Head of Mexico's Federal Electricity Commission, Implicated in the 1985 Murder of DEA Agent Camarena

“MX” for Borderland Beat

Manuel Bartlett Díaz, the Director of Mexico’s Federal Electricity Commission (CFE), is the newest suspect in the murder of US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agent Enrique “Kiki” Camarena, who was killed by members of the Guadalajara Cartel in Mexico in 1985.

This new information surfaced after several protected witnesses said that Bartlett met with organized crime figures to plan Camarena’s murder. 

Officials of the US Department of Justice, who spoke anonymously to Mexican news magazine Proceso, said that Bartlett would be arrested should he enter the US.

The unnamed US officials said that some of the protected witnesses framing Bartlett do not know each other, which is a strong indication that he may have been involved or knows more about the case that he is willing to admit.

“His name appears on numerous occasions in multiple investigation files of the Camarena case. If he enters the US, he would be detained for questioning,” the US official confirmed to Proceso.

DEA agent Camarena was kidnapped on February 7, 1985 in Guadalajara, Jalisco, and murdered two days later by former state judicial police officers under the orders of the Guadalajara Cartel, a criminal group headed by Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo, and Rafael Caro Quintero.

Camarena was brutally tortured for two days and purposely kept alive. His body was later found in the neighboring state of Michoacan.

Sources: Proceso; Infobae