Google Translate from a variety of Mexican news sources. For a map, click here.
The story is that in April the 16 year old son of Sinaloa Drug Cartel leader Ignacio Villareal, Alejandro Coronel, was murdered by the Beltran-Leyva Cartel.
Villareal's response was to immediately order a hit on the shooters responsible, which was done over several days in Jalisco and Nayarit, murders which included incinerating the victims.
In May, Clara Helena Laborin Archuleta, wife of Beltron-Leyva cartel boss Hector Beltran Leyva, was kidnapped in Sonora on orders of Villareal, but she was released a few days later unharmed.
In Mexico, unless you are a wealthy individual, a kidnapping is virtually a death sentence. But instead a message was left:
We are going to teach you to be men and respect the family, child murderer. Here is your wife, which you refused to answer, you lay it safely so you can see and learn that we see the family is sacred
Whether the details of the story are true or not, Villareal was known as the "King of Crystal" by the FBI and a danger to both Mexico and the United State, and so his end at the hands of the Mexican Army was fitting. He had been indicted in Texas and a warrant issued in Spring, 2003 for trafficking in crystal meth.
At the time of his death he was 56 years old. He was born February 1st, 1954 in Canelas, Durango. He was originally with the Juarez drug cartel operating under Amado Carrillo Fuentes until his death in 1997. After Fuentes' death he joined the Sinaloa Cartel. He eventually became Number Three in the organization.
| Look at that -- they have Number Threes in Mexico, too! No wonder he was killed, it's the natural order of things. |
In Zapopan, Mexican authorities were constantly raiding the area in search of Villareal, but were always coming up short, despite high profile events such as one of Villareal's sons killing two at a bar, and an arrest sweep in 2006 which yielded the arrest of five of his associates, jewelry and about $2 million in cash, but no Villareal.
In Zapapoan, Villareal kept to himself, associating with no one else except for a single lieutenant, Iranian born Francisco Quinonez Gastelum.
| Iranian born? That seems odd. |
Without saying in so many words, Mexican military authorities called the intelligence operation which pinpointed Villareal's location as "precision" meaning electronic means were used to find his hideout.
| And about bloody time, too! What took them so long? |
Published reports say Villareal's death and the intelligence find will put a large dent of crystal meth manufacturing and trafficking in the Mexican republic.
| That would be nice. |