THE BORDER REPORT Arturo Beltran Leyva, the charismatic rising cartel figure of Mexico's narco wars was killed a few minutes ago in a gunbattle with the Mexican Navy in Cuernavaca. Reports from sources within the Mexican Federal Attorney General's Office state that El Barbie, Edgar Valdez Villarreal, had been arrested at the scene. Those reports are now unconfirmed. Also the rumor that Beltran's brother, Mario, was one of those killed tonight. A third had allegedly committed suicide. Milenio is reporting seven dead total. The power move in northern Mexico sounds like it's already begun. Nogales erupted about 11:10 tonight with at least ten gunshots throughout the city. NOTE, another source is telling me it's a celebration not a gunfight. Chapo's people, I presume. "A stray bullet injured a little girl but it's all about the celebration," a friend said. "It's a posada, man." Sources at Justice say that Arturo was almost captured at a party a few nights ago when the Navy arrested Ramon Ayala. No idea if Arturo had been at the party but my guys at Justice insist he left shortly ahead of the Navy's arrival. Also of interest; the Navy. Where's the Army in all this? Why is the Marina moving on Arturo Beltran and not SEDENA? Locally, along the Arizona border, this has just created a power vacuum in Sonoyta, Nogales and Agua Prieta. Nationally, the Juarez Cartel and the Zetas in Tamaulipas and Coahuila just lost their most powerful ally and we all know what means: Shorty Guzmán's back in charge, no doubt celebrating in a hot tub somewhere. Just in time for his birthday, too.

THE BORDER REPORT

This story’s a few months old but I like it because it shows nicely to what extent the U.S. simply doesn’t invest in punishing high-end drug traffickers. The United States has entered into a plea agreement with one of Mexico’s most famed drug lords that ensures the man will not spend more than a few years behind bars despite having moved more than an average of 15 tons of marijuana across the border every year of his ... illustrious ... career. Miguel Angel Caro Quintero, who headed the Sonora Cartel in the 1980s, is accused of moving nearly fifteen tons of marijuana and cocaine into the U.S. for years. His brother, Rafael Caro Quintero, is serving a 40-year sentence in Mexico for the 1985 murder of DEA agent Enrique Camarena. Miguel was captured in Sinaloa in late 2001 and served eight years in that country before he was extradited to Colorado last winter to stand trial on indictments filed by the U.S. The Feds worked a suspect named Harold Allen Hughes, a Cessna pilot and smuggler dating back to 1967, recorded deals of upwards of 80-ton loads of pot moving through Sonora. Hughes, who worked with El Azul Juan Esparragoza as far back as 1973, was also in the growing business, raising some 30 tons of pot every year in Sonora, Sinaloa, and Chihuahua. Court documents show that he went to work with Miguel Caro Quintero after Rafael's arrest, moving loads into Tucson and Phoenix then driving half-ton loads up to Colorado. Cash was coming back at a rate of $300K a week in those heady days of the late eighties and nineties before a source fingered Hughes and Caro Quintero in 2001. The evidence seems a bit shady; according to court documents, the snitch "identified a photograph of Miguel Angel Caro-Quintero as the person that Hughes obtained his marijuana from ..." between 1985 and 1989. For his part, Caro Quintero has always proclaimed his innocence, saying that the Feds were simply retributing the murder of Kiki Camarena and that he's simply a cattlerancher. Nevertheless, last October, he pleaded guilty to two counts of drug trafficking in Colorado and Arizona. Here's where it gets a little sketchy. Sentencing won't be held until February but I'm told that he will serve his five-year Arizona sentence concurrently with that of Colorado where he faces 10-20. However, I'm told that he's really facing the lower end of the larger sentence minus the eight years he's already served in Mexico. Bottom line: maximum seven years for a drug lord career that spanned nearly two decades. Possibly two years if he gets the ten and the court accepts the eight years he's served in Mexico. That's what a great lawyer will do for you. I don't even know what to think about the federal prosecutors ...

THE BORDER REPORT

With the finding of six bodies in a dirt lot yesterday afternoon, about twenty people have now been murdered along the Arizona-Sonora border since last Tuesday. The bodies were found in Nogales, Sonora, and were presumed to have been there some three to five days, a timeline that matches up nicely with the start of this current conflict. Still don't know who the man was that was killed in Agua Prieta last week; nobody's saying so you know it's good (regionally interesting, probably not national). But a source in the area says Mexican Feds were in a meeting with the gringos on the Arizona side when they got the call and went running back into Mexico to deal with this. The latest conflict appears to be a group of Nuevo Zetas moving against the powerhouses of the Arizona border (and it ain't DHS). Meanwhile, the Mexican Army exercised an extreme case of ineptitude when a soldier was shot in a crossfire in Agua Prieta last Thursday. Seems the Army had surrounded a stash house when two traffickers in a Pontiac Grand Am raced out. A desmadre ensued when the soldiers unloaded on the car, hitting the car but also shooting at each other. The narcos got away. I thought training was a big part of the Merida money ... pero bueno. In light of this latest ordeal, Sonora Gov. Guillermo Padrés is asking Mexico City for one thousand more federales to be brought up into Sonora (mas ratas pal pozo ... ) And, up north of me, one of Arturo Beltrán Leyva's people was indicted on cocaine trafficking and money laundering charges in Phoenix. Misael Beltrán Cital and seven other people were indicted on the charges after the State Department issued him a visa to come to the U.S. Total setup and he fell for it, oops. We'll see what happens next.

THE BORDER REPORT

Cd. Juárez – A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent is being investigated on possible corruption charges after running an informant network that has imploded throughout the El Paso law enforcement community, a Mexican law enforcement source in Juárez said this morning.

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