Guerreros Unidos sent heroin aboard buses

Borderland Beat posted by DD, part of which is Republished from Mexico Daily News

In Dec. 2014, Borderland Beat reporter Itzli posted a story about the leaders of a cell of Guerreros United operating out of the Chicago area being arrested in Oklahoma.     Both these individuals, 40 year old Pablo Vega Cuevas and his 37 year old brother-in-law Alexander Figueroa, lived in the Chicago suburb of Aurora, where they oversaw the importation of heroin and cocaine hidden in commercial passenger buses arriving in Chicago from Mexico, which was stored in warehouses in Aurora and Batavia before the drugs were distributed.  

The story posted by Itzli also related that 3 others from the same cell had been arrested the same day and that warrants had been issued for the arrest of 3 more alleged members.  It also said that  since August 2013, when the investigation of this cell began, 68 kilograms of heroin, 9 kilograms of cocaine, and $500,000 has been seized by authorities.

But those facts do not tell the whole story.  

KEEP IT SIMPLE

Much, if not most of the bloodshed and violence in the cartel wars has been battling over the distribution end of trafficking drugs. Think Zetas and the Gulf cartel, think Juarez and Tijuana, Reynosa, Matamores, and Laredo.  All of that violence was fighting over control of the plazas on the US/Mx. border and routes leading to the border.  In Guerrero most of the violence has been over cartels fighting for control of areas of production 

Some cartels, most notably the Sinaloa cartel has been very innovative in coming up with ways to transport their merchandise across the border.  From migrants (mules) with packpacks crossing the desert to submarines, ultra-light aircraft, catapults, and most famously their extensive use of tunnels under the border.

Guerrero United has not been known as a strategic planner, but has followed the old adage "keep it simple stupid" - grow it process it, package it, ship it (by bus) to warehouses in Chicago, and distribute it to their street dealers.

Itzli's story just touched on this in one sentence, but a story in Mexico Daily News this week (translation of original story in Spanish from Milenio) give a more detailed account of transporting heroin and cocaine from Iquala direct to Chicago on Mexican bus lines.  

Twice a week Iguala to Chicago

 (From Daily News)

 From opium poppies in the mountains of Guerrero to heroin in streets of Chicago

With the efficiency of a multinational corporation, the drug gang Guerreros Unidos cultivated, commercialized and killed at large in Mexico and the United States, eventually controlling a lucrative heroin supply chain that extended from the opium fields in the mountains of Guerrero to the shooting galleries in the streets of Chicago.
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There, the cartel distributed tens of thousands of doses, contributing to the worst epidemic of heroin overdoses that region of the U.S. has seen in decades, according to information gathered by U.S. authorities.

Between 2013 and 2014, a single cell of the cartel — previously believed to have limited capacity for planning — moved at least 183 kilograms of high-quality heroin, valued at US $11 million, into the Windy City.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) maintains that the cartel moved the drugs through companies named Autobuses Volcano Travel Agency and Autobuses Monarca Zacatecanos. They transported the heroin in hidden panels on the buses that ran from their territory in Iguala to Aurora, a suburb of Chicago.

The Chicago band funneled millions to fund the gang’s illicit activities in Guerrero, among which was the September 2014 murder of the Ayotzinapa student-teachers.

According to the U.S. Department of Justice’s first case against the Guerreros, its most successful known cell in the U.S. began in August 2013 under the leadership of Pablo “El Transformer” Vega Cuevas.

The small cell began importing and distributing large quantities of heroin and cocaine, sending the profits back to Iguala. After the DEA got wind of the group through an informant it planted anti-narcotics officers who monitored Vega and his collaborators for over a year, until last December 8, 2014.

Agents identified numerous phone calls made from Chicago and its suburbs to a long-distance area code, 733, that of Iguala. The calls offer a record of the cell’s transactions: Vega once moved $600,000 in a single sale, while one incoming shipment contained 26 kilograms of heroin.

At home, the Guerreros Unidos was fighting the rival gang Los Rojos to gain control of more poppy fields. With a secure source of heroin from fields around Tlapa and Chilpancingo, the cartel expanded just as Illinois began consuming heroin at levels not seen since the 1970s.

There was fighting up north, too. The cell in Chicago began taking on the Sinaloa Cartel for control of the crown jewel: the enormous and growing population of addicts in the Great Lakes region of the U.S.

The latter might also have had supply problems to reckon with. The Mexican government has razed a far larger number of poppy fields in Sinaloa — 78,703 hectares — than it has in the state of Guerrero, where only 30,649 hectares have been burned.

The Guerreros Unidos’ Chicago cell fell in December. Vega and his accomplices are accused of importing prohibited substances and face prison sentences of 10 to 40 years. Autobuses Volcano Travel Agency is still offering non-stop Chicago service every Wednesday and Friday, but it is not known if they continue to carry a secret cargo in hidden panels.

DD:

Why the Department of Justice has not seized any of the buses and applied the sanctions allowed under the King Pin Act, which would prohibit any US citizen from doing business with the bus company which  would include passengers buying tickets or riding the buses is beyond me.  

To learn more about Guerreros United, see two stories posted by our BB in-house expert Itzli; 

"What is Guerreros United?"  

"Overview of Criminal Organizations"

From opium poppies in the mountains of Guerrero to heroin in streets of Chicago - See more at: http://mexiconewsdaily.com/news/guerreros-unidos-sent-heroin-aboard-buses/?utm_source=Mexico+News+Daily&utm_campaign=ebf9d8bbb9-Apr.+21&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_f1536a3787-ebf9d8bbb9-349444589#sthash.H6N9IbaE.dpuf

From opium poppies in the mountains of Guerrero to heroin in streets of Chicago - See more at: http://mexiconewsdaily.com/news/guerreros-unidos-sent-heroin-aboard-buses/?utm_source=Mexico+News+Daily&utm_campaign=ebf9d8bbb9-Apr.+21&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_f1536a3787-ebf9d8bbb9-349444589#sthash.H6N9IbaE.dpuf