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Mexico Busted an Alleged Drug Cartel Boss While He Was on a Pleasure Cruise

Daniel Quintero Riestra captured near Cancún, over 1,000 miles from the city of Guadalajara where he allegedly headed operations for The New Generation Jalisco Cartel.
Photo via National Security Commission

The Mexican authorities have announced the capture of a high level drug trafficker they say was responsible for multiple crimes in the western city of Guadalajara where he allegedly headed operations of the locally dominant cartel.

National Security Commissioner Renato Sales told reporters that Daniel Quintero Riestra was among the government's "122 primary objectives" and was arrested while on a pleasure boat trip near the resort city of Cancún, over 1,000 miles from Guadalajara.

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Sales said Quintero was "responsible for carrying out illegal activities of all kinds in the metropolitan area of Guadalajara, [the capital of the state of] Jalisco, at the service of the criminal organization operating there."  This appeared to be code for the New Generation Jalisco Cartel that is currently one of the government's top concerns.

The commissioner, speaking on Tuesday evening, directly linked Quintero to the murders of a state level minister and a Venezuelan model.

Jalisco's tourism minister, José Gallegos Alvarez, was ambushed and killed by an armed commando in March 2013. Alleged gunmen later arrested for the assassination said they were acting on orders from Quintero, according to daily newspaper Reforma.

Local media also reported that two men arrested for the murder of model Daysi Ferrer said they were following Quintero's instructions. Ferrer was kidnapped in December 2012. Her body was found two days later.

Both murders took place in Guadalajara before the government had explicitly identified the New Generation Jalisco Cartel as one of Mexico's biggest criminal organizations. The relatively young organization was formed about five years ago from the remnants of other cartels that fragmented in the wake of the death or capture of their top leaders. It is now said to maintain a working alliance with the more deep-rooted Sinaloa cartel that remains the country's largest trafficking group.

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The government announced that combatting the New Generation Jalisco Cartel was one of its most important objectives only after the group began directly challenging security forces in Jalisco last year.

A series of attacks on officers from different kinds of police and numerous government officials lead up to a mountain ambush in April in which gunmen killed 15 state police officers and wounded another five.

The federal government responded by launching a major army-led operation in Jalisco in May, focused on the cartel. The offensive's first day ended in chaos with gunmen shooting down a military helicopter, at the same time as the cartel orchestrated dozens of burning roadblocks in Guadalajara and across the state, as well as attacks on banks and gasoline stations.

Direct confrontations with the authorities have faded since then.

Related: How the Jalisco New Generation Cartel Is Terrorizing the People of Western Mexico

Follow Jo Tuckman on Twitter: @jotuckman