Z-12 Captured in Monerrey

Posted by DD 
Sources Proceso, Vanguardia, el Universal, Reforma, and .Zeta Tijuana

Zeta Tijuana

Elements of the Navy, Federal Police and State Investigation Agency Nuevo Leon captured the alleged Zeta leader Luis Reyes Enriquez, The Rex or Z-12, a founder and leader of the Zetas.

He was allegedly responsible for the operations of the criminal group in Tamaulipas and Nuevo Leon,  and was arrested Thursday night in the municipality of San Pedro Garza Garcia near the city of Monterrey, Juan Carlos Silva,  head of the anti-drugs division of the federal police was quoted as saying.

According to information released by the newspaper Vanguardia, the criminal leader had his residence in the municipality of San Pedro.
 

 However, the Mayor of San Pedro said that Reyes did not live in that community and had just finished dinner a restaurant in the city when arrested.   There are reports that Reyes had 3 homes in the Monterrey area and rotated between them.

 Reyes had been the focus of a three-month-long investigation which revealed he was making his home in three different locations, two in Monterrey and one — an exclusive hotel — in San Pedro Garza García, one of Mexico’s wealthiest communities.

Fifty-one federal agents — including 30 Navy personnel, nine anti-drug agents and 12 officials from the State Investigations Agency — intercepted the drug lord while he was driving a vehicle in Monterrey. No shots were fired and there was no violence.

The alleged organized crime leader in Nuevo Leon and Tamaulipas was arrested in June 2007 in Atotonico, in the State of Hidalgo when Los Zetas was amidst a violent rampage against other gangs across the country.  He was sentenced to 48 years in prison.

However, he was let go from the Puente Grande maximum security prison in April 2015 after a judge lifted his sentence on a technicality.  That decision was reversed in August 2015 but Reyes Enriquez went into hiding after an order for his re-arrest was issued.

He now faces “a sentence of 47 years and six months in jail,” Silva said.

Reyes Enriquez was a former soldier who served in the Army from 1990 to 1999 and achieved a rank of Sergent in the mid 90's, when he was assigned to work in Tamaulipas as a judicial police officer with the federal Attorney General’s office.

That was in 1998. A year later he quit the armed forces to  work for Osiel Cardenas and the Gulf Cartel where he, along with several other former soldiers, helped found the Zetas, originally the armed wing of the Gulf Cartel.   .   

However, the group grew in force and broke off ties to the Gulf Cartel in 2010 to arguably become Mexico's most violent cartel.

Reyes kept up his close ties to Lazcano until his death in 2012 and reportedly is still close to Osiel Cardenas even after his extradition in 2007.  He is still a Zeta, but is known to have signed mantas along with Gulf Cartel leaders in giving warnings to the newer cartels wanting to expand into the North East.  There are even reports of he and his crew have fought battles alongside the Gulf Cartel against common enemies. 

Z-12 is considered to be one of the principal leaders of Los Zetas.