Mexico’s most wanted drug cartel Nemesio Oseguera Ruben Cervantes, popularly known as “El Mencho”, has been killed. The drug lord died in a military operation that had targeted to arrest him at Tapalpa, Central-Western Jalisco state.
During the Sunday, February 22 operation, El Mencho, a co-founder and leader of a gang that in recent years had become Mexico’s most powerful criminal organisation, “Jalisco New Generation Cartel” (CJNG), was wounded in a clash with soldiers in the town of Tapalpa and died while being flown to Mexico City.
Mexico’s Defence Ministry confirmed El Mencho was initially wounded, but later died during an air transfer to Mexico City. The operation sparked a wave of violence as gunmen attacked cars and blocked highways in more than half a dozen states, including Jalisco, Colima, Michoacan, Nayarit, Guanajuato, and Tamaulipas, where the gang’s operations are active.
Videos shared online by eyewitnesses showed heavy smoke blowing into the sky from burning cars in several neighbourhoods, while frightened tourists at Jalisco’s Puerto Vallarta resort beach on social media described it as a “war zone”.
The 59-year-old former police officer and avocado farmer turned to a gang leader, who had a $15 M bounty on his head from the United States. According to the US Drug Enforcement Administration, the cartel was one of the main suppliers of cocaine, fantelyn and other drugs in large quantities to the US market. In 2015, an effort to capture El Mencho ended badly with cartel gang members shooting down an army helicopter with a rocket launcher.
According to the defence force department, during the operation, four people were killed, three others were badly injured, including El Mencho, and later died. Two more people were arrested, and armoured vehicles, rocket launchers and other firearms were seized.
The governor of Jalisco, Pablo Lemus, told residents to stay at home, halting all public transport and cancelling mass events and in-person classes. A post shared on X by the Mexican President, President Claudia Sheinbaum, praised Mexico’s security forces for the operation in which “El Mencho” was captured.
“There is absolute coordination with the governments of all states. In the vast majority of the national territory, activities are proceeding with complete normality,” she said.
This military operation against El Mencho follows a pressure campaign from the administration of US President Donald Trump on Sheinbaum’s government to ramp up its crackdown on drug trafficking, including threats to intervene directly in Mexico.
According to the US Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, El Mencho was a top target for the Mexican and United States government as one of the top traffickers of fentanyl into the US.
The Mexican Ministry of Defence said that the raid aimed at capturing El Mencho had been carried out by the Mexican army, with support from the country’s National Guard and Air Force. Adding complementary information provided by the US had helped seize the drug cartel.
Article by Lydia Oluoch
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