Wife of powerful Mexican drug lord ‘El Mencho’ arrested

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MEXICO CITY – Mexico’s military arrested the wife of drug lord Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, alias “El Mencho,” in the western state of Jalisco on Tuesday, raising concerns about possible violent retaliation by her gang, Mexican officials said. .

Rosalinda González Valencia was captured in Zapopan, part of the Guadalajara city conurbation, in a “significant blow to the financial structure of organized crime in the state of Jalisco,” the Defense Ministry said in a statement.

On the other hand, a Mexican official said that two marines had been kidnapped in Zapopan and that the government was concerned that González’s arrest could provoke a reaction from her husband’s gang, the Jalisco Nueva Generación Cartel (CJNG).

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González was arrested for various crimes, and the evidence points to her participation in “the illicit financial operation of an organized crime group,” the ministry added.

Oseguera, a former police officer, is possibly the most wanted drug lord in Mexico. The violent CJNG is widely viewed as the most powerful gang in Mexico alongside the Sinaloa Cartel.

Oseguera, who was awarded a $ 10 million bounty on his head by US authorities in 2018, has planned the rise of the CJNG as a criminal empire spanning five continents and is one of the few long-term cartel leaders to has evaded capture.

The CJNG has been blamed for smuggling large amounts of drugs, including the synthetic opioid fentanyl, into the United States, where overdose deaths primarily related to fentanyl rose to more than 93,000 in 2020, US data shows.

González was previously arrested in May 2018, but was released on bail a few months later.

Oseguera’s daughter, Jessica Johanna Oseguera González, was arrested in February 2020, and last May she pleaded guilty in a United States court to conducting financial deals with Mexican firms identified as drug traffickers.