Mexico: 149 extradited people in this Government

For the time being of the current government a total of 149 persons have been extradited as reveal official sources of the PGR and the Government of the United States, a country which received 97.3% of the total of people. Alfredo Beltrán Leyva, Iván Velázquez –el Z-50- and César Meza García are some of the drug kingpins handed over to the US-American justice. Other Mexicans that ran the same luck were Lionel Portillo and Iván Soto, allegedly responsible of the murder of an agent of the Border Patrol; and Armando Albarrán, alleged assassin of a sheriff. Among the extradited people is also Manuel Ortíz Barraza, financial consultant pointed out for committing fraud against EximBank. From the administration of Ernesto Zedillo to this date 1,068 persons have been handed over to a foreign judicial system.

Unlike the drug lord Joaquín Guzmán Loera, el Chapo, who managed to escape the extradition by two ways –his jailbreak and the amparo lawsuit promoted and won before the federal justice-, in the time being of the government of Enrique Peña Nieto 149 persons have been handed over to a foreign judicial system, most of them to the United States.

Those persons sum up the long list of extradited people during the past administrations which in over two decades add up to 1,068 persons. Data from the Attorney’s General Office of Mexico (PGR) state that there were 63 persons in the government of Ernesto Zedillo; 243 during the one of Vicente Fox and 613 during the one of Felipe Calderón.

Among the extradited people by the current government are included drug lords, financial offenders, person traffickers, gang members, assassins, rapists, money launderers and former detainees, whose names have been classified by the federal government as confidential for being “personal data”, refers the PGR in response to the information request No. 0001700041815 made by Contralínea.

Nevertheless the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), the Department of Justice, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) do reveal the identity of the alleged criminals that are under trial in their territory as a result of the U.S.-Mexico Extradition Treaty undersigned between Mexico and the United States on the 4^th of May 1978.

Hence it is possible to know that among the extradited people by the current government is Alfredo Beltrán Leyva, el Mochomo, leader of the Beltrán Leyva Cartel. He was handed over to the United States on the 15^th of November 2014, and the drug kingpin was accused of leading an organization that in the last two decades distributed “dozens of thousands of kilograms of cocaine” into the US and has participated in the campaign of violence that unleashed the internal wars in the drug market, thus “the public security being put in danger” in this country.

Another drug lord that was put to the disposal of the US justice –the 21^st of November 2013- was Iván Velázquez Caballero, el Z-50 or Taliban. Recognized as one of the leaders of the Zetas (who before his detention fought for the control of the cartel), el Z-50 was accused of conspiring to transfer illegal drugs, fire arms and illicit funds between Mexico and the US, as well as to assassinate and hijack a US-citizen in a foreign country and for using underage people involved in violent crimes.

In that list is also Ricardo Quintero and Jesús Domínguez Gallardo, member of the Familia Michoacana, extradited on the 18^th of October 2013 under the charges of conspiracy for trafficking methamphetamines, cocaine and marihuana to the neighboring country. According to the DEA they are key retailers of this cartel and some of their main money launderers.

Furthermore there is the case of César Alfredo Meza García, allegedly responsible for conducting the transfer of narcotics from Mexico to the United States for the Cartel of Tijuana. According to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Meza García was extradited on the 7^th of March 2013 for alleged responsibility in distributing cocaine and methamphetamines.

Another alleged drug trafficker that the Mexican government sent to the United States –on the 7^th of August 2013- was Raúl Ernesto Esquivel, who is identified as a member of a criminal gang operating in the south of Arizona. He was accused of 65 offenses, among them for founding “an illegal enterprise related with drugs”, money laundry and illegal use of cable communication systems.

For the researcher Jorge Retana Yarto, specialized in international economy and intelligence related with national security, the extraditions have been of great benefit for the United States, as the majority become protected witnesses that provide information and money: part of their assets are confiscated and all of their data they possess on criminal business is requested.

This information provided to the US authorities are not always made public, as states the author of the book Transnational Mafia and criminal economy: Mexico in the orbit of a parastatal power (Mafia transnacional y economía criminal: México en la órbita de un poder parastatal), “but rather is used at the convenience for political or diplomatic pressure”.

The issue being that Mexico does not rely on a trustworthy judicial and penitentiary system, as indicate the also member of the Mexico-China Network of the Faculty of Economy of the National Autonomous University of Mexico.

Traffickers, fraud offenders and gang members

Data provided by the PGT to Contralínea indicates that of the 149 extradited people during this government, 70 were accused of offenses related with organized crime and 79 for other illicit activity. Also that 126 were Mexican nationals, 18 were US-Citizens and 5 were of another nationality (one of them, US-Mexican Citizenship and one Colombian, both sent to the United States).

Also can be read from it that 145, i.e. the 97.3% were handed over to the US judicial system, one of British citizenship to the United Kingdom; one Panamanian citizen to Panama; one Spaniard to Spain; one Dutchman to the Netherlands.

In addition to the alleged drug traffickers, the United States managed that two persons responsible of sexual exploitation were handed over. They are Rafael Alberto Cadena Sosa, extradited in November 2013, and Carmen Cadena, delivered in December 2014.

For the authorities of the neighboring country both are members of a “brutal” family organization of sexual trafficking with their headquarters in southern Florida. Cadena Sosa and their relatives would have hooked several women and girls in the State of Veracruz to allegedly work in the United States, but with extreme violence, sexual aggressions, death threats and body injuries they were obliged to engage in prostitution 12 hours a day, six days a week.

In the list of the extradited people is also included the financial consultant Manuel Ernesto Ortíz Barraza, sent to US territory on the 25^th of January 2013. According to the Department of Justice, Ortiz would have defrauded the Export-Import Bank (EximBank) for over 2,5 million dollars. The 56-years-old man was accused of conspiracy to commit bank and electronic fraud.

In this case there was also involvement of the Chihuahuan businessman Sergio Acosta Camacho, former owner of the AML Construcción Company; Pedro Ruvalcaba Placencia, owner of the Delicias Nuez company; Alfredo Rodela Campos; Jorge Martínez Joo, former owner of the El Paso Exportador and the El Paso Valcomar, Inc company; Adrián Rascón Chávez and Genoveva Fontes, former owners of the Centro Oncológico del Norte, SA company; María de Jesús Ortíz Saldívar, former accountant ofGenoveva Fontes, Jorge Valdez Cota and his spouse Verónica Iglesias Lucero; and Gilberto Ruiz González, owner of the Passage Supply company.

The Master’s Degree Retana Yarto considers that to avoid the extradition and to be able to judge its own citizens, Mexico is compelled to strengthen its judicial and penitentiary system in the coming years.

Aggressors of Border Patrol Agents

Unlike to what is occurring with the Border Patrol that has murdered with impunity Mexican nationals –including the 15-years-old boy Sergio Adrián Hernández, killed in June 2010 allegedly for throwing stones at them-, two alleged assassins of a member of that US institution were requested to the current Mexican government and handed over to be trailed on the northern side of the border.

The first one of them is Lionel Portillo Meza, extradited on the 17^th of June 2014. This man is suspected of first-degree murder of the agent Brian Terry, who he allegedly would have shot on the 14^th of December 2010 north of Nogales, Arizona.

Portillo Meza was processed in a federal court of the District of Tucson on the 18^th of June 2014 and declared himself as innocent. However, the United States beholds that not only did he participate in the murder, but also he was involved in the attempt of armed robbery against businesses. In this event the man would have aggressed along with other persons that accompanying him, three more agents of the Border Patrol.

In this case the Department of Justice also accused Jesús Rosario Favela Astorga, Manuel, Rito and Heraclio Osorio Arellanes, and Iván Soto Barraza. The latter was detained in Mexico in September 2013 and extradited on the 1^st of August 2014.

Extradited Gang Members

In the time being of the government also were extradited two alleged gang members; one of them a Mexican citizen. He is identified as Jaime Balam, who reportedly is known with the alias of Tweety and who belonged to the Mara Salvatrucha or MS-13, “a criminal transnational gang that operates in several countries in Central America and in numerous states of the United States.

Balam was extradited on the 10^th of February 2015 to face charges of conspiracy for executing the businesses of the MS-13 “throughout a pattern of organized crime activity that included murder, attempt of assassination and other acts of violence”. The accusation included homicide of a person occurred on the 19^th of February 2009 in Daly City.

According to the accusation, members of the MS-13 that operate in the United States were born outside the country, and set their base in southern California. Their main rivals would be members of the northern gangs in that state that in their majority were born in the United States. One of the main rules of the MS-13 is that their members must “chase”-attack and kill- the norteños (northerners) and other rivals.

Another alleged gang member that was held to account in the United States is Armando Albarrán, alias Chivo, 30 years old, who was accused of the offense of homicide. In this case it was a murder occurred in 2008 against the sheriff of the County of Los Angeles, Juan Abel Escalante.

The suspect also was linked with a criminal gang that operates in the area where the crime occurred. Albarrán was extradited of Mexico on the 14^th of December 2012.

Alleged assassins and rapists

The most recent extradition of which there is account in the electronic archives of the US institutions occurred on the past 13^th of July when Juan Jesús Flores of 67 years that was handed over to the US authorities.

The man is suspected of killing Robert Garver on the 6^th of April 1983, when the latter attended the Roxbury Park in Beverly Hills, to facilitate a meeting between the accused person and his spouse and daughter.

According to the authorities the victim was killed while trying to stop Flores, who fled in his car with the girl, and since then he has sought refuge in Mexico.

Other persons that have been handed over to the US justice due to the treaty are: Cristiano Vázquez, accused of the homicide of his daughter of only 2 years of age, extradited on the 17^th of January 2013; Jacinto Flores Xochimitl, pointed out for raping a minor child, handed over on the 6^th of January 2014; Raúl Antonio González López, who allegedly handled illegal toxic waste, extradited on the 14^th of January of that year; Eduardo Salas, suspected of murder, sent to the United States on the 25^th of January 2014; Daryl Nenninger, pointed out for rape, extradited to a Texan prison, sent on the 24^th of April 2014 to the neighboring country; Pedro Hernández Maldonado, accused of killing his partner and extradited on the 2^nd of October 2014.

Already in 2015, Eduardo García Estrada, for the charges of murder, extradited on the 22^nd of January; Santos Ismael Hinojos, who would have incurred in the raping of a minor child, handed over on the 23^rd of January; and Marisol Alvarado, accused of killing her newborn nephew, extradited on the 29^th of April 2015.

Nancy Flores, @nancy_contra

(Translated by: Axel Plasa)

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 Contralínea 449 / del 10 al 16 de Agosto 2015