The founder of the feared drug cartel Los Zetas has been deported to Mexico after a long prison sentence in the USA.
Osiel Cárdenas Guillén, 57, led Los Zetas until 2003, when he was cornered by Mexican soldiers near his hometown of Matamoros.
Under his leadership, the group developed into one of the most powerful and brutal hit squads in the Mexican drug war.
U.S. immigration officials turned Cárdenas over to Mexican police at the Otay border crossing, where he was quickly rearrested and taken to the maximum-security El Altiplano prison in the Mexican state.
Mexican prosecutors said he was arrested on murder and organized crime charges dating back to his time as one of the most powerful drug lords in Mexico.
Cárdenas Guillén made his criminal career in the Gulf drug cartel in the 1990s and was reportedly not afraid to have his allies killed to rise to the top, earning him the nickname “Mata Amigos” (Spanish for “friend killer”) . ).
But what made him famous was recruiting members of Mexico’s elite special forces and using them as hitmen and enforcers for the Gulf Cartel.
The lawmen-turned-hitmen became known as Los Zetas.
The brutal methods they used, such as beheading and dismembering their victims, quickly spread terror throughout northeastern Mexico, which was their stronghold.
At the beginning of the 2000s, Cárdenas Guillén was one of Mexico’s most wanted men.
Mexican security forces managed to capture him in his home state of Tamaulipas in 2003 after a bloody gun battle.
Aware of the power the gang leader wielded in the region, security forces quickly flew him to the capital, Mexico City, where he was remanded in custody.
He was extradited to the USA in 2007.
There he was not only accused of smuggling tons of cocaine into the USA, but also of threatening to attack and murder federal officials.
He pleaded guilty in 2010 and was sentenced to 25 years in prison.
After serving most of his sentence, he was released from the federal prison in Terre Haute, Idaho, in August 2024 and turned over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
This paved the way for his deportation to Mexico on Monday.
Mexican prosecutors said Cárdenas Guillén still has seven federal cases pending and could be sentenced to a total of more than 700 years in prison if found guilty on all charges.
