The world’s most wanted drug lord is still alive despite rumors he is dead and his whereabouts have been determined.
Nemesio Rubén Oseguera Cervantes, better known as El Mencho, is the leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), considered the most dangerous drug trafficking organization in Mexico.
El Mencho is at the top of both Mexico’s and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) most wanted lists. The DEA is offering a $10 million reward for information leading to his arrest, but only El Chapo’s son, Iván Archivaldo Guzmán Salazar, has a similar reward.
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Many high-profile drug offenders have been arrested in Mexico in recent months, but El Mencho has proven to be the most elusive of them all. Now, according to reports, security forces finally located him late last year.
MVS Noticias journalist Oscar Balmen reported that “three senior officials” in Mexico confirmed last fall that “national criminal intelligence had tracked down the leadership of the CJNG.”
He added: “They even predicted that El Mencho would collapse between the beginning of 2024 and March 1 of this year.” Mr Balmen said based on information from the US, Australian Federal Police and Panamanian National Police, he was ready to launch two operations, “Plan A and Plan B”, to finally bring the drug gangs to justice. .
However, the report claimed that none of these plans were implemented due to a breakdown in relations between Mexican authorities and the DEA following a series of leaks containing information about corruption allegations against Mexico’s president. Andrés Manuel López Obrador (known as AMLO).
Articles last month by InSight Crime, ProPublica, and Deutsche Welle claimed that DEA agents discovered evidence of financial ties between AMLO’s inner circle and cartels during the failed 2006 presidential election.
The New York Times subsequently claimed that U.S. law enforcement officials were investigating alleged ties between human traffickers and close associates of ALMO. The paper reported that the US government had “little appetite to pursue allegations against the leader of one of America’s key allies” and no formal investigation was launched. Mexico’s president denied the allegations.
MVS Noticias reports that the January allegations led to a breakdown in cooperation between Mexico and the DEA. This is said to have stalled attempts to coordinate an operation to capture El Mencho, allowing the world’s most wanted drug lord to go on the loose.
In 2020, there were claims that El Mencho built his own medical facility in rural Jalisco to receive treatment for a long-term kidney disease, according to Insight Crime.
The Narcomantas billboard, erected by the drug cartel to send a message to the public, claimed that he died of kidney problems in 2022. CJNG splinter group Mescales also announced that it would end its allegiance with the cartel, saying he would die in 2022. .
Other unconfirmed reports suggest that he died of respiratory arrest in early 2022. These rumors now seem to have died down for good.
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