Jaime Zapata, who was shot to death in February while driving on a highway in San Luis Potosi state.

The first statements of Rejón alias el Manito to the mexican police revealed the current strategy of Zetas in order to smuggle u.S. weapons into Mexico.

The captured Mexican crime boss said his gang purchased weapons in the United States and smuggled them across the Rio Grande river due to increased security at international crossings.

“All the arms are bought in the United States… Before we would transport them over the bridges, but now we transport them across the river, with difficulty,” he said, according to the mexican public security ministry.

The Rio Grande — known as the Rio Bravo del Norte in Mexico — forms the 1,200-mile (2,000 kilometer) border between Mexico and the US state of Texas.

“El Manito”  was one of the founders of the Zetas cartel, an Army gang of former elite soldiers who use of military tactics and weaponry, have a military organization like organized in batalions, and the Zetas worked first as hitmen in the service of the Gulf cartel, and after a few years became independent. This group is the bloodiest of all mexican criminal groups. They have also a “broad portfolio” of criminal activities, drugs, kidnappings, human smuggling, weapons, etc.

The Zetas are accused of two mass killings, one in Mexico’s northeast and one in a Guatemalan border province.