3 Mexican Police Officials Held in U. S. Agent’s Death

Three federal police commanders and 27 other people are being held in connection with the abduction and murder of an American narcotics agent, the Mexican attorney general’s office said late Wednesday.

Drug Enforcement Administration agent Enrique S. Camarena and his Mexican pilot, Adolfo Zavala Avelar, were kidnaped Feb. 7 in Guadalajara, 300 miles north of Mexico City, and were found dead last week at a nearby ranch.

The attorney general’s office said in a statement that federal police commanders Jalisco Benjamin Locheo Salazar and Gabriel Gonzalez Gonzalez were detained late Wednesday and that Cmdr. Jose Manuel Lopez Razon has been held since Monday, all on suspicion of “criminal conduct.”

Other Arrests

Also being held are police agents Juan Rufo Solorio, Victor Lopez Malo, Raul Lopez Alvarez, Gerardo Lepe and five others, the announcement said.

The statement said the three commanders, the nine police agents and 18 civilians were being held for suspected drug activities and for possible collaboration in Camarena’s abduction and murder.

Earlier, Times staff writer Ronald J. Ostrow reported from Washington that federal investigators are providing Mexican police with what they consider prime leads on four Mexican narcotics suspects linked to the kidnap-murder of Camarena.

The information being relayed deals with both the present whereabouts of the four suspects as well as details that reportedly tie them to the murder, a source familiar with the case said Wednesday.

Since Camarena’s body was discovered, U.S. officials have accused Mexican police of negligence in the investigation. But the Justice Department, after Atty. Gen. Edwin Meese III met with other top officials of the department and the DEA, decided to withhold further criticism pending a Mexican response to the new information, officials said.

Meese is expected to talk about the Camarena case Friday at his first news conference as the nation’s top law enforcement official. In remarks made after the bodies of Camarena and Avelar, a Mexican pilot who sometimes flew DEA missions, were found, Meese labeled those responsible for the murders as “terrorists.”

4 Suspects’ Names Listed

The four men being sought in the case are Rafael Caro Quintero, who was allowed by Mexican federal judicial police to leave Guadalajara after the DEA had asked that he be detained; Jose Mata Ballesteros, who with four bodyguards escaped a raid by police on a Mexico City apartment conducted two days after the DEA pinpointed his location; Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo, who with Caro Quintero is reportedly a member of a marijuana and cocaine trafficking operation, and Manuel Salcido, known as “Cochiloco” (Crazy Pig), a runner for the traffickers who had exchanged sharp words with Camarena.

None of the suspects are believed to be among those who actually abducted and killed Camarena, federal investigative sources said. They said they believe that three of the suspects planned and ordered the kidnaping and murder but that the role of the fourth, Salcido, is not clear.

Mata Ballesteros is believed to be in Madrid and Caro Quintero in Mexico’s Sonora state, sources said.

In a related development, it was learned that the Air Force has billed the DEA $31,300 for flying Camarena’s body from Guadalajara back to the United States. DEA officials expressed annoyance about the billing, noting that the Camarena investigation already has cost the agency more than $1 million and that it must seek a supplemental appropriation from Congress to meet the costs.