When Mexico chose not to capture El Chapo Guzman

El Diario de Coahuila/Proceso (4-6-2013) J. Jesus Esquivel

Translated by Un Vato for Borderland Beat

[I have translated two articles that appeared in Proceso and other sources yesterday and today. In my opinion, together, they help illustrate the consequences of Mexican President's Enrique Pena Nieto's recently announced policy of limiting access to information about law enforcement efforts to combat drug trafficking in Mexico. This is the first.-- un vato]

Since the war against the drug trafficking cartels broke out and intensified, one element has been present in the country: the DEA, the anti-drug agency in the United States that has personnel working here full time. Some of its agents are talking now, they say they carry weapons in Mexico and say that on several occasions they told the Mexican government of "El Chapo" Guzman's location... and nothing happened.

J. Jesus Esquivel, Proceso's Washington correspondent,  reveals these and other stories in the book "The DEA in Mexico: A hidden story told by the agents", soon to be published by Grijalbo. Below, some excerpts from Chapters 7 and 14 of the book.

MEXICO, DF (apro).-- The Constitution of the United Mexican States (Constitucion Politica de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos) flately prohibits foreign agents and military personnel from carrying firearms within national borders. In 1992, in the Rules of the Game (Reglas del Juego), DEA agents were absolutely prohibited from carrying weapons.

 Sandalio Gonzalez, a Cuban born retired agents who spent a great deal of his life in national and international work in the DEA, says that personal safety is a very important part of the anti-drug operations that are carried out in Mexico and Colombia.

-- Do DEA agents in Mexico carry weapons?

-- Yes, all of them. All the agents carry weapons; only intelligence personnel in the DEA offices do not, since they are basically people who do bureaucratic work and who know how to manipulate technology in an investigation; they are the ones who do not go out to places where operations are being conducted.

-- Do DEA agents in Mexico carry weapons only when they are involved in an undercover operation, or are they always armed?

-- They always carry weapons, although there is no official type of weapon for DEA agents.

-- Do DEA agents carry weapons when they go to meetings with Mexican officials, police or military?

-- Yes.

-- And they know it?

-- Sure, that is known but not talked about, that's the unwritten rule in Mexico on relationships with DEA agents. Neither federal police or the military search DEA agents; they never do this in meetings.

-- Have there been occasions when Mexican police or military search DEA agents to see whether they're carrying weapons?

-- It happens. When they wanted to fuck us over and they knew we were out of the office, they would send out a team of Federal Police or the military to set up roadblocks on the highway. They would stop you and fuck with you; they would search you, take your weapon or detain you for a while.

"It would be a mess when this happened, because the problem would only be resolved when somebody at the U.S. embassy would pick up the phone and negotiate with somebody from the Secretariat of Interior (Secretaria de Governacion), the Secretariat of Foreign Affairs (Secretaria de Relaciones Exteriores); with the commanders of the Federal Police, the Army or the Navy. In one case, I'm almost certain that they had to talk to Los Pinos [The President].

A Gentleman's Agreement

-- Has the DEA sought a solution to the question of the prohibition against carrying weapons in Mexico?

-- A few years ago, the United States government tied to resolve the problem. The Department's of State and Justice proposed to the Mexican government that if it would allow DEA to carry weapons in Mexican territory, Mexican agents would be allowed to carry weapons on U.S. ground. In the United States, in the states where Mexican consulates are located, there are agents of the PGR (Procuraduria General de la Republica; Mexico's Attorney General). But Mexico's response to Washington's proposal was a flat 'No'.

The prohibition against the DEA carrying weapons in Mexico is treated as a sort of "gentleman's agreement" that extends to personnel from other agencies:

"DEA agents are not the only U.S. agents who carry weapons in Mexico; this certainly is the case with the FBI, ATF, with all Customs agents and the CIA. These last, I don't know why the hell they don't admit they're with the CIA since all of the Mexican government knows who they are. According to them, they are "vice consuls", but no vice consul carries weapons; only the CIA vice consul does that.

-- Can it be said that the Mexican government keeps all U.S. agents in Mexico under observation to make sure they comply with the rules imposed on them?

-- Yes, but they not all treated the same, because in the case of DEA agents, when we are in a foreign country, we're not there as "secret agents," like many people think.

"When we're in a foreign country, we are not registered as agents or law enforcement officers of the DEA. In some cases, which is the case with Mexico, the agents are registered with the Secretariat of Foreign Affairs as diplomats -- political attache--; in other countries, they're given diplomatic identification under the category of technical or personnel administrator with the embassy or the consulate.

 That is, the government of the host country knows very well who is an agent and who is not, where they live, how many family members they have. Everything, they know everything, but nothing happens in Mexico."

Strengthened cartel

"The Sinaloa cartel is not weakened; on the contrary, it got stronger because of the corruption in the federal government, at very high levels. You don't have to be a rocket scientist to come to this conclusion. Why hasn't anybody arrested  "El Chapo" or any of his partners, like Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada Garcia, or Juan Jose Esparragoza Moreno, "El Azul"? All of them have been in the business for years, but, incredibly, nobody arrests them and they continue to be free."

-- Does the Mexican government really know where "El Chapo" and the rest of the Sinaloa Cartel members are hiding?

-- Yes, they know where they are. Of course they know, and they know where their relatives are. The Army or some of the police commanders who are supposedly looking for them don't mess with them or with their families because they know who is protecting them and how high up in the government (the protectors are).

-- Who protects "El Chapo" and the Sinaloa Cartel?

-- That's not for me to say. The day that certain politicians are arrested in Mexico, they're going to find out a lot of truths about the mysteries behind "El Chapo: and the Sinaloa Cartel.

-- What does the DEA know about "El Chapo"?

-- The DEA has a long list of Chapo's properties, his ranches, his homes. The Mexican government also has that list. Before, we were the only ones who had it, but we gave it to them.

"In several meetings with Mexican authorities, we would tell them: 'Look, we have this information'. They would respond by asking if "El Chapo" was in that place that very moment. Of course, we couldn't guarantee it, but we would explain that the property belonged to him, and it was necessary to investigate the lead, that an important operation would take time. They didn't pay attention to us."

-- Does "El Chapo" have many properties in Mexico?

-- Many. I remember one time, early in the Calderon administration; we gave the Army some information about a place in Sinaloa where he was due to arrive. It was one of his ranches, where they supposedly went to look for him, but they didn't tell us when they did it. Two or three days later, they called us to tell us: "He got away from us, we don't think he ever came to the place."

Why is "El Chapo" still free?

Calderon's military battle left Mexicans a wound that will not heal as his inheritance, a wound that will continue to bleed for a long time, mostly due to the impunity surrounding the more that 60,000 deaths and more than 20,000 'disappeared'.

"El Chapo" is emblematic of the failure of Calderon and Washington.

But, why is a criminal untouchable, why wasn't he captured or eliminated despite support from the White House and the Capital during Calderon's presidency?

"It was because of the enormous corruption that grew under Calderon's administration, that's why they cannot catch him," says, without the least hesitation, Jose Baeza, the DEA agent who left Mexico in 2008 at the end of his third tour in the fight against drug trafficking.

"'El Chapo' is an important capo -- Baeza explains--, there's no doubt about that. But he will never surpass Amado Carrillo Fuentes. 'El Chapo' has benefited from the publicity given to him by the media and from everything the Mexican government has said about him. He escaped from prison in (January 19) 2001, and more than 11 years have gone by. Why don't they arrest him? You don't think the Mexican government doesn't know where he or his family are? -- asks Baeza, who goes on to answer his own questions with three words--: because of corruption."

-- Does the Mexican government really know where "El Chapo" and his family are located?

-- Sure, (the Mexican government) has gotten a lot of intelligence information from us, from other (U.S.) agencies and from its own military and civilian investigation services.

"They have never carried out an in-depth investigation to arrest his family, who is enjoying the money that "El Chapo" has accumulated from drug trafficking. They don't want to touch him; they don't want to touch his assets, nor his ranches nor his businesses. To me. it's very clear: the Calderon government doesn't want to go against him."