Baja Drug Prosecutor Replaced Amid Killings

The top Baja California federal prosecutor has been replaced amid a string of unsolved killings of senior law enforcement officials--a bloody barrage for which Tijuana’s notorious drug lords are responsible, federal authorities said Tuesday.

A top Mexican official said his government is outraged by two recent slayings on its doorstep in Mexico City and views them as a direct challenge by the Arellano Felix brothers, the reputed leaders of the Tijuana cartel. He vowed that the government would strike back.

“Behind these lamentable murders stands the organization of the Arellano Felix brothers,” said Rafael Estrada, a deputy attorney general in Mexico City. “We are almost sure it is them. We have been exerting strong pressure against this organization. . . . They are trying to rebound with this type of action.”

Estrada said the killings raised strong concerns over the security of U.S. anti-drug agents in Mexico, who he said were on heightened alert. U.S. officials refused to comment.

“We think the situation is under control, but there is worry that virulent attacks such as those we have suffered could extend to other organizations, Mexican or foreign, that are working in the country,” Estrada said.

The outgoing prosecutor, Luis Antonio Ibanez Cornejo, 37, is the first top Baja federal official in recent months to leave his post alive.

The two other top anti-narcotics officers assigned to Tijuana, federal police Cmdr. Ernesto Ibarra Santes and local anti-drug chief Jorge Garcia Vargas, were killed in the last two weeks, part of a string of seven assassinations that have left Baja California law enforcement in disarray.

Estrada said authorities had already arrested a chauffeur of an Arellano vehicle for alleged involvement in the Ibarra killing. He said the man was being interrogated but gave no further details. “The attorney general is heading toward an important and exemplary action” against the Arellanos, he said, adding: “This is not for vengeance, but because of the country’s urgent need to dismantle these organized crime groups.”

The killing of Ibarra and Garcia Vargas in Mexico City was a clear challenge to federal authorities, Estrada said.

“It’s a very clear message. To me, the message is, ‘I can operate wherever I want, including a few blocks from your headquarters,’ ” Estrada said.

“This is a direct challenge to the government of Mexico and their law enforcement program,” a U.S. official said. “Now it’s up to the government to respond to this.”

Cuauhtemoc Herrera Suastegui, 43, a veteran anti-narcotics expert who was federal police commander in Jalisco and Campeche and head of a federal narcotics research center in Mexico City, took over as Baja delegate of the federal attorney general’s office in a ceremony late Monday, according to Jesus Velasco, the spokesman of the Tijuana federal delegation.

Ibanez Cornejo will go to Mexico City for reassignment, he said.

Federal investigators in Tijuana are also looking into whether corrupt federal police may have been involved in any of the murders, said Hector Villareal of the attorney general’s office in Mexico City.

Five of the killings took place in Mexico City or nearby, and investigators are scrutinizing possible criminal links to officials elsewhere, Villareal said.

“They could be officials, police, ex-police. It will all be investigated,” Villareal said.

Although most of the seven killings this year appear to be narcotics-related, several U.S. and Mexican officials said they are not certain all of the victims were martyrs of the anti-drug war; some, they suggested, may have been corrupt allies of the traffickers.

Ibarra Santes, however, was well-respected by U.S. law enforcement agents. He was killed in Mexico City shortly after arriving on a flight from Tijuana on Sept. 14.

He had been named to the post 28 days earlier after a sweep of more than 700 corrupt federal agents nationwide, and he vowed to fire any Baja agent caught working for the traffickers. In August, he had helped to arrest the Lupercio Serratos brothers, alleged allies of the Arellanos in their narcotics turf war with reputed Gulf Cartel kingpin Amado Carillo.

The second recent victim, Garcia Vargas, was tortured and strangled after getting off a plane in Mexico City. In a macabre mix-up, his death was announced three days before his badly decomposed body was found Sept. 25 in the trunk of a car, along with the corpse of a cashiered police commander with strong reputed ties to drug barons. Authorities said a body found Sept. 21 had been mistaken for the corpse of Garcia Vargas.

O’Connor reported from Tijuana, Sheridan from Mexico City.