Whereabouts of infamous drug lord nicknamed “La Barbie” unknown as Mexico presses U.S. for solutions

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on Wednesday urged america to disclose the whereabouts of a infamous drug trafficker whose title has disappeared from the U.S. jail register.

Edgar Valdez Villarreal, a Mexican-American nicknamed “La Barbie” for his honest complexion, was captured by Mexico in 2010 and extradited to america, the place he was sentenced to 49 years in jail.

Media studies lately revealed that the previous henchman of the Beltran-Leyva cartel not seems in a search of the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ on-line register of inmates.

“The USA authorities has to clear it up as quickly as doable,” Lopez Obrador informed reporters, including that Mexico was awaiting a response.

“We’ll proceed asking them,” he added, describing the case as “odd” for the reason that trafficker nonetheless had a few years to serve until he struck a take care of the U.S. authorities.

The Bureau of Prisons informed AFP that the Texas-born Valdez “just isn’t presently within the custody” of the U.S. federal company, which could possibly be for a number of causes.

“Inmates who have been beforehand in BOP custody and who haven’t accomplished their sentence could also be outdoors BOP custody for a time frame for court docket hearings, medical therapy or for different causes,” it mentioned.

“We don’t present particular info on the standing of inmates who are usually not within the custody of the BOP for security, safety, or privateness causes,” it added.

In line with prosecutors, Valdez started his drug trafficking profession in Laredo, Texas, and shortly developed cocaine clients in New Orleans and Memphis. He ultimately entered right into a relationship with Arturo Beltran-Leyva, who was then related to the Sinaloa Cartel and Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman in Mexico, prosecutors alleged. 

Valdez, prosecutors mentioned, then started coordinating shipments of cocaine into Mexico utilizing speedboats and airplanes, whereas additionally paying bribes to native regulation enforcement officers.  The cocaine was then allegedly transported throughout the border into the U.S..  Prosecutors mentioned Valdez turned a top-level enforcer for the cartel and coordinated a battle in opposition to his rivals, the Gulf Cartel and Zetas in Mexico.

In the end, DEA brokers have been in a position to construct the case in opposition to Valdez utilizing wiretaps, seizures of over 100 kilograms of cocaine and $4 million of drug proceeds, and witness testimony, prosecutors mentioned.

When Valdez was sentenced in 2018, the Justice Division mentioned he was “ruthlessly working his approach up the ranks of one in all Mexico’s strongest cartels, leaving in his wake numerous lives destroyed by medication and violence.”