This article was translated and reposted from RIODOCE
The United States extradited ‘Rey’ Zambada and ‘Minilic’ to punish them for their crimes, but instead negotiated with them and released them; in Mexico, their crimes remain unpunished.
The appearance of drug traffickers such as Jesus Reynaldo Zambada Garcia, Rey, and Damaso Lopez Serrano, the Minilic, giving interviews to broadcasters and journalists, shows how the US justice system really works, because from being among the most wanted, today both drug traffickers work and walk free in the streets of the United States, under the label of being on parole.
Luis Astorga, professor at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), considered that for the United States there are more important, emblematic and mediatic cases than the cases of Zambada García and Minilic, which did not represent the trophies that other drug traffickers are for that country.
“Some of those cases will never be released, others will, if after many years their information they gave was profitable; and the least will undoubtedly be released in a short time, of course, as long as their testimonies are solid to sink drug traffickers who will undoubtedly be the biggest trophies,” said Astorga, referring to Joaquin, El Chapo Guzman and his sons, who, in the opinion of other analysts, represent a political medal for U.S. officials.
Two weeks ago, López Serrano gave separate interviews to journalists Anabel Hernández and Luis Chaparro, while King Zambada gave it to broadcaster Pepe Garza, during a program for his Youtube channel.
EL ‘MINILIC’.
The interviews caused outrage among journalists and security analysts who criticized the U.S. government, which always sold the idea that these drug traffickers had done a lot of damage and that they would be judged with the full weight of the law when they were in its power, to finally shelter them for collaborating with them, with the understanding that they would collaborate to sink drug traffickers of their own group that the government considered more emblematic.
“It is a transaction that the United States carries out with drug traffickers, and it does so because these are its rules of the game. And they are rules that the Colombians understood. Now that possibility is open to the Mexicans. Afterwards, they will see if those narcos write books, corridos and live off their royalties,” said the researcher, author of El siglo de las drogas (The Century of Drugs).
Zambada García was arrested on October 19, 2008 in Mexico City, along with 15 other people. He was first prosecuted for organized crime, aggravated homicide and possession of weapons for the exclusive use of the Armed Forces. Two years later, the Fifth Court for Federal Criminal Proceedings, based in the State of Mexico, sentenced him to formal imprisonment for another trial, criminal case 180/2009 for crimes against health, stockpiling weapons and cartridges for exclusive use of the Armed Forces.
He was then incarcerated in the high security federal prison of Matamoros, Tamaulipas.
However, both processes were pending resolution, since in April 2012 he was handed over to the United States. According to the bilateral extradition treaty, Zambada García must be returned to Mexico after paying his debts with the U.S. justice system.
Even though such proceedings are pending, unofficial sources from the Attorney General’s Office (FGR) stated that King Zambada does not have any arrest warrants in Mexico.
The website Búho Legal, for its part, also has no data showing charges pending against Ismael Zambada’s younger brother, El Mayo Zambada, although the legal consultation site clarifies the possibility that his defense requested the judge to keep his name private.
“There are occasions when it happens, but in this case we can’t know if this person’s case was kept confidential, or if there was never really an accusation against him by federal authorities in the country,” said a spokesperson for Búho Legal.
The Minilic case is different, because the drug trafficker is accused of being the intellectual murderer of journalist Javier Valdez Cardenas, and there is an extradition request against him that the U.S. government refuses to grant, due to the fact that Lopez Serrano continues to collaborate as an informant with the U.S. government.
They wanted to kill me
During the interview with Pepe Garza, Zambada García acknowledged having been one of the leaders of the faction commanded by his brother Ismael, but that after 12 years in prison, good behavior, and having collaborated with the U.S. government, he is now on parole “working honestly”, but without specifying what he does.
“I don’t want to go back to Mexico, because if I do, I would go back to the same thing. And the reality is that prison life is very hard. If someone has never lived it, they don’t know what it’s like. But I have, because I spent 12 years there, and I don’t want to go back even one day,” said Zambada García, during an interview that lasted for an hour and 20 minutes, and where he spoke about his intention to become a singer-songwriter.
THE KINGPIN ARRESTED IN MEXICO CITY. End of the race.
Dressed in a gray Porkpie hat, a royal blue shirt and a necklace with a Santa Muerte figure hanging from it, Zambada García admitted that the night of his arrest in Mexico City, they were actually going to kill him, because after the first shots were fired by a convoy of Siedo agents trying to enter his home, he recognized Sergio Villarreal Barragán, El Grande, among the soldiers, so he quickly tried to get to safety.
“My arrest was more like an attempted homicide. They were going to kill me. They never came to identify themselves as the government, nor did they show an arrest warrant, but they came firing bullets, left and right, because what they wanted was to kill me,” recalls the former drug trafficker.
He adds: “And I realized and the truth is that I acted coldly, and when I saw that Arturo (Beltrán Leyva)’s people were with them, and how could I not recognize the Grande, I quickly asked for help from the local municipal police, and that’s why they didn’t kill me.
Zambada Garcia’s account coincides with the testimony Villarreal Barragan gave during the trial against Genaro Garcia Luna, when he details how he participated in the operation to arrest King Zambada in October 2008.
“On orders from Arturo Beltrán Leyva, I infiltrated with other hitmen, with agents of the then Deputy Attorney General’s Office Specializing in Organized Crime Investigations (Siedo), to capture the brother of Ismael Zambada.
to capture Ismael Zambada’s brother,” said El Grande.
During that operation, in addition to King Zambada, 15 other people were also arrested, among them his son Jesús Zambada Reyes, 21, and his nephew Juan José Parra Zambada, known as Juanjo.
Finally, the King was arrested in that operation and detained in the Altiplano prison in Almoloya, and a year later he was extradited to the United States where, after agreeing to collaborate with the U.S. government, a sentence of 20 years was reduced to 12 years, thanks to good behavior and negotiations made by his lawyer with prosecutors.
But it wasn’t until a couple of years ago that prison agents told him to be careful, because they had intelligence information that the former Public Security Secretary had ordered him to kill him.
“The agents told me to be careful because Genaro had sent to kill me. It is difficult to know if that was true or not, since those who really know is the government. But they told me not to worry, because everything would be fine. Maybe they told me that so I wouldn’t get scared,” recalled El Rey.
Eventually, Zambada Garcia testified against Garcia Luna, and his testimony would have contributed to putting the former security secretary in prison for life.
According to El Rey, the formula to stay out of the spotlight was to keep a low profile, for which he had to change his name, a name, he explains, that he suddenly came up with.
“Everything I did was under that name, and I ended up being that name. I had a passport with that name, a visa, border crossing, so I could enter the United States whenever I wanted, and I traveled through Europe and South America. That’s why, when I was captured, I (as Jesús Reynaldo Zambada García) didn’t even have a traffic violation,” said the drug trafficker.
Article published on November 12, 2023 in the 1085 edition of the weekly Ríodoce.
