Kingpin avoids death penalty with plea deal
Mexican drug lord Francisco Javier Arellano Felix pleads guilty to federal charges that will put him in prison for life without the possibility of parole.

Competing Mexican drug cartels are destroying each other ... and that's where 'Warrior' begins ...."

http://imdb.com/title/tt0320751
http://www.warriorthemovie.blogspot.com

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-208917617001990565&q=warrior+mexican+OR+drug+OR+cartels+duration%3Ashort+genre%3AMOVIE_TRAILER

"the action adventure fantasy feature film "Warrior" ... about the son of a divine force ... is a story of a young man's quest to find his true identity set against the twin backdrops of Native American folklore and the treacherous Mexican drug trade and a portrayal of the classic confrontation between "good and evil" ... filmed in the exotic jungles of Costa Azul in the State of Nayarit and the urban grit of Puerto Vallarta in the State of Jalisco, Mexico .. with action, adventure, romance, comedy, a multi-ethnic cast, a major studio movie music score and spectacular cinematography..."

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-mexgang18sep18,1,1245241.story?coll=la-headlines-california
From the Los Angeles Times
Kingpin avoids death penalty with plea deal
Mexican drug lord Francisco Javier Arellano Felix pleads guilty to federal charges that will put him in prison for life without the possibility of parole.
By Tony Perry
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

September 18, 2007

SAN DIEGO -- Mexican gangster Francisco Javier Arellano Felix, the alleged boss of a family-run drug cartel thought to be responsible for scores of murders in Mexico and the U.S., pleaded guilty Monday to charges that will put him in prison for life without the possibility of parole.

Arellano Felix, who appeared wan and submissive, pleaded guilty to running a drug organization and money laundering. In exchange, federal prosecutors agreed to drop other charges and not seek the death penalty.

In a brief recitation to the judge, Arellano Felix's attorneys said their client had admitted that his Tijuana-based organization grossed $20 million a year from the smuggling and sale of hundreds of tons of cocaine and marijuana. Violence was a routine business practice, the attorneys told U.S. District Judge Larry A. Burns.

Burns set Nov. 5 for sentencing to allow for a probation report, although he noted that federal sentencing guidelines required him to sentence Arellano Felix to life in prison without parole. The report might be helpful if those guidelines were changed to allow parole for the charges to which Arellano Felix pleaded guilty, he said.

"I don't want to create any false hopes by pointing out that that possibility exists," Burns said.

Arellano Felix, 39, has been in federal custody since August 2006, when 30 heavily armed Coast Guardsmen boarded his fishing boat, the Dock Holiday, in international waters off the coast of Baja California.

U.S. drug agents had received a tip that the elusive Arellano Felix and others were deep-sea fishing. Ten people were aboard the boat, including three of Arellano Felix's children, ages 5 to 11.

As part of the plea bargain, Arellano Felix agreed to forfeit the boat, a 43-foot yacht, and $50 million in drug profits.

At its height in the 1990s, Arellano Felix's organization was believed to be supplying nearly half of the cocaine sold in the U.S.

The organization allegedly ordered the murder of a deputy police chief in Tijuana and the beheadings of three officers. In the crossfire of a shootout at Mexico's Guadalajara airport in 1993, Roman Catholic Cardinal Juan Jesus Posadas Ocampo was killed.

Arellano Felix, alleged to have had plastic surgery to mask his identity, was said to have frequently traveled to San Diego and enjoyed the local night life and shopping.

But any hint of bravado was gone Monday as he shuffled into court, shackled,wearing an orange prison jumpsuit and surrounded by U.S. marshals. Assistant U.S. Atty. Laura E. Duffy told Burns that a deal was struck Saturday after Department of Justice officials in Washington agreed to drop a request for the death penalty.

Also pleading guilty was Manuel Arturo Villarreal Heredia, 32, an assassin for the cartel and one of Arellano Felix's top lieutenants, who was aboard the Dock Holiday when the U.S. Coast Guard arrived.

Villarreal Heredia pleaded guilty to operating an illegal enterprise and conspiring to invest drug profits. He agreed to forfeit $5 million. In exchange for his guilty pleas, federal prosecutors agreed to recommend a sentence of 30 years in federal prison.

Karen Hewitt, acting U.S. attorney for Southern California, said that U.S. and Mexican authorities have dismantled the leadership of the cartel.

Arellano Felix assumed control of the cartel in 2002, according to federal prosecutors.

Under his control, cartel "soldiers" killed rival gangsters, kidnapped individuals for ransom, trained assassination squads and paid millions of dollars in bribes to government officials in Mexico, they said.

The cartel also "taxed" other criminal groups in Tijuana and Mexicali.

In Washington, Drug Enforcement Agency Administrator Karen P. Tandy said the guilty pleas have "driven a stake through the heart of one of the world's most powerful drug cartels."

Acting Deputy Atty. Gen. Craig S. Morford said Arellano Felix finally joined the list of convicted drug kingpins that included Gilbert and Miguel Rodriguez-Orjuella, both Colombian, and Afghan drug lord Mohammad Noorzai.

Arellano Felix eluded authorities for years despite a $5-million reward for information leading to his capture. He surrendered without a fight when the Coast Guardsmen boarded his boat.

tony.perry@latimes.com

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Colombia arrests alleged drug lord

Competing Mexican drug cartels are destroying each other ... and that's where 'Warrior' begins ...."

http://imdb.com/title/tt0320751
http://www.warriorthemovie.blogspot.com

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-208917617001990565&q=warrior+mexican+OR+drug+OR+cartels+duration%3Ashort+genre%3AMOVIE_TRAILER

"the action adventure fantasy feature film "Warrior" ... about the son of a divine force ... is a story of a young man's quest to find his true identity set against the twin backdrops of Native American folklore and the treacherous Mexican drug trade and a portrayal of the classic confrontation between "good and evil" ... filmed in the exotic jungles of Costa Azul in the State of Nayarit and the urban grit of Puerto Vallarta in the State of Jalisco, Mexico .. with action, adventure, romance, comedy, a multi-ethnic cast, a major studio movie music score and spectacular cinematography..."

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-cocaine11sep11,1,3455289.story?coll=la-headlines-world
From the Los Angeles Times
Colombia arrests alleged drug lord
From the Associated Press

September 11, 2007

BOGOTA, COLOMBIA — -- Soldiers swarmed onto a farm before dawn Monday and captured Diego Montoya, an alleged leader of a cartel accused of shipping hundreds of tons of cocaine to the United States since the 1990s.

Montoya, 49, sits on the FBI's 10 most-wanted list with a $5-million reward for his capture. The Norte del Valle cartel is deemed Colombia's most dangerous drug gang, and Defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos told a news conference at Bogota's airport that Montoya was responsible for 1,500 killings.

"Drug traffickers take note: This is the future that awaits you," Santos said before Montoya limped out of an air force plane, wearing plastic handcuffs and escorted by five commandos.

The suspect put up no resistance when the army finally cornered him in the cartel's stronghold of Valle del Cauca state in western Colombia, officials said. He is to be questioned before being extradited to the U.S., a process that Santos said would take at most two months.

After months of planning, elite commandos raided the small farm and nabbed Montoya along with his mother, an uncle and three other cartel members, said the army chief, Gen. Mario Montoya, who is not related.

The government has been closing in on the cartel since last year, when soldiers killed eight members of a private militia believed to be protecting Montoya. But a wide network of cartel informants had frustrated the search for the alleged drug boss himself. Local media have recently carried stories on the cartel's alleged infiltration of Colombia's army and navy.

Santos said the operation was kept top secret to avoid leaks and was run entirely by an elite army commando unit that works with prosecutors to bring down the cartel.

Colombian officials called it their biggest drug war victory since the 1993 slaying of Medellin cartel leader Pablo Escobar.

Washington welcomed the news. "Colombia's capture of cocaine kingpin Diego Montoya shows what can be accomplished by a government that is relentless, focused and skilled in the effort to dismantle threats to its democracy," said White House drug czar John P. Walters.

Better known as "Don Diego," Montoya is said to be in a bitter turf war with his cartel's other leader, Wilber Varela, who goes by the nickname "Jabon," or "Soap," and is reported to be living in Venezuela. Hundreds have died in fighting between their rival armed bands along Colombia's Pacific coast.

A U.S. indictment unsealed in 2004 against Montoya and Varela said that over the previous 14 years, their cartel had exported more than 1.2 million pounds -- 600 tons -- of cocaine worth more than $10 billion from Colombia to Mexico and ultimately to the United States for resale.

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