Arellano drug gang leader captured in TJ

Fernando Sanchez Arellano ran vestiges of the Arellano Felix cartel

By Sandra Dibble 8:07 P.M. JUNE 23, 2014 Updated8:25 A.M.JUNE 24, 2014

TIJUANA — Fernando Sanchez Arellano, reputed leader of the vestiges of the once-powerful Arellano Felix drug cartel, was arrested Monday afternoon in Tijuana, according to law enforcement sources.

Sanchez, nicknamed “El Ingeniero,” is a nephew of the Arellano Felix brothers who built up the Tijuana-based organization. The uncles have all been captured or killed.

While the rival Sinaloa cartel has grown increasingly powerful in Baja California, Sanchez’s organization has remained active, the U.S. law enforcement sources said. They could not be named because they are not authorized spokesman for their agencies.


A spokesperson for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration could not be reached late Monday night.

One U.S. official familiar with the operation said that Arellano was arrested while in the company of his wife and child at a Tijuana fast food restaurant, apparently after watching the World Cup game of Mexico versus Croatia. At the time of his arrest, Arellano wearing a team shirt and had his face painted with the team’s colors, one source said.

“He’s the last of the bloodline that’s truly involved,” said a U.S. law enforcement source who has tracked the Arellanos.

The Arellano Felix cartel, once one of Mexico’s most powerful and ruthless drug organizations, first rose to power in Tijuana in the 1980s. The group’s longtime leader, Benjamin Arellano Felix, is serving a 25-year prison sentence in the United States. A younger brother, Javier Arellano Felix is serving a life sentence in the United States and is in a special witness protection program.

Brother Eduardo Arellano is serving a 15-year sentence in the United States. Brother Ramon Arellano Felix, said to be the cartel’s chief enforcer, was killed in a shootout in 2002 in Mexico.

Under the nephew, the group was further weakened by a challenge in 2008 by a onetime Arellano lieutenant, Teodoro Garcia Simental. The dispute led to a bloody turf battle in Baja California between the two factions, and the killings of law enforcement officers. Garcia was arrested in January 2010 in the state of Baja California Sur.

Sanchez is a low-profile figure but has long been sought by U.S. and Mexican authorities. The Mexican Attorney General’s Office in 2009 offered up to 30 million pesos (about $2.3 million) for information leading to his arrest. Also in 2009, the U.S. government published a poster seeking information about Sanchez Arellano and other suspected traffickers.

In May 2012, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in San Diego unveiled a 43-count indictment originally issued in July 2010 that targeted the Fernando Sanchez-Arellano Organization. The lead defendant in that case was Armando Villareal Heredia, accused of racketeering and drug charges. He pleaded guilty in September 2013, later receiving a 30-year prison term.

A statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office at the time described the organization as a “violent transnational racketeering enterprise controlled by Fernando Sanchez Arellano.” It said that its members committed murders, kidnappings, robberies, assualts, money laundering and “a wide range of drug trafficking offenses.”

sandra.dibble@utsandiego.com
(619) 293-1716

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