Twenty-five members of the Mexican National Guard were left dead in six separate attacks after special forces killed the notorious leader of theJalisco New Generation Cartel, the country’s security secretary said Monday as much of Mexico feared more violence,
AP reports.
Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, known as “El Mencho,” was the boss of one of the fastest-growing criminal networks in Mexico, known for trafficking fentanyl, methamphetamine and cocaine to the United States and staging brazen attacks against government officials who challenged the cartel.
He was killed after a shootout in his home state of Jalisco as the Mexican military attempted to capture him. Cartel members responded with widespread violence, blocking roads and setting fire to vehicles.
Mexican Defense Secretary Ricardo Trevilla said Monday that authorities had followed one of Oseguera Cervantes’ romantic partners to his hideout in Tapalpa, Jalisco.
Army and National Guard special forces moved in Sunday morning and immediately came under heavy fire. Eight gunmen were killed there. Oseguera Cervantes and two bodyguards fled into a wooded area where they were seriously wounded in a firefight, Trevilla said. They were flown out along with a wounded soldier, but El Mencho and his bodyguards died en route to Mexico City, he said.
In a different location in Jalisco, soldiers also killed another high-ranking cartel member who Trevilla said was coordinating violence and offering more than $1,000 for every soldier killed.
Also killed Sunday were a prison guard, an agent from the state prosecutor’s office and a woman who was not identified by authorities. Security Secretary Omar García Harfuch said some 30 criminal suspects were killed in Jalisco and four others were killed in the neighboring state of Michoacan.
