MEXICO CITY — Mexican authorities Thursday announced the capture of Vicente Carrillo Leyva, a suspected top leader of a family-run drug gang based in Ciudad Juárez and one of the country’s most-wanted figures.
Federal law enforcement officials said Carrillo Leyva, the son of deceased drug kingpin Amado Carrillo Fuentes, was arrested Wednesday while exercising in a wealthy neighborhood of Mexico City.
The younger Carrillo was listed among the country’s 24 most-wanted drug suspects last week when the federal government offered $2 million rewards for each. Authorities described him as an heir to the organization once led by his father, who was known as the “Lord of the Skies” for his use of aircraft to move drugs.
The announcement came as U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano were preparing to meet outside Mexico City on Thursday afternoon with top Mexican security officials. Emerging from their conference, Mexican Attorney General Eduardo Medina-Mora said the U.S. and Mexico are creating a cross-border group to develop strategies for stopping the illegal flow of guns and drugs between the two countries.
Medina-Mora said Mexico planned to begin checking 10 percent of the vehicles entering the country from the U.S. for illegal weapons and will more closely check outgoing vehicles for drugs and money.
Medina-Mora said the new vehicle-inspection measures were part of Mexico’s overall $1.4 billion modernization of border customs and crossing points. The first such vehicle checks are already being carried out in Matamoros, across the border from Brownsville, Texas.
The officials hammered out an agreement that might be signed when President Barack Obama visits Mexican President Felipe Calderon later this month.
Medina-Mora said one point still in negotiation is how to ensure prosecution of anyone violating guns laws, whether they are arrested in Mexico or the United States. In addition, he said, the two countries will create a shared ballistics database to track weapons used in crimes.
Drug- and gang-related violence left about 1,600 people dead in Ciudad Juárez last year.
