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48-461: Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo , a former federal police officer, started working for drug traffickers brokering corruption of state officials and his partners in the cartel, Rafael Caro Quintero and Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo ("Don Neto"), who previously worked in the Avilés criminal organization , took control of the trafficking routes after Avilés was killed in a shootout with MFJP police officers. It

96-449: A major blow in 1985 when the group's co-founder Rafael Caro Quintero was captured, and later convicted, for the torture and murder of American DEA agent Enrique Camarena . Camarena was an undercover field agent who the cartel suspected of giving information to the DEA which led to destruction of the organization's 2,500 acre marijuana crop known as Rancho Búfalo (English: "Buffalo Ranch") in

144-488: A major threat to the Guadalajara cartel's operations throughout Mexico. In response, Félix Gallardo reportedly ordered the kidnapping of Camarena. On February 7, 1985, Jalisco police officers on the cartel's payroll kidnapped Camarena as he left the U.S. consulate in Guadalajara. His helicopter pilot, Alfredo Zavala Avelar, was kidnapped shortly afterward. They were taken to a residence located at 881 Lope de Vega in

192-487: A medium-security prison in Guadalajara (State of Jalisco), due to his declining health. On 20 February 2019, a court in Mexico City denied his request to complete the remainder of his sentence at his home. The court stated that Félix Gallardo's defense did not provide them with sufficient evidence to prove that his health issues were putting his life at risk. On September 12, 2022, it was reported that Félix Gallardo

240-413: A month later, Camarena and Zavala's corpses were taken to the neighboring state of Michoacán and dumped in a roadside ditch to be discovered on 5 March 1985. Caro Quintero then left Mexico on March 9, 1985, with his associates and his girlfriend Sara Cristina Cosío Gaona. Former Mexican Judicial Police chief Armando Pavón Reyes, after receiving a $ 300,000 bribe, reportedly allowed Caro Quintero to flee from

288-402: A problem that was eventually solved by massive bribery . It was also easier to spot plantations in the barren deserts; the larger the farm, the easier to spot. With an end to solo American overflights as part of the eradication program, however, money and intimidation allowed farms to grow dramatically without coming to official notice. Throughout most of the 1970s and early 1980s, a majority of

336-418: A residence owned by Quintero located at 881 Lope de Vega in the colonia of Jardines del Bosque, in the western section of the city, brutally tortured, and murdered. Camarena was interrogated and tortured to gain information regarding his knowledge of law enforcement operations directed against the cartel; as well as any information that the DEA may have on Mexican politicians involved in drug trafficking. Over

384-583: Is a convicted Mexican drug kingpin who was one of the founders of the Guadalajara Cartel , which controlled much of the drug trafficking in Mexico and the corridors along the Mexico–United States border in the 1980s. Félix Gallardo was arrested in 1989 for ordering the murder of Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agent Enrique "Kiki" Camarena . He was serving his 40-year sentence at

432-535: Is believed Avilés was set up by Fonseca, the gang's treasurer . After the implementation of " Operation Condor " (Spanish: Operación Cóndor ), a Mexican antidrug program carried out in the 1970s to stop the flow of drugs from Mexico to the United States, many drug traffickers from the state of Sinaloa regrouped in Guadalajara, Jalisco , to continue their operations. The regrouping led to the formation of

480-502: Is known to come from female cannabis plants which have not been pollinated by male plants. Therefore the plant puts more energy into fostering psychoactive cannabinoids like THC instead of putting its energy towards producing seeds. These new plantations were located in remote desert areas, where transportation was much less expensive but additionally, faced several new problems. Desert production required well drilling for irrigation, and Mexico had strict laws governing well digging,

528-437: Is not allowed to leave, even to use the recreational area. In March 2013, Félix Gallardo started a legal process to continue his prison sentence at home when he reached his 70th birthday (8 January 2016). On 29 April 2014, a Mexican federal court denied Félix Gallardo's petition to be transferred from the maximum-security prison to a medium-security one. On 18 December 2014, federal authorities approved his request to transfer to

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576-640: The Altiplano maximum-security prison but was transferred to a medium-security facility in 2014 due to his declining health. Born on a ranch in Bellavista, on the outskirts of Culiacán, Sinaloa , Félix Gallardo graduated from high school and studied business in college. He took a job as a Mexican Federal Judicial Police agent. He worked as a family bodyguard for the governor of Sinaloa state Leopoldo Sánchez Celis , whose political connections helped Félix Gallardo to build his drug trafficking organization. He

624-611: The Cali Cartel , one of the largest Colombian drug cartels. The Guadalajara Cartel managed to traffic cocaine to the U.S. in multi-ton shipments each month. Rather than taking cash payments for their services, the smugglers in the Guadalajara Cartel took a 50% cut of the cocaine they transported from Colombia. This was extremely profitable for them, with some estimating that the trafficking network, then operated by Felix Gallardo, Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo, and Rafael Quintero

672-579: The Mexican Drug War . Félix Gallardo was initially sentenced to 40 years of prison. After serving 28 years, a 2017 retrial sentenced him to an additional 37 years. While incarcerated, Félix Gallardo remained one of Mexico's major traffickers, maintaining his organization via mobile phone. After his arrest, Félix Gallardo decided to divide up the trade he controlled as it would be more efficient and less likely to be brought down by law enforcement. Félix Gallardo instructed his lawyer to convene

720-501: The Sinaloa Cartel , which was not a party to the 1989 pact. When Félix Gallardo was transferred to a high-security prison in 1993, he lost any remaining control over the other drug lords. As he aged, Félix Gallardo complained that he lived in poor conditions while in jail. He says that he suffers from vertigo , deafness, loss of an eye, and blood circulation problems. He lives in a 240 × 440 cm (8x14ft) cell, which he

768-408: The Sinaloa Cartel . Guzmán and Zambada brought veteran Héctor Luis Palma Salazar back into the fold. Félix Gallardo still planned to oversee national operations, he had the contacts so he was still the top man, but he would no longer control all details of the business; he was arrested on April 8, 1989. It is also believed that Amado Carrillo Fuentes was once a part of the Guadalajara Cartel, but he

816-541: The "rescue" of a broken-down marijuana truck near Lomas de Arena . Through a protection scheme with the Mexican federal and state police agencies and with the Mexican army, Acosta was able to ensure the security for five tons of cocaine being flown by turboprop every month from Colombia to Ojinaga, sometimes landing at the municipal airport, sometimes at dirt airstrips on ranches upriver from Ojinaga. Traditionally, Acosta would mostly smuggle marijuana and heroin but towards

864-499: The Camarena murder, Félix Gallardo kept a low profile and in 1987 he moved with his family to Guadalajara city. Félix "The Godfather" Gallardo then decided to divide up the trade he controlled as it would be more efficient and less likely to be brought down in one law enforcement swoop. In a way, he was privatizing the Mexican drug business while sending it back underground, to be run by bosses who were less well known or not yet known by

912-647: The Carrillo Fuentes family, headed by the nephew of Fonseca Carrillo, Amado Carrillo Fuentes . Miguel Caro Quintero would run the Sonora corridor . Control of the Matamoros, Tamaulipas corridor – then becoming the Gulf Cartel - would be left undisturbed to Juan García Ábrego . Meanwhile, Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán Loera and Ismael Zambada García would take over Pacific coast operations, becoming

960-498: The DEA. Félix Gallardo convened the nation's top drug narcos at a house in the resort city of Acapulco where he designated the plazas (turfs) or territories. Different drug lords were given a certain region where they could traffic drugs to the U.S. and tax smugglers that wished to move merchandise on their turf. The Tijuana route would go to his nephews, the Arellano Félix brothers . The Ciudad Juárez route would go to

1008-504: The Guadalajara Cartel which would roughly put the origins of the group between 1978 and 1980. The cartel eventually managed to control nearly all the narcotics trafficking operations in Mexico throughout in the 1980s. Major marijuana plantations began to spring up beginning in the early 1980s. Earlier plantations were usually located in remote mountain areas where they were hard to spot and irrigation did not require drilling wells. Yields were relatively low, quality varied, and transportation

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1056-499: The Sinaloa governor's house as a guest, which governor Antonio Toledo Corro has denied. When asked about his association with Félix Gallardo, governor Toledo said he was "unaware of any outstanding arrest warrants" against Félix Gallardo. The arrest of Félix Gallardo was the catalyst for exposing the widespread corruption at political and law enforcement levels in Mexico. Within days of Félix Gallardo's arrest, and under pressure from

1104-488: The airport in Guadalajara, in a private jet, to seek refuge in Costa Rica . The police chief was fired shortly afterward, and was charged with bribery and complicity in the Camarena murder. It was also alleged that Caro Quintero, in just eight days prior to Camarena's kidnapping had ordered the abduction, torture, and murder of writer John Clay Walker and dentistry student Albert Radelat on January 30, 1985. According to

1152-470: The allegations, the two Americans were dining in a Guadalajara restaurant when they encountered Caro Quintero and his men as they accidentally walked into one of Quintero's private parties. Caro Quintero was said to have then ordered his men to seize the Americans and take them to a store room, where they were tortured with ice picks and interrogated. John Walker died on the scene from blunt force trauma to

1200-743: The cocaine that was smuggled to the United States was trafficked by the Colombian drug cartels through Florida and the Caribbean Sea . However, with increased law enforcement measures in these areas by the mid-1980s, the Colombian drug kingpins shifted their operations to Mexico. Juan Matta-Ballesteros was the Guadalajara Cartel's primary connection to the Colombian cocaine cartels. Matta had originally introduced Felix Gallardo's predecessor, Alberto Sicilia-Falcon to Santiago Ocampo of

1248-455: The colonia of Jardines del Bosque, in the western section of the city of Guadalajara, owned by Rafael Caro Quintero, where they were tortured and interrogated over a period of 30 hours. On February 9, Camarena was tortured and murdered. Autopsy results indicated that he died when his skull was perforated with a drill. He was injected with adrenaline and other drugs to be kept awake during his torture and interrogation. His body, wrapped in plastic,

1296-455: The course of the 30 plus hour torture session, Camarena's skull, jaw, nose, cheekbones, windpipe, and ribs were broken; the kidnappers brought in a doctor to administer drugs to the agent to keep him conscious throughout the whole session. The kidnappers made audio recordings of some parts of Camarena's interrogation. The final blow was apparently done when the torturers crushed his skull with a piece of rebar or other similar piece of metal. About

1344-641: The end of his life focused more on cocaine. Once Pablo Acosta was killed in 1987 during a joint cross-border raid by the FBI and Mexican Federal Police in the Rio Grande village of Santa Elena (Chihuahua), and Carillo's other successor Rafael Aguilar Guajardo was murdered by Amado Carrillo himself in 1993 in Cancún , Amado Carrillo Fuentes then took over complete control of the Juárez Cartel . In 1989 Amado

1392-1031: The end of the 1980s, the Guadalajara Cartel headed by Félix Gallardo (comprising what is now known today as the Sinaloa , Tijuana , Juarez and Pacifico Sur cartels) had nearly monopolized the illegal drug trade in Mexico. In 1980, DEA special agent Enrique "Kiki" Camarena was assigned to the Administration's resident agency in Guadalajara . Working through informants, Camarena discovered cartel marijuana plantations in Zacatecas state. The plantations were raided and destroyed. In 1984, Mexican soldiers, backed by helicopters, destroyed an even larger 1,000  hectare (≈2,500  acre ) marijuana plantation known as "Rancho Búfalo" in Chihuahua , known to be protected by Mexican DFS intelligence agents, as part of "Operation Godfather". Thousands of farmers worked

1440-507: The fields at Rancho Búfalo, and the annual production was later valued at US$ 8 billion. All of this took place with the knowledge of local police, politicians, and the military. Camarena was beginning to expose the connections among drug traffickers, Mexican law enforcement, and high-ranking government officials within the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI), which Félix Gallardo considered to be

1488-422: The hand-written notes to Osorno. The memoirs include narrative about his arrest and presentation before police, and explains a bit of his family tree, jumping from one topic to another. Selections of the 35 pages were published in the Mexican magazine Gatopardo , with background by the journalist. Upon his arrest at least nine of Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo's nieces and nephews took over different roles within

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1536-555: The head. Albert Radelat was still alive when he was wrapped in tablecloths, taken to a park near the city, and buried. The men's bodies were found six months later buried at the San Isidro Mazatepec Park in Zapopan . The authorities believe that Caro Quintero had mistaken Walker and Radelat for U.S. undercover agents. The murder of agent Camarena outraged the U.S. government and put pressure on Mexico to arrest all

1584-423: The largest Colombian drug cartels. Rather than taking cash payments for their services, the smugglers in the Guadalajara Cartel took a 50% cut of the cocaine they transported from Colombia. This proved to be extremely profitable for them, with some estimating that the trafficking network, then operated by Félix Gallardo, Ernesto Carrillo and Rafael Quintero, was pulling in approximately $ 5 billion annually. Until

1632-483: The major players involved in the incident, resulting in a four-year law enforcement manhunt that brought down several leaders of the Guadalajara Cartel. The U.S. applied heavy political pressure to the Mexican government throughout the investigation, going as far as to close several U.S.-Mexican port of entries for a period of several days. After the arrest of Rafael Caro Quintero and Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo in April 1985 for

1680-452: The media, several police commanders were arrested with as many as 90 officers deserting. Félix Gallardo's arrest also led to the dismantling of the Guadalajara Cartel, as key members of the federation chose to withdraw and form their own cartels, relying on violence to claim various territories and trafficking routes. The continuous disputes and conflict among the leaders would breed political, social, and military chaos, and eventually lead to

1728-675: The nation's top drug narcos in 1989 at a house in the resort of Acapulco where he designated the plazas or territories. The Tijuana route would go to his nephews, the Arellano Felix brothers . The Ciudad Juárez route would go to the Carrillo Fuentes family . Miguel Caro Quintero would run the Sonora corridor . Joaquín Guzmán Loera and Héctor Luis Palma Salazar were left the Pacific coast operations, with Ismael Zambada García joining them soon after and thus forming

1776-550: The organization to form the Arellano Félix Organization, also known as the Tijuana Cartel . Members of the Arellano Félix Organization (Tijuana Cartel) Sinaloa Cartel Miguel Nazar Haro Miguel Nazar Haro (26 September 1924 – 26 January 2012) was the head of Mexico's Dirección Federal de Seguridad (Federal Security Directorate) from 1978 to 1982. He started his career working for

1824-610: The primary suspects in the kidnapping. Under pressure from the US, Fonseca and Quintero were apprehended, but Félix Gallardo still enjoyed political protection. Félix Gallardo kept a low profile and, in 1987, moved with his family to Guadalajara . He was arrested in Mexico on April 8, 1989, and was charged by the authorities in Mexico and the United States with the kidnapping and murder of DEA agent Enrique Camarena, as well as racketeering , drug smuggling, and multiple violent crimes. According to US officials, Félix Gallardo also spent time at

1872-569: The secret-police chief Fernando Gutiérrez Barrios . During his time in the DFS, Nazar Haro and the Directorate were involved in the Mexican government's so called Dirty War , a series of state-crimes against leftist insurgents, social movements and the government's political opposition. He was arrested in 2004 on charges stemming from the disappearance of a group of alleged guerrillas. In 2006, these charges were dropped. This article about

1920-462: The state of Chihuahua during November 1984. The authorities reportedly burned more than 10,000 tons of marijuana – totaling a loss of around $ 160 million. This allegedly prompted Caro Quintero and other high-ranking members of the Guadalajara Cartel to seek revenge against the DEA and Camarena. In retribution, Camarena and his pilot Alfredo Zavala Avelar were kidnapped in Guadalajara on February 7, 1985, in broad daylight by several DFS officers, taken to

1968-463: Was also the godfather of Sánchez Celis' son, Rodolfo. Félix Gallardo started working for drug traffickers brokering corruption of state officials, and together with Rafael Caro Quintero and Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo , who previously worked in the Avilés criminal organization , took control of the trafficking routes after Avilés was killed in a police shootout. In the early 1980s, drug interdiction efforts increased throughout Florida , which

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2016-546: Was expensive. These new plantations however were seeded with an improved variety of marijuana, originally developed by American cannabis cultivators from California and Oregon, this new variety came to be referred to by Mexican cultivators as " sinsemilla " (meaning seedless ) marking the first time growing marijuana without seeds was brought to a grand-scale. This more powerful, higher quality variety brought much higher prices in North American markets. Seedless marijuana

2064-512: Was found with that of pilot Alfredo Zavala Avelar, in a shallow hole on a ranch in Michoacan state. The murder prompted one of the largest DEA homicide investigations ever undertaken, Operation Leyenda. A special unit was dispatched to coordinate the investigation in Mexico, where corrupt officials were being implicated. Investigators identified Félix Gallardo and his two close associates, Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo and Rafael Caro Quintero, as

2112-418: Was granted house arrest and would be moved on September 13, 2022. Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador released a statement about his transfer. "I do not want anyone to suffer. I do not want anyone to be in jail." In 2008, the investigative journalist Diego Enrique Osorno was able to contact Félix Gallardo through the latter's 13-year-old son. Félix Gallardo secretly wrote about his life and passed

2160-626: Was jailed for several weeks in Mexico. By then, he had undergone plastic surgery already at least once to alter his appearance. At present, these aforementioned cartels/factions, or remnants of them, are battling each other for control of trafficking routes, influence over the Mexican government, and in retaliation for past offenses and betrayals. This conflict is known as the Mexican Drug War . Miguel %C3%81ngel F%C3%A9lix Gallardo Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo (born January 8, 1946), commonly referred to by his aliases El Jefe de Jefes ('The Boss of Bosses') and El Padrino ('The Godfather'),

2208-494: Was pulling in $ 5 billion annually. According to some writers, like Peter Dale Scott , the organization prospered largely because it enjoyed the protection of the Mexican DFS intelligence agency, under its chief Miguel Nazar Haro . Several of the agency's members were involved in organized crime directly by actively participating in murder and drug trafficking on the cartel's behalf. The Guadalajara Cartel however suffered

2256-413: Was sent to Ojinaga , Chihuahua to oversee the cocaine shipments of his uncle, Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo, and to learn about border operations from Pablo Acosta Villarreal , "El Zorro de Ojinaga" ( The Ojinaga Fox ). Amado was a long-time socio , or partner of Acosta. During the mid and late 1980s Amado accompanied Pablo Acosta, Marco DeHaro and Becky Garcia on many of their smuggling activities, including

2304-403: Was then the major shipping destination for illegal drug traffickers. As a result, the Colombian cartels began to utilize Mexico as their primary trans-shipment point. Juan Matta-Ballesteros was the Guadalajara Cartel's primary connection to the Colombian cartels, as he had originally introduced Félix Gallardo's predecessor, Alberto Sicilia Falcón, to Santiago Ocampo of the Cali Cartel , one of

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