Drug kingpin Rafael Caro Quintero makes Interpol's Most Wanted List

$5M reward offered for capture

By Diana Washington Valdez / El Paso Times
POSTED: 12/27/2013 12:23:06 AM MST


A DEA reward poster for Rafael Caro Quintero. (Courtesy of the Drug Enforcement Administration)


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›› Related: Release of drug lord linked to murder of Enrique "Kiki" Camarena angers ex-DEA officials

The Mexican drug kingpin linked to the kidnapping and murder of a Drug Enforcement Administration agent in 1985 has become an international fugitive, according to the International Police (Interpol).
Rafael Caro Quintero, 61, who was released on an alleged technicality from a Mexican prison in August after serving 28 years of a 40-year sentence, was added to Interpol's wanted list of fugitives.
REPORTER

Diana
Washington Valdez

According to the Interpol web site, Caro Quintero, whom DEA officials said had amassed a multi-billion dollar fortune from drug-trafficking, is being sought by U.S. authorities, who have offered a $5-million reward for his capture.

Caro-Quintero was convicted by a Mexican court in 1989, along with two other major drug-traffickers Miguel Felix Gallardo and Enrique Fonseca Carrillo, for conspiring to kidnap and kill DEA Special Agent Enrique "Kiki" Camarena.

The charges that Caro Quintero is wanted for include commission of violent crimes in aid of racketeering (four counts), conspiracy to commit violent crimes in aid of racketeering, conspiracy to kidnap a federal agent, kidnapping of a federal agent and felony murder of a federal agent.

Phil Jordan, former director of the El Paso Intelligence Center and retired DEA official, and Hector Berrellez, a retired DEA official who investigated the Camarena murder for five years, said it was an outrage that Caro Quintero was released.

The two former DEA officials also said that more people should be indicted in Camarena's death.

"We have recent statements from several witnesses who placed a key suspect in same room that was used to torture "Kiki," and that person is still around and has not been brought to justice," said Jordan, who met Camarena in Mexico.

Jordan said that as far as he knows there is no statute of limitations for murder, and that the witnesses who came forward are available to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

Berrellez said he suspects there are people working behind the scenes to make the Camarena case go away. He said it cannot be over until everyone who was involved faces a trial, preferably in a U.S. court.

"The release of Caro Quintero reopened the case, which based on what I've learned recently, is far from over," said Berrellez, a highly decorated law-enforcement official.

DEA officials said that before his arrest, Caro Quintero controlled a large marijuana ranch in the state of Chihuahua and trafficked drugs through the Juárez-El Paso corridor.

Berrellez said that according to the Caro Quintero bank accounts he was familiar with during the Camarena investigation, the kingpin's fortune was in the billions, and that as far as he knows, law officials did not seize all his assets.

Earlier in December, Mexican attorney general officials confirmed that they received a letter, allegedly from Caro Quintero, asking Mexico's president and other high-level officials not to give in to U.S. government pressures to re-arrest him. Mexican officials said the letter states that he (Caro Quintero) claims he has already paid his debt to society.

In October, the U.S. Treasury Department announced that it expanded its sanctions against Caro Quintero's financial empire to include 20 entities and an individual associated with the kingpin's alleged businesses.

"While in prison, Caro Quintero continued his alliance with Mexican drug trafficking organizations and used a network of family members and front persons to invest his illicit fortune into ostensibly legitimate companies and real estate projects in the Mexican city of Guadalajara," the U.S. Treasury Department said in its Oct. 31 announcement.

The U.S. sanctions prohibits anyone from doing business with the companies associated with Caro Quintero that the U.S. Treasury Department identified in its designation list.

The U.S. government first designated Caro Quintero as a significant foreign narcotics trafficker under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act in 2000.

U.S. officials said Caro Quintero is wanted in the Central District of California on criminal charges related to Camarena's murder and drug trafficking violations.

The Interpol website (http://www.interpol.int/Wanted-Persons/) describes Caro Quintero as 6-feet tall, weighing about 160 pounds, and with greyish hair and brown eyes.

Diana Washington Valdez may be reached 546-6140.

http://www.elpasotimes.com/news/ci_2...st-wanted-list