The most bloodthirsty Mexican drug lord was captured. Local authorities said they had arrested Rafael Caro Quintero, accused of masterminding the 1985 killing of US Drug Enforcement Administration agent Enrique Camarena, the world news agency quoted bTV as saying.
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Caro Quintero, one of Mexico’s most wanted drug lords, was captured yesterday, nearly 10 years after he was released from prison in Mexico and returned to drug trafficking, the Mexican navy said. He is among the ten most wanted fugitives on the list of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), which has announced a reward of 20 million dollars for his capture. Quintero is known for the brutal murders he orders.
Caro Quintero was captured just days after Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador met with his American counterpart Joe Biden in Washington. According to a Mexican official, the US has put pressure on the drug lord to be detained.
He was arrested after a specially trained dog found him in the town of San Simón, Sinaloa state, during a joint operation by the Navy and the Attorney General’s Office.
Caro Quintero co-founded the now defunct Guadalajara Cartel, one of the most powerful drug trafficking organizations in Latin America in the 1980s.
The drug lord previously denied involvement in the murder of US agent Enrique Camarena, which has strained relations between the US and Mexico.
Last year, Caro Quintero lost a final appeal against extradition to the United States. A Mexican official said he would be extradited as soon as possible.
In 2013, judicial authorities overturned his 40-year sentence for Camarena’s kidnapping and murder, and he was released after 28 years in prison. Since then he has been in hiding, having meanwhile resumed drug trafficking.
The US government welcomed his arrest and said it would immediately seek his extradition.
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