Way Cleared for Zuno to Return to Mexico

A Los Angeles federal judge Tuesday cleared the way for Mexican businessman Ruben Zuno Arce, who faces perjury charges in connection with the murder of a U.S. drug agent, to return to Mexico.

U.S. District Judge Robert M. Takasugi accepted offers by Zuno’s lawyers of property and cash to secure $200,000 bail and ordered Zuno’s release at 10 a.m. today after Assistant U.S. Atty. Adam Schiff signs off on two pieces of property offered as security.

Unless an unexpected problem arises, Zuno, 59, will be released from the Metropolitan Detention Center, where he has been held since Aug. 9, and placed on a flight to Mexico.

The arrangement for Zuno’s departure was approved last week by Immigration Judge Lauren R. Mathon after the INS modified a “hold” placed on Zuno that labeled him a suspected drug trafficker.

“The immigration service will take him to LAX and place him on the next available flight to the interior of Mexico,” said INS District Counsel John Bartos.

Zuno, brother-in-law of former Mexican President Luis Echeverria, is due back in federal court on Nov. 7. He faces charges of lying to a grand jury when he denied knowing two drug kingpins who are in jail in Mexico pending charges in the February, 1985, murder of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent Enrique Camarena.