Who is the biggest drug lord 2022

MEXICO CITY, July 15 (Reuters) - Mexico's navy on Friday captured drug lord Rafael Caro Quintero, convicted of murdering a U.S. anti-narcotics agent in 1985, in a law enforcement coup that came at a heavy cost when a helicopter used in the mission crashed, killing 14 military personnel.

Marines flushed out Caro Quintero with a bloodhound in a far-flung corner of the northwestern state of Sinaloa, one of Mexico's drug-trafficking heartlands, before the Black Hawk chopper came down as it was about to land further south.

Caro Quintero 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.

Register now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com

The U.S. government hailed the arrest, and said it would waste no time in requesting his extradition.

"This is huge," White House senior Latin America adviser Juan Gonzalez said on Twitter.

Caro Quintero was captured in San Simon in the Sinaloa municipality of Choix after the military-trained female bloodhound named Max found him in shrub land, the navy said.

The arrest comes after pressure from the United States, according to a Mexican official, and the same week that President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador met with U.S. President Joe Biden in Washington.

Lopez Obrador said on Twitter the navy would investigate what caused the crash of the helicopter in the city of Los Mochis, Sinaloa, that killed 14 and left one seriously injured. He said it had been carrying military personnel who were backing up the team that arrested the kingpin.

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

Caro Quintero has previously denied involvement in the killing of Camarena. He was released in 2013 on a technicality by a Mexican judge, embarrassing the previous government.

A vehicle for the members of the National Guard is parked outside Altiplano Federal Penitentiary where drug lord Rafael Caro Quintero is imprisoned after Mexico's navy captured him on Friday, in Almoloya de Juarez, on the outskirts of Mexico City, Mexico July 17, 2022. REUTERS/Luis Cortes

He quickly went underground and returned to trafficking as part of the Sinaloa Cartel, according to U.S. officials, who put 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.

Last year, he lost a final appeal against extradition to the United States. He will be extradited as quickly as possible, another Mexican official said.

"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.

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said he would seek Caro Quintero's immediate extradition.

"There is no hiding place for anyone who kidnaps, tortures, and murders American law enforcement. We are deeply grateful to Mexican authorities for their capture and arrest of Rafael Caro-Quintero," Garland said in a statement.

Before extradition, Caro Quintero will be held in Altiplano prison in the state of Mexico, Mexican prosecutors said. The penitentiary is notorious as the one from which his old Sinaloa Cartel associate Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman escaped in 2015.

While the 69-year-old Caro Quintero is no longer considered a major player in international drug trafficking, the symbolic impact of his capture is significant.

The arrest points to significant cooperation between the United States and Mexico despite recent clashes over security, said Mexican security expert Alejandro Hope. "This type of capture is unthinkable without the participation of the DEA," he said.

Mexico's unwillingness to extradite Caro Quintero to the United States before his release from prison had been a source of tension between the two countries. A U.S. official said Washington was very eager to have him extradited.

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

Register now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com

Reporting by Lizbeth Diaz, Drazen Jorgic, Dave Graham and Jackie Botts; Additional reporting by Diego Ore; Writing by Drazen Jorgic and Brendan O'Boyle; Editing by Stephen Eisenhammer, Rosalba O'Brien and William Mallard

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Rafael Caro Quintero, a drug lord known as “the narco of narcos” who was behind the killing of a US drug enforcement agent in 1985, has been captured by Mexican forces nearly a decade after walking out of prison, according to the country’s navy.

Caro Quintero was arrested after a search dog named Max found him hiding in brush in the town of San Simon in Sinaloa state during a joint operation by the navy and the attorney general’s office, a navy statement said. The site was in the mountains near Sinaloa’s border with the northern border state of Chihuahua.

Mexico’s national arrest registry listed the time of Caro Quintero’s capture as around midday. There were two pending arrest orders for him as well as an extradition request from the US government.

Movie star Sean Penn, drug lord El Chapo and a failed marine raid

A very short video segment released by the navy showed Caro Quintero – his face blurred – dressed in jeans, a soaking wet blue shirt and baggy khaki jacket held by both arms by men wearing camouflage uniforms and carrying assault rifles.

A navy Blackhawk helicopter carrying 15 people crashed near the coastal city of Los Mochis at the same time, killing 14 of those aboard, the navy statement said. The available information indicated it suffered an “accident,” the cause of which had not yet been determined, the statement said.

The arrest came days after Mexico’s president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, met Joe Biden at the White House.

“This is huge,” White House senior Latin America adviser Juan Gonzalez said on Twitter.

Caro Quintero, from La Noria, Sinaloa, is perhaps best known as one of the co-founders of the Guadalajara cartel. The group’s heyday was in the 1970s and 1980s, when it primarily trafficked cocaine, heroin and marijuana from Mexico to the US.

One of the group’s hitmen – or “sicarios” – was Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who founded the violent Sinaloa cartel but is now imprisoned.

Caro Quintero at one point was sentenced to 40 years in prison, over the kidnapping, torture and murder of a Drug Enforcement Administration agent, Enrique “Kiki” Camarena, in 1985.

Caro Quintero believed Camarena was to blame for a raid on a marijuana plantation the previous year.

In 2013, a Mexican appellate court ruling set Caro Quintero free after he had served 28 years. US authorities and Mexican prosecutors were outraged. The supreme court reversed the decision.

But Caro Quintero had gone into hiding. US officials have since accused him of assuming a leadership role in the Sinaloa cartel after El Chapo’s downfall while also running his own organization in the same region.

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

Before Caro Quintero’s reported arrest on Friday, the US government was offering a reward of up to $20m for information leading to his capture.

Caro Quintero, who last year lost a final appeal against extradition to the United States, will be extradited as quickly as possible, another Mexican official said.

While the 69-year-old Caro Quintero is no longer considered a major player in international drug trafficking, the symbolic impact of his capture is likely to be significant on both sides of the border.

Mexican security expert Alejandro Hope said the arrest pointed to significant cooperation between the two countries despite recent clashes over security. “This type of capture is unthinkable without the participation of the DEA,” he said.

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.

A US official said Washington was very eager to have him extradited.

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