Photo: Contributed Notorious drug lord Rafael Caro Quintero, who was behind the 1985 killing of a US DEA agent, has been captured by Mexican forces nearly a decade after he escaped from a Mexican prison and returned to drug trafficking, a Navy official confirmed Mexico on Friday. The source was not authorized to speak publicly and agreed to confirm the action only if not named. No further details about the arrest were immediately available. Caro Quintero was freed in 2013 after serving 28 years in prison when a court overturned a 40-year sentence for the kidnapping and murder of US Drug Enforcement Agency agent Enrique “Kiki” Camarena in 1985. The brutal killing marked a low point in US-Mexico relations. Caro Quintero, the former leader of the Guadalajara cartel, had since returned to drug trafficking and waged bloody turf wars in the northern Mexican border state of Sonora. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has argued that he is not interested in detaining drug lords and prefers to avoid violence. An appeals court overturned Caro Quintero’s verdict, but the Supreme Court upheld the sentence. It was too late by then. Caro Quintero retired to a waiting vehicle. He was on the FBI’s most wanted list, with a $20 million reward for his capture through the State Department’s Narcotics Bounty Program. Added to the FBI’s 10 Most Wanted List of 2018. Caro Quintero was one of the main suppliers of heroin, cocaine, and marijuana in the United States in the late 1970s. He blamed Camarena for a raid on a marijuana plantation in 1984. In 1985, Camarena was kidnapped in Guadalajara, allegedly on orders by Caro Quintero. His tortured body was found a month later.
