A violent re-accommodation in Sinaloa

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

Subject Matter: Cartel re-accommodation in Sinaloa
Recommendation: No prior subject matter knowledge required

Despite what Rafael Caro Quintero insists publicly, that he is not involved in narco trafficking, Sedena has information his organization maintains its activity in trafficking marijuana, opium gum, crystal meth, in his control zone, located between Badiraguato, Sinaloa and Tamazula, Durango. There, no one other than the ex leader of the now extinct Guadalajara Cartel exercise command, together with his hoard of men.

Reporter: Zeta Investigations
It was Caro Quintero who made the region of Los Placeres to Genaro Payan Haro a no go zone, he moves with a group of armed men, and put in sight of the Marines that this was his territory”, commented a State security functionary.

El Gringo Payan, identified as an operator of Ismael “El Mayo Zambada”, was captured in a field of his located on the outskirts of the town of Mocorito and Badiraguato, Sinaloa, on the 22nd of June of 2015. Before the liberation of the capo, he controlled the transit of drugs from the region.

Days before, on the 13th of June, the Secretary of the Marina had devastated various communities in an operation to detain Rafael Caro Quintero, El Gringo Payan was one of the men that could have guided the Federal Government until his arrest in the Sinaloa mountains. Today he can be found in the Federal prison of El Rincon, Nayarit.

Testimony from the local villages from a year ago, said that the Marines and the Army had a list of names with photographs of all of the operators of the interviewed capo, three of them residents of the community of Las Juntas, located up in the mountains of Babunica and La Noria, of where originated the brothers Emilio and Juan Jose Quintero Payan, and Rafael and Miguel Angel Caro Quintero, respectively.

They knew the structure of the organization, who managed the poppy plantations and marijuana plantations, the packing and transit, who paid the bills, and who stood to gain financially.

Also, Federal authorities identified that Jose Luis Caro, “Chelis” Caro, another friend of Rafael was linked to illicit narco trafficking activities.

Other family members are  Jose Gil Caro Quintero, nephew of the capo, detained and then released in Jalisco, and identified by the PGR as an operator of Esparragoza Moreno; Caro and Juan Israim Caro Ley, captured on the border between Jalisco and Michoacan, close to Mazamitla, in April of 2015.

In August of 2014, another nephew, Sajid Quintero Navidad, was identified by the Dept of Treasury of the United States, as a former high up member of the Sinaloa cartel, and later of the Beltran Leyva Cartel.

The Persecution

Since August of 2015, when the Marines returned to launch their third operation to recapture Car Quintero in Badiraguato, the man accused of killing the DEA agent Enrique Camarana Salazar, he has kept a low profile, what with the hunt for Joaquin El Chapo Guzman their principal objective.

In these operations, they informed the inhabitants of Badiraguato who were interviewed, the Marines were carrying portable computer tablets with electronic satellite maps, names and addresses of every single person who lives in El Barrio de Guanajuato, La Noria, Babunica, Las Juntas, Los Placeres, among other localities.

Even some of the lowliest dwelling without paving, they had data on how many people lived in the home, and who they were. To a woman in the house of a neighbour whom they accused of giving breakfast every morning to Caro Quintero, and that her daughter was a lover of the seventy year old.
drug trafficker.

On the 13th of June of 2015, the soldiers of the Mexican Marines insisted to the mother of a family that the capo had been there very early in the morning at her house eating breakfast, and that after he had moved high into the mountains of the region. In his interview with Proceso, published last week, Caro mentioned that in effect he had been on the point of being captured.

In each operation against him, people have denounced that they strike and beat civilians including women, the Marines throw up a ring around any site suspected of being a hiding place for him, from possible tunnels under houses, and water wheels, stables of livestock, compartments within vehicles and inside the roof of houses.

The 17th of August last year, was the last operation that the Marines carried out in this zone, named by the locals as ” the corridor of Caro Quintero”.

After having gone against the local population, the new inhabitants of the mountains denounced their excesses. Weeks later the attention from the Marines was on El Chapo Guzman Loera, and the PGR have concentrated their investigations into the structure of the men who participated in the construction of the tunnel used by Guzman to flee “Altiplano”.

The following month, in September, the Marines started a pursuit in the mountains of Tamazula, Durango, and Cosala, for Guzman Loera, and Caro passed into the shadows.

With El Chapo being imprisoned in the Cefereso No.9 in Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua, the dispute between factions headed by his sons, Archivaldo Ivan and Jesus Alfredo Guzman Salazar, and Los Damaso for control of point of sale drug shops, have caused several clashes between their sicarios.

From April until now, the elevated numbers of assassinations in Culiacan, Navolato and Mazatlan are increasing, meanwhile the State Ministerial Police detect every time greater number of gunmen patrolling the capital.

With the assault on the community of La Tuna by a group of Alfredo Beltran Guzman, El Tito, son of El Mochomo, the level of breakdown between the cartels has lead to a tense situation, according to sources in the Security Cabinet, but it wasn’t until the magazine Proceso linked Caro Quintero to a war with El Chapo, that the army and PGR of Chihuahua, Jorge Gonzalez Nicolas, confirmed that information, that the boss of La Noria had left the shadows to establish the facts, and once again denied his involvement in illegal activities.

When word got out that Caro Quintero was going against Los Guzmans, according to information filtered through from the cartels to the State authorities, Ivan Archivaldo sought a meeting with him in order to avoid any major confrontations, in his own words that El Chapo and El Mayo were his friends.

The feud of the late Ignacio Nacho Coronel and his family, including the father of Emma Colonel Aispuro, third wife of El Chapo, on Tuesday 26th July resurfaced, with two nephews of the ex capo were executed in Ciudad Obregon, Sonora.

The investigating State Police informed that the attack happened around 3:15 pm in the Cuauhtemoc colonia, at the crossroads of Nainari and Michoacan, when they were travelling in a red colored Volkswagen Jetta. They were Kevin Alexis and Justin Coronel Orduno, 13 and 19 years old respectively.

The information signalled that they were shot with an AK47 from a white Honda Accord vehicle of recent model, they were the sons of Sergio Coronel Ibarra.

Since the 90′s, Nacho Coronel owned the plaza of Ciudad Obregon, meanwhile Ines Coronel Barredas was occupied with the transit of drugs from Agua Prieta.

Even thought the State Prosecutor of Sonora has not established a motive, on his face book account Justin Coronel showed photos of his with high powered weapons in hoods or masks or beside Ferrari’s.

Original article in Spanish at Zetatijuana