or Mexico pursued suspicions that the shooting was a deliberate attack by corrupt police working on behalf of organized crime. Twelve police officers were detained in the case but there is no public evidence that the U.S. embassy vehicle, wounding two CIA officers in one of the most serious attacks on U.S. said little last year after Mexican federal police opened fire on a U.S. sending billions in equipment and training in exchange for wide access to Mexican law-enforcement agencies and intelligence. The two countries have worked closely against drug cartels over the last seven years, with the U.S.

Nearly 20 years after the enactment of the North American Free Trade Agreement, U.S.-Mexico trade exceeds $1 billion a day. Department of Justice said Friday that it found the Mexican court's decision to free Caro Quintero 'deeply troubling,' but former DEA agents said they were pessimistic that the Obama administration would bring similar pressure to bear. to perhaps their highest level in recent decades, with the Reagan administration nearly closing the border to exert pressure on a government with deep ties to the drug lords whose cartel operated with near impunity throughout Mexico.

Mexican officials did not respond to calls seeking comment Saturday.Ĭamarena's murder escalated tensions between Mexico and the U.S. He said he had not spoken to Felix Gallardo's attorneys about their expectations for that case. At its base, the issue is the same as Rafael's. 'Fonseca Carrillo should already be on the street. We believe that the judges will stick to the law,' Guizar said.

The three-judge appeals court in the western state of Jalisco ordered Caro Quintero's immediate release on procedural grounds after 28 years behind bars, saying he should have originally been prosecuted in state instead of federal court.Īlso imprisoned in the Camarena case are Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo and Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo, two of the founding fathers of modern Mexican drug trafficking.įonseca Carrillo's attorney, Jose Luis Guizar, said his team had filed an appeal based on the same procedural grounds used by Caro Quintero, and expected him to be freed within 15 days by a different court in Jalisco. Mexican drug lord Rafael Caro Quintero walked free Friday after a federal court overturned his 40-year sentence in agent Enrique 'Kiki' Camarena's kidnapping, torture and murder. MEXICO CITY - Defense attorneys believe freedom is imminent for a second member of the trio of Mexican drug kingpins responsible for the 1985 slaying of a Drug Enforcement Administration agent, one of the capo's attorneys said Saturday.

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