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CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico — On March 16, two Mexican nationals arrived at El Dorado Worldwide Airport in Bogota, Colombia. As each have been getting off the airplane, Colombian Nationwide Cops approached them and requested for his or her paperwork. Regardless that they offered counterfeit passports utilizing pretend identities, the Colombians knew that their actual names have been Carlos Omar Felix and Silvano Francisco Mariano, two high-ranking Sinaloa Cartel members who have been working underneath the notorious Guzman household.
Whereas the Biden administration has launched a extensively publicized hunt in opposition to the sons of drug lord and former Sinaloa Cartel chief Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman Loera, collectively often called “Los Chapitos,” for allegedly being behind a large operation of unlawful fentanyl manufacturing and trafficking from Mexico into the U.S., the Guzman brothers are mentioned to be one step forward, shifting their drug manufacturing from Sinaloa – the eponymous Mexican state residence of the Sinaloa Cartel – to Colombia, in response to sources contained in the Colombian authorities and cartel operators.
The U.S. authorities had a $1 million warrant in opposition to Felix and Mariano, now captured by the Colombian authorities, for allegedly working for Ovidio Guzman, son of El Chapo, who was captured in January throughout a bloody operation that left a number of cartel members and Mexican troopers lifeless and went for greater than 10 hours.
Prosecutor Francisco Barbosa introduced that the equal of hundreds of {dollars} in drug cash was seized in a drug raid in Colombia. (Workplace of the Lawyer Basic of Colombia)
ARMED SUSPECTED MEXICAN CARTEL MEMBERS ARRESTED ON TEXAS SIDE OF BORDER
“Carlos Omar Felix Gutierrez and [Silvano] Francisco Mariano, often called Rayo, function clandestine fentanyl laboratories for the Cartel in and round Sinaloa the place fentanyl precursor chemicals imported from China are processed into totally shaped fentanyl for subsequent importation into the US,” a just lately unsealed indictment states.
Felix and Mariano had arrived in Bogota to supervise the operations of a sequence of recent fentanyl “kitchens” established in one of many wealthiest areas in Colombia, an exported modus operandi from Sinaloa, in response to the Colombian authorities.
A truck burns on a avenue in Culiacan, Sinaloa, Mexico, on Jan. 5, 2023. Mexican safety forces captured Ovidio Guzman, an alleged drug trafficker wished by the US and one of many sons of former Sinaloa Cartel boss Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, in a pre-dawn operation that set off gunfights and roadblocks throughout the western state’s capital. (AP Picture/Martin Urista)
Months earlier, that they had rented a high-end residence in a residential residence advanced referred to as Colina Campestre. From the surface, the residence appeared similar to the remainder contained in the advanced, however on the within, Colombian authorities discovered tables coated in blue powder – allegedly coloured fentanyl – a number of capsule urgent machines, precursors to fabricate fentanyl and several other firearms, in response to a presser by the Colombian Nationwide Police.
“What they have been placing collectively was not a small manufacturing web site, it had the potential to provide round 100,000 counterfeit fentanyl capsules a day,” a supply from the Colombian Nationwide Police advised Fox Information Digital who requested to stay nameless for not having clearance to talk with the press.
Bogota, Colombia (iStock)
However a Sinaloa Cartel member actively working on fentanyl trafficking from Sinaloa to Los Angeles mentioned that Colombia “was simply considered one of many testing websites.”
“What we established in Colombia was a testing web site to see if we might get fenta (fentanyl) from the pharmacies and see if that was worthwhile, as a result of whether it is, then we might have an additional supply for it,” the Sinaloa Cartel operative mentioned.
Prosecutor Francisco Barbosa introduced that 163 vials of fentanyl have been seized in a drug raid in Colombia. (Workplace of the Lawyer Basic of Colombia)
EL CHAPO’S SONS DENY FENTANYL TRAFFICKING ALLEGATIONS
At the moment, pure fentanyl is extensively offered illegally to Mexican drug cartels by China, in response to current investigation by U.S. authorities. However on a decrease scale, China additionally exports precursors to fabricate fentanyl in Mexico.
However in response to the cartel operative and the supply contained in the Colombian Nationwide Police, the Sinaloa Cartel is trying into the authorized stream of fentanyl in Colombia, constructing a community of corruption inside hospitals, pharmacies and small clinics to purchase excessive portions of the drug to be later utilized in laboratories and processed into capsules or combine it with heroin.
Fentanyl remains to be not extensively identified in Colombia, however testing in cocaine and in a brand new and widespread substance referred to as 2CB or “Tusi” have proven small traces, as revealed in current official investigations.
In January, El Chapo’s son, Ovidio Guzman, was arrested throughout a morning raid in Culiacan, Sinaloa, Mexico. (AP Photos)
In April, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) flagged the Sinaloa Cartel as “the biggest, most violent, and most prolific fentanyl trafficking operation on the earth,” and pointed particularly at “Los Chapitos,” Ivan Archivaldo, Jesus Alfredo, Joaquin and Ovidio Guzman, all sons of El Chapo Guzman.
“In the present day’s indictments ship a transparent message to the Chapitos, the Sinaloa Cartel, and legal drug networks all over the world that the DEA will cease at nothing to guard the nationwide safety of the US and the security and well being of the American folks,” mentioned DEA Administrator Anne Milgram on the unsealing of a big indictment in opposition to a number of members of the Sinaloa Cartel.
A month later, Los Chapitos responded to the indictment in a letter despatched to a significant Mexican information present by way of considered one of their attorneys and denied that they had “any enterprise with fentanyl.”
Ovidio Guzman-Lopez, son of drug kingpin El Chapo. (US State Division)
“We’re not the leaders of the Sinaloa Cartel, nor are we occupied with being so,” Los Chapitos wrote. “We’ve got by no means knowingly established relationships with individuals who site visitors fentanyl.”
However proof reveals in any other case. Mexican authorities say they’ve seized greater than 600 fentanyl labs in Sinaloa and have linked the Guzman household to them.
The seizures, on the most, have slowed the manufacturing in Mexico, however fentanyl remains to be arriving into the U.S. in massive numbers, in response to Customs and Border Safety current figures.
Border Patrol makes fentanyl bust in San Clemente, California. (U.S. Border Patrol)
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Throughout the first 4 months of 2023, authorities have seized more than 17,000 pounds of fentanyl from the totally different ports of entry on the U.S.-Mexico border, surpassing final yr’s file of 14,000 kilos.
“If we will’t manufacture in Mexico anymore, we are going to discover the place, both it’s Colombia, Ecuador or elsewhere. This is not going to cease,” the cartel operative mentioned.
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