For four decades, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) had waited for the narcotics boss they believed responsible for the murder of one of their agents to face justice on American soil.
That wait finally ended last week when Rafael Caro Quintero stood in a federal court in Brooklyn, New York, to answer for the 1985 killing of Enrique “Kiki” Camarena. Kidnapped outside the U.S. consulate in Guadalajara, Camarena’s body was discovered a month later, showing clear signs of torture—his ribs broken and skull fractured by heavy blows.
Caro Quintero, the leader of the Guadalajara Cartel (a precursor to the Sinaloa Cartel), has long been believed to be the mastermind behind the crime. The killing of Camarena severely damaged relations between the United States and Mexico, exposing deep corruption within this country’s armed forces, police and government, with ties to organized crime that many claim persist to this day.
Caro Quintero spent most of the past three decades behind bars in Mexico for his criminal activities, but the DEA never gave up hope of one day securing his extradition to the United States.
Enter President Donald Trump, whose aggressive stance on curbing drug and migrant flows into the United States has led him to make bold threats against Mexico. On January 20, the first day of his second term, he issued an executive order designating Mexican cartels as terrorist organizations, effectively giving him the authority to order military strikes on drug targets in Mexico. In response, President Claudia Sheinbaum quickly ramped up security operations throughout the country, and, breaking with established protocols and legal precedent, oversaw the “expulsion” of 29 drug traffickers awaiting trial, and arranged for their transfer to the United States.
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