Four gunmen suspected in this week’s abduction and murder of the mayor of an affluent Monterrey suburb were captured Friday by Mexican army troops, the military said.
Word of the army operation followed an announcement by Nuevo Leon state authorities that five police officers and a traffic warden were in custody for the death of Santiago Mayor Edelmiro Cavazos Leal, whose body appeared a few days after his kidnapping last weekend.
The troops who apprehended the gunmen also seized handguns, AK-47 assault rifles, a rocket-launcher and several vehicles, a military source said.
The four suspects were found at a home in the Santiago residential development of Rincon de la Boca, but at least 17 other gunmen managed to flee and are still being sought, the source said.
Nuevo Leon state Attorney General Alejandro Garza y Garza said the officers confessed to being involved in the Cavazos' killing, though some declared their innocence while being presented to the press.
One of the five Santiago municipal police arrested for the crime was directly involved in the abduction, Nuevo Leon Attorney General Alejandro Garza y Garza said earlier Friday in Monterrey.
Four other officers stood watch on the town’s main highway to alert the kidnappers if federal police appeared and provide cover as they drove away with the mayor, Garza y Garza said at a joint press conference with Nuevo Leon Gov. Rodrigo Medina.
The police suspects include the Santiago cop assigned as the 38-year-old mayor’s bodyguard, Garza y Garza said.
The Attorney General of the State (PGJE) identified the people arrested as police officers; Homero López Silva, Mónica Martínez, Antonio Rodríguez Gallardo and José Alberto Rodríguez Rodríguez who worked as the personal bodyguard of the mayor who was abducted on August 16 and found dead on August 18.
They are also detained Mauricio Roberto Mayorga and Traffic Officer Jose Javier Garcia Martinez who admitted having participated in the incident and said he received money in exchange for his work with the cartel.
Adrian de la Garza, head of the police investigations agency in Nuevo Leon state, told a news conference that the police officers received 6,000 pesos ($700) per month to cooperate with criminals "in different ways and different affairs," with some allegedly acting as lookouts.
"They were employees" of a criminal gang, De la Garza said at a news conference where he displayed security-camera footage from Cavazo's house (shown below), showing armed kidnappers arriving at the home on Sunday night in five SUVs.
The grainy video showed the vehicles turn on flashing lights, apparently to simulate police patrol vehicles, as armed men get out without any apparent resistance from the officer guarding the home.
Cavazos is seen being lead out of his home and forced into a vehicle at gunpoint.
The guard is then also seen getting into the front cabin of another SUV, contrary to his earlier statement claiming he had been bundled into the trunk of one of the vehicles and later dumped unharmed by the side of the road.
Gov. Medina, one of the hundreds of people who attended Cavazos Leal’s funeral Thursday in Santiago, vowed to remain “personally” engaged in the ongoing investigation.
Around 150 federal police arrived Thursday night in Monterrey, Mexico’s wealthiest city, to beef up security.
The reinforcements came a day after the powerful Coparmex business federation joined two Nuevo Leon organizations to take out full-page ads in major newspapers demanding that the government dispatch four additional battalions of soldiers and marines to curb violence in the border state.
A number of Nuevo Leon’s 51 municipalities are practically without police, as many officers have resigned in the face of threats from organized crime.
Five police officers have been murdered in the past few months in Santiago amid mayhem attributed to drug traffickers battling for control of smuggling routes into the United States.
Violence in the state has intensified state since the appearance in February in Monterrey of giant banners heralding an alliance of the Gulf, Sinaloa and La Familia Michoacana drug cartels against Los Zetas, a band of Mexican special forces deserters turned outlaws.
Cavazos Leal’s kidnapping occurred near the end of a violent 72-hour stretch that included a shootout between gunmen and the army in the Monterrey metro area and an attack on the Televisa office in the northern industrial city.
More than 200 people, including 30 police officers, have died in the gang war in Nuevo Leon, while the drug war has claimed more than 28,000 lives nationwide since December 2006, when newly inaugurated President Felipe Calderon militarized the struggle with the cartels.
The surveillance video of the abduction of Cavazos at his home.
I want to know where I can exchange 6000 pesos for 700 USD?? should be apx 470 or 108 USD per week
ReplyDeleteGreat Work!! Now what?? Arrest - Mexican justice all hat no cows, Conviction rate 15%?? No Death Penalty??Except for elected officials,clean cops office seekers. Now that a nerve has been hit by some idiot drug don lets see what Mexican justice system can deliver. Under Texas Law almost all would be chargable as partys to capital murder and we do execute worthless scum that are a continuing threat to society Proudley So. Maby just Maby Mexico can become a place of action instead of excuses. Congrads to the investigators proves what can be done if there is Motivation.
ReplyDeleteEn Donde esta Natividad Gonzalez Paras ? el verdadero responsable junto con sus hermanos de que esl estado de Nuevo Leon sea el principal campo de batalla de la guerra contra el Narco !!! Nati o mas bien Rati, tejio una red de corrupcion y complicidades junto con sus mas cercanos colaboradores como Abel Quezada para saquear al Estado de Nuevo Leon, no solo le fue suficiente la partida petrolera que la invirtio en obras triviales, insultantes e inutiles como las realizadas en el rio Santa Catarina que se destruyeron con el Huracan Alex, sino la Torre Administrativa, una burda copia de la "Shanghai Financial Tower", las inutiles e inusltantes obras del Forum.....sino que desmantelo el aparato de seguridad que llevaba un conotado militar a quien le dio las gracias pues no hacia equipo con los que querian seguir robando a todos los niveles...fue esa la unica razon ? o mas bien permitir que sus hermanos vendieran la plaza al mejor postor !!!, Dejo entrar impunemente a los capos de la droga de todas las bandas para que establecieran aqui sus familias...ya no sabemos que fue peor, el roba, el pedir prestado para seguir robando, desmantelar el aparato de seguiridad o haberse empeñado en imponer a una persona sin meritos y totalmente incapas como Gobernador.... Medina !!! Quien asi como no puede mantener al Estado a Flote tampoco investiga las Fechorias de Nati o mas bien Rati !!! un Gobenador que se lleva a su familia del estado a vivir a San Antonio, Tx. Que nos toca hacer a la gente que trabajamos y tenemos un pequeño negocio...tambien corremos ?
ReplyDeleteYa me da miedo todo esto!!
ReplyDeleteno puedo creer que ya ni podamos salir agusto porque por donde quiera existe toda esta violencia que el gobierno ha dejado crecer!!!
de verdad ya stamos hartos!!!!
basta!!!
Hey somebody, are these people the real kidnappers and killers or were coherced to confess by the puppet government or do they have real evidence about the kidnapping and murder of the mayor? Interseting to see this develop
ReplyDeleteNo, miedo es lo que quieren inculcar y no les vamos a dar el derecho ni el gusto, porque lo que hicieron no tiene palabras.
ReplyDeleteEl gobierno tiene que responder por esta tragedia, tan injusta.
According to a previoust BB post, they are the police officers that were working with his bodyguard (who was also 'kidnapped' with the mayor, but didn't have a scratch on him when he was 'released').
ReplyDeleteI get the impression all these police municipal officers were "halcones" for the actual cartel, and I hope they get the principals. I am still trying to find out which cartel was involved, words has it, the Familia Michoacana was on the Nuevo Leon soil and having a huge dispute with Zetas, but I am still waiting for further developments, hopefully the Governor continues to push for an extensive investigation, and not allow party lines interfere as it usually does on these type of cases.
ReplyDeleteSome Michoacan sicarios were captured a couple of days ago, a report on it on BB tomorrow
I'm not Mexican, but don't need to be acknowledge how disgusting this drug trafficking has become in Mexico. I recently started educating myself and reading this blog. I'm simply SHOCKED, I'm still a member of the US Forces and once was offered security job intel in Central America, A.K.A Mercenary. I think I'd accept the offer in Mexico if it was ever offered, he'll I may just do it for fun.
ReplyDeleteThese police, with exception to the one that was actually guarding the Mayor at the time of his kidnapping apparently worked only as "halcones", or look outs.
ReplyDeleteFrom what I understand they have been doing this for sometime, not just prior to Mayor Cavazos execution..The stake out the highways and report federal police, military, and rival cartel movements...They may have not even known the kidnapping/execution of the mayor was in the works..Somehow I don't think that this kind of operation would have been shared with many.
Regardless, they are GUILTY, to what degree, is what remains unknown at this point.
I read alot of Nuevo Leon news online and the comments made on the reports..From what I can see, nobody really knows the who or why.
It seems as though nothing is very clear anymore.