CDG Plaza Boss commits suicide rather than be taken alive

Translated by Otis B Fly-Wheel for Borderland Beat from a Milenio article

[ Subject Matter: Ignacio Zuniga Sanchez
Recommendation: No prior subject matter knowledge required]

Reporter: Ruben Mosso
Ignacio Zuniga Sanchez, alleged plaza chief for the Cartel del Golfo in Pueblo Viejo, Veracruz, responsible for the coordination of kidnapping, murder of a businessman and his son from Tamaulipas, killed himself in the municipality of Tampico, Tamaulipas, when he was about to be detained by elements of the Federal Police.

Zuniga ordered the kidnapping and assassination of Juan Manuel Gomez Fernandez and his son Juan Manuel Gomez Monteverde, father and brother of film maker Alejandro Gomez Monteverde.

The businessmen were kidnapped on 4th of September of this year and their bodies were found on 19th of September with torture wounds, even though the family of the men had paid the ransom.

Information gathered by the Coordination Group of Tamaulipas signalled that intelligence work by personnel of the Federal Police in coordination with the Army, garnered the location in Tampico of Ignacio Zuniga Sanchez, 39 years old, with an existing arrest warrant for organized crime.

When the deceased realised that the Federal Police had discovered his location on Calle Coyolitos, in the Naranjal Colonia, North Tampico, he fled with a weapon concealed in his jacket and ran into the dwelling that he shared with his partner.

When the Federal elements were close to the property and proceeding to form up to breach the building to detain Sanchez, they heard a gun shot inside the house. Shortly after the woman  who shared the house with the kidnapper, left the property and informed the Federal forces that Zuniga Sanchez had shot himself.

The Federal Police gave information that Ignacio Zuniga operated as Plaza Boss of the Cartel del Golfo criminal organization in Pueblo Viejo, the place where on the 19th of September the bodies of the Restaurateur and his son were found.

Zuniga was also responsible for heading diverse criminal cells dedicated to robbing auto buses, kidnapping of undocumented migrants and extortion, as well as being in charge of Halcones.

In two actions before this, the Federal Police detained 10 alleged members of this criminal group.

Original article in Spanish at Milenio