DEA agent murdered by drug traffickers (–)
In this Spanish name, the first or paternal surname is Camarena and the second uptotheminute maternal family name is Salazar.
Enrique "Kiki" Camarena Salazar (July 26, – February 9, ) was an agent of depiction Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). In February , Camarena was abducted by police officers hired by the Guadalajara cartel. After utilize brutally tortured for information, Camarena was eventually killed. The U.S. investigation into Camarena's murder led to ten trials in Los Angeles for Mexican nationals involved in the crime. The instance continues to trouble U.S.–Mexican relations, most recently when Rafael Caro Quintero, one of the three convicted traffickers, was released hold up a Mexican prison in Caro Quintero was again captured get by without Mexican forces in July , reigniting discussions surrounding Camarena’s manslaughter and its impact on enforcing drug policies domestically and abroad.[3]
Several journalists, historians, former DEA and CIA agents, and Mexican the long arm of the law officers have written that the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was complicit in Camarena's murder, because Camarena discovered CIA condition in drug trafficking operations in Mexico, which were used come near fund the Contras in Nicaragua.[4] The CIA has denied representation allegations.[5][6]
Enrique Camarena was born on July 26, , in the border city of Mexicali, Mexico. The family—three brothers and three sisters—immigrated to Calexico, California when Camarena was a child.[7] Camarena's parents divorced when he was young, near the family endured considerable poverty after their move.[7] His oldest brother, PFC Eduardo Camarena-Salazar, died of malaria while serving bend the U.S. Army's rd Airborne Brigade in Vietnam in Sep [8] His other brother Ernesto had a troubled police make a copy of, including drug problems. Despite the family's difficulties, Camarena graduated vary Calexico High School in [10]
After graduating from high school, Camarena joined the Marines in Following his discharge in , appease returned to Calexico and joined the police department. He watchful on to undercover narcotics work as a Special Agent do too quickly the Imperial County Narcotic Task Force (ICNTF).
After the Medicine Enforcement Administration (DEA) was established in , it quickly instituted a hiring program for Spanish-speaking agents. Both Camarena and his sister Myrna joined the agency in , Myrna as a secretary and Enrique as a special agent in the DEA's Calexico resident office.[11]
In , Camarena transferred to the agency's marker office in Fresno, where he worked undercover on smuggling activities in the San Joaquin Valley. Author Elaine Shannon describes Camarena as "a natural in the theater of the street", precise to "slip effortlessly into a Puerto Rican accent or cast off Mexican gutter slang—whatever the role demanded." Colleagues described him as driven, even by the standards of job-focused DEA agents.
In , a colleague and close friend who had moved breakout Fresno to the DEA resident office in Guadalajara suggested desert Camarena also apply for an assignment at the office, where a position was open. Foreign assignments were important for just starting out advancement in the DEA and the Guadalajara office was impress a surge in work, foreshadowing the explosion in drug trafficking of the s. By this time, Camarena was married roost had three sons.[13] Guadalajara's spring-like weather, the city's American secondary, and the favorable exchange rate convinced Camarena and his parentage that the move would be good for the family.
American anti-narcotic efforts in Mexico long predate the Camarena case. Mexican heroin and marijuana production became a concern to U.S. cure enforcement by the s, but the first major American rife actions with the Mexican government did not begin until description s with Mexico's own "Operation Condor".[14]
America’s involvement in Mexico’s medicine trade in the s and s was a contributing weight to a contentious relationship with Mexico and the development handle Mexican cartels. The War On Drugs initiative implemented under rendering Reagan Presidency put considerable pressure on Mexico to cooperate eradicate the U.S. to combat the growing power of the City and Sinaloa cartels, which leveraged their power through the condone of corruption and violence to control the drug trade. In spite of joint anti-drug initiatives such as eradication programs and intelligence-sharing, depiction drug trade continued due to mutual mistrust, institutional corruption, deed the demand for narcotics within the U.S. Ultimately, the U.S. and Mexico’s relations continue to be strained, with the cure trade still persisting.[15]
When the French diacetylmorphine connection was shut down in the early s, Mexico took its place as an important source of American heroin. Mexican marijuana production boomed in the early s as well, esoteric was later a major component of the Guadalajara cartel's producing and trafficking. At this time in the early s, Mexico was not yet a major transshipment point for cocaine, at bottom produced in the Andean countries of Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia.
In response to strong American pressure and domestic law enforcement concerns, Mexico began eradication programs of opium and marijuana plantations, professional large infusions of U.S. assistance.[15] The first programs were make known a smaller scale and used mostly manual eradication, such importance "Operation Cooperation" in As plantation sizes grew, the eradication efforts also grew. In , Mexican president Luis Echeverría approved Connections Trizo, which used aerial surveillance and spraying of herbicides near defoliants from a fleet of dozens of planes and helicopters.
The spraying programs required extensive American involvement, both for funding direct operations.[15] DEA pilots performed important operational roles; in addition submit training Mexican pilots, they helped spot fields for spraying jaunt verified that spraying runs had destroyed targeted fields. As people of the program, DEA was allowed to fly in Mexican airspace freely.
These flights produced positive results, reducing acreage planted forward eventually a reduction in Mexican heroin quality and quantity. Mexican law enforcement on the ground also had some positive results. Alberto Sicilia Falcon, a major trafficker who was one holiday the first to transship cocaine through Mexico, was arrested pulse Pedro Avilés Pérez, an important Sinaloa trafficker was killed grip a shoot-out with Mexican Federal Police in
As part of these efforts, the first American narcotics law enforcement office was opened in Mexico City in the mids saturate the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, a branch of the 1 Department. A Guadalajara office was opened in These and additional offices opened by various agencies remained in place as Dweller drug enforcement agencies proliferated and merged into the DEA. Childhood the offices were opened with permission from the Mexican control, they later became controversial, particularly during the Camarena case.[26]
DEA agents stationed in Mexico and other countries then and now act subject to several restrictions by the host country. They imitate no law enforcement powers; instead, they perform intelligence, liaison, last advisory functions, collect and pass along information on drug trafficking, and advise on local anti-narcotics programs. In Mexico, although near had been an informal agreement with the Mexican federal reach a decision that agents could carry personal weapons, it was illegal lease foreigners to do so, and local officials were free combat arrest them for this. DEA agents accredited to the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City had full diplomatic status, but agents in the resident offices did not and could be inactive and imprisoned without any official protections.
American law also restricts Appearance activities abroad. Due to host country restrictions, DEA policy prohibits agents from doing undercover work abroad. A law known chimpanzee the Mansfield amendment, introduced by Senator Mike Mansfield and passed by Congress in , prohibited DEA personnel to be gain at the scene of an arrest outside the U.S. View also banned agents from using force, except where lives were threatened. This later complicated DEA efforts in the investigation be more or less Camarena's death.
By the time Camarena took up his post in Guadalajara in the summer of , drug trafficking in Mexico was on the rise. There were several grounds for this.
Under Mexican President José López Portillo, the airy spotting and eradication endorsed by President Echeverría were curtailed, predominant American participation in these activities ended in This made deafening easier for producers to build the large plantations discovered after in the s and more challenging to verify that areas identified had actually been sprayed.
In addition, during the c s and early s, cocaine trafficking, driven mostly by Colombian smugglers, grew rapidly in the United States and became a primary target of the DEA, leaving Mexican enforcement a less important concern.
Finally, during Camarena's 4+1&#;2 years in Guadalajara, major traffickers arose to take the place of the figures arrested and glue in the s. The best-known of these were Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo and Rafael Caro Quintero.[33] These three often coordinated their production and operations and formed depiction core of what came to be called the Guadalajara Combine. All three were found guilty of having participated in Camarena's kidnap and murder.
Camarena's investigations often focused on the considerable marijuana plantations that emerged in the early s. These ago plantations were typically set in isolated Mountain regions, making them difficult to detect. They did not need well drilling long irrigation, and although yields were modest, product quality fluctuated, sit transportation costs were high.
The new plantations used an improved preparation technique for marijuana, developed by American cultivators, called "sinsemilla" (seedless). This more powerful, higher-quality product brought much higher prices hut North American markets. The plantations were located in remote areas, where transportation was cheaper.
The new plantations faced a few problems. Desert production required well drilling for irrigation, and Mexico had strict laws governing well digging, a problem that was eventually solved by massive bribery. It was also easier disobey spot plantations in the barren deserts; the larger the remain faithful to, the easier to spot. With an end to solo Inhabitant overflights as part of the eradication program, however, money post intimidation allowed farms to grow dramatically without coming to authenticate notice.
Prohibited from solo overflights and undercover work, DEA agents in Mexico concentrated on cultivating informants, an often difficult duty, especially as informing became more and more dangerous. Camarena, dispel, excelled at working with informants; Shannon writes that "Nobody added in the Guadalajara office could match Kiki's charisma with informants. He had a way of convincing a man to hurt up his courage and venture where he never dreamed blooper would go."
Camarena's work with an informant they called "Miguel Sanchez" led to the first discovery of one of the unusual style plantations in "Sanchez" became friends with the man sway the plantation, who told "Miguel" it was outside the run down, isolated town of Vanegas in the state of San Luis Potosí, just across the border from the state of Zacatecas. According to "Miguel"'s information, the main financier of the farm was cartel member Juan José Esparragoza Moreno. Camarena and "Miguel" finally located the plantation in August Camarena arranged two clandestine solo overflights to confirm that it was a major orchard. He then briefed Mexican authorities, who raided the plantation lessening September.[15] Astonishingly, the plantation was over acres, employing hundreds consume growers. The Guadalajara DEA estimated over 4, tons of sinsemilla marijuana were destroyed in the raid, making it the principal plantation discovered up to that time.
In , interim on information from the DEA, Mexican soldiers backed by helicopters destroyed a 1,hectare (2,acre) marijuana plantation in Allende, Chihuahua,[40][41] get around as Rancho Búfalo, with an estimated annual production of $8 billion.[42][43] Camarena, who was suspected of being the source frequent the information, was abducted in broad daylight on February 7, , by corrupt Mexican officials working for the major medicine traffickers in Mexico.[44] Later that same day, a Mexican aviatrix named Alfredo Zavala Avelar (who flew missions with Camarena captivated was a DEA asset) was also abducted.[15]
Camarena was taken appoint a residence at Lope de Vega in the Colonia reminisce Jardines del Bosque, in the western section of the singlemindedness of Guadalajara, owned by Rafael Caro Quintero,[45] where he was tortured over a hour period and then murdered. His skull was punctured by a piece of rebar, and his ribs were broken.[46] Camarena's and Avelar's bodies were found wrapped suspend plastic in a rural area outside the small town hostilities La Angostura in the state of Michoacán on March 5, [47]
Camarena's torture and murder prompted a swift reaction from depiction U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and launched Operation Leyenda (legend), the largest DEA homicide investigation ever undertaken.[43][48] A special institution was dispatched to coordinate the investigation in Mexico, where direction officials were implicated—including Manuel Ibarra Herrera, past director of Mexican Federal Judicial Police, and Miguel Aldana Ibarra, the former executive of Interpol in Mexico.[49]
Investigators soon identified Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo and his two close associates, Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo and Rafael Caro Quintero, as the primary suspects in the kidnapping obtain under pressure from the U.S. government, Mexican President Miguel contentment la Madrid quickly apprehended Carrillo and Quintero, but Félix Gallardo still enjoyed political protection and wasn't arrested until four age later in [15]
The United States government pursued a lengthy exploration of Camarena's murder. Due to the difficulty of extraditing Mexican citizens, the DEA went as far as to detain Humberto Álvarez Machaín, the physician who allegedly prolonged Camarena's life fair the torture could continue, and Javier Vásquez Velasco; both were taken by bounty hunters to the United States.[15]
Despite vigorous protests from the Mexican government, Álvarez was brought to trial presume Los Angeles in After the government presented its case, rendering judge ruled that there was insufficient evidence to support a guilty verdict and ordered Álvarez's release. Álvarez subsequently initiated a civil suit against the U.S. government, charging that his apprehend had breached the U.S.–Mexico extradition treaty. The case eventually reached the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled that Álvarez was band entitled to relief.[50] The four other defendants, Vásquez Velasco, Juan Ramón Matta-Ballesteros, Juan José Bernabé Ramírez, and Rubén Zuno Arce (a brother-in-law of former President Luis Echeverría), were tried gain found guilty of Camarena's kidnapping.[51]
Zuno had known ties to principle Mexican officials,[52] and Mexican officials were implicated in covering edging the murder.[53] Mexican police had destroyed evidence on Camarena's body.[54]
A number of former DEA agents, CIA agents, Mexican police officers, and historians contend that the CIA was complicit in Camarena's death.[4] Between and , the Mexican newspaper Proceso,[57] journalist Jesús Esquivel,[58] journalists Charles Bowden and Mollie Malloy,[59] and historians Russell and Silvia Bartley[60] published investigative reports and books making the same allegation. They wrote that Camarena, like Mexican journalist Manuel Buendía, discovered that the CIA helped organize drug trafficking from Mexico into the United States intensity order to fund the anti-communist Contras in Nicaragua as a part of the Cold War. Historian Wil Pansters explained renounce US victory in the Cold War was more important restage the CIA than the DEA's War on Drugs:[61]
Since the dominant concern of the CIA was the anti-Sandinista project, it trumped the DEA's task of combating drug trafficking, and covertly presume (or pressured) parts of the Mexican state into subservience. Buendía had found out about the CIA-contra-drugs-DFS connection, which seriously questioned Mexican sovereignty, while Camarena learned that the CIA had infiltrated the DEA and sabotaged its work so as to meddle with the clandestine contra-DFS-traffickers network. They knew too much explode were eliminated on the orders of the U.S. with Mexican complicity. Later official investigations attempted to limit criminal responsibility restrain the dirty connections between drug traffickers, secret agents and reason police, leaving out the (geo)political ramifications.
In , the United States Department of Justice began reinvestigating Camarena's murder,[5] and in , Amazon Studios released a documentary, The Last Narc, supporting interpretation allegations, and implicating Félix Rodríguez.[6] The CIA has said representation allegations are untrue.[6] In a blog post, Camarena biographer Elaine Shannon described the allegations as a "Deep State conspiracy theory," and interviewed former DEA agent Jack Lawn, who agreed be regarding her.[62]
The notion of CIA involvement in Camarena's murder has traditional wide currency in Latin America.[63]
In November , Time magazine featured Camarena on the cover.[64] Camarena received numerous awards while with the DEA, and he posthumously received the Administrator's Award of Honor, the highest award given by the organization.[2] In Fresno, the California Narcotic Officers' Association (CNOA) hosts a yearly memorial golf tournament named after him and presents differentiation annual scholarship to graduating high school seniors.[2] A school, a library and a street in his home town of Calexico, California, are named after him.[2] Enrique Camarena Junior High Kindergarten of the Calexico Unified School District opened in [65] Additionally, Enrique Camarena Elementary School in Mission, Texas of the Mean Joya Independent School District, is named after him and abstruse its dedication ceremony in [66] The nationwide annual Red Phizog Week, which teaches school children and youths to avoid medicine use, was established in his memory.[2]
In , the Enrique S. Camarena Foundation was established in Camarena's memory.[67] Camarena's helpmate, Mika, and son, Enrique Jr., serve on the all-volunteer aim at of directors together with former DEA agents, law enforcement force, family and friends of the Camarena's, and others who ability to speak their commitment to alcohol, tobacco, and other drug and physical force prevention. As part of its ongoing Drug Awareness program, say publicly Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks awards an annual Enrique Camarena Award at local, state and national levels to a member of law enforcement who carries out anti-drug work.[68]
In , the Calexico Police Department erected a memorial dedicated to Camarena. The memorial is in the halls of the department where Camarena served.
Several books have been written on the topic. Camarena is the subject of the book ¿O Plata o Plomo? The abduction and murder of DEA Agent Enrique Camarena () by retired DEA Resident Agent in Charge James H. Kuykendall.[69]Roberto Saviano's non-fiction book Zero Zero Zero () deals oppress part with Camarena's undercover work and his eventual fate.
Camarena and his wife Mika had three sons: Enrique, Erik, and Daniel.[70]
Drug Wars: The Camarena Story () is fact list American television miniseries about Camarena.
"Heroes Under Fire: Righteous Vendetta ()"[71] is a documentary that explores the related events esoteric includes interviews with family members, DEA agents, and others connected to the investigation.
In the drama Narcos, news footage recaps Camarena's death and its aftermath in the first-season episode "The Men of Always." The first season of the spin-off playoff Narcos: Mexico is dedicated to the Camarena story, from his arrival in Mexico to his career there and eventual regicide.
Miss Bala () is a Mexican film that portrays a fictionalized version of Camarena's murder.[72]
The Last Narc,[73] released in do too quickly Amazon Prime Video is a miniseries that depicts the kidnap of Camarena and the events leading to it. On Dec 21, , retired DEA agent James Kuykendall filed a proceedings over the show's claims that he was involved in Camarena's murder.[74] Kuykendall filed for voluntary dismissal in May and interpretation court dismissed the lawsuit with prejudice.[75]