BY RICHARD FAUSSET & CECILIA SANCHEZ

MEXICO CITY — The case against six Mexican military officers accused of colluding with the Beltran Leyva drug cartel may be falling apart as federal prosecutors under new President Enrique Peña Nieto have reportedly admitted they lack sufficient evidence to back up the government’s allegations.

The prosecutors’ statement to a federal judge presiding over the criminal case was included in court documents obtained by the newspaper Reforma and published Tuesday. A representative of the Mexican attorney general’s office would not comment.

The case against the six officers, who remain in custody, has been one of the most high-profile military-related corruption scandals in the country since 1997, when the nation’s then-drug czar, Gen. Jose de Jesus Gutierrez Rebollo, was arrested, and later convicted, on charges that he protected a leader of the Juarez cartel.

In the current case, the active and retired officers, including four generals, are accused of protecting ... Read More

MEXICO CITY — Mexican prosecutors formally filed drug charges Tuesday against four high-ranking army officers, including three generals and a lieutenant colonel.

They are the highest-ranking Mexican army officials arrested in at least 15 years, and allegedly provided protection for the Beltran-Leyva drug cartel. They were detained in May and have been held under a form of house arrest.

The Attorney General’s Office said charges of “organized crime to further drug trafficking” were lodged against retired generals Tomas Angeles Dauahare and Ricardo Escorcia, as well as active service Gen. Roberto Dawe Gonzalez. Retired Lt. Col. Silvio Hernandez Soto faces the same charge.

The office did not mention specifics of the case lodged against the four along with an army major. But charged in the same case is U.S.-born drug trafficker Edgar Valdes Villarreal, alias “La Barbie,” who worked for the Beltran Leyva cartel until it began to break up with the death of ... Read More

BY RANDAL C. ARCHIBOLD

MEXICO CITY — The biggest military corruption case here in recent years has worsened an already frayed relationship between American law enforcement officials and the Mexican Army, the institution most trusted and empowered by officials here to fight the drug war.

The case involves the arrests this month of four formerly high-ranking army officers, including a former under secretary of defense, who are suspected of passing information to the Beltrán Leyva drug gang for money. For some Americans, the arrests confirm a longstanding wariness of the army, and have reawakened concerns about how closely it may be linked to the gang, one of the top traffickers of cocaine to the United States and a particular focus of American drug agents.

American exasperation with the army reached a high point in 2009 when, fed up with what they saw as unusual foot-dragging by the army after it failed to act on American ... Read More

FELIPE TRIGOS

Last week, the government of President Felipe Calderón in Mexico demonstrated yet again its commitment and seriousness of purpose in ending the corruption and impunity that has resulted from decades of narcotics trafficking through Mexico. Retired three-star general and former undersecretary of defense, Tomás Ángeles Dauahare, and Brigadier General Roberto Dawe were arrested for their alleged involvement with the Beltran Leyva Cartel.

News of the arrest of the highest-ranking general ever shocked the public. Then, 2 days later, one more general was arrested for his alleged complicity with the same criminal organization. Three-star General Ricardo Escorcia Vargas is now also in a detention cell that belongs to Mexico’s Department of Justice (PGR).

Although formal charges have not been made as yet, Mexico’s Justice Department reports that the generals were involved with Alfredo Beltrán, a.k.a El Mochomo, former leader of the Beltran Leyva Cartel, and with Edgar Valdez Villarreal a.k.a La Barbie, ... Read More

FELIPE TRIGOS

La semana pasada, el gobierno del presidente Felipe Calderón demostró una vez más su compromiso de poner fin a la corrupción y la impunidad que ha emanado después de décadas de tráfico de narcóticos a través de México. El general de división retirado y ex subsecretario de la defensa, Tomás Ángeles Dauahare, y el general brigadier Roberto Dawe fueron detenidos por su supuesta complicidad con el cártel de los Beltrán Leyva.

La noticia de la detención sorprendió a los medios de comunicación internacionales, puesto que Dauahare es el general de más alto rango arrestado por el gobierno mexicano. Dos días más tarde, el general de división Ricardo Escorcia Vargas,  también fue detenido por su presunta complicidad con la misma organización delictiva. Actualmente se encuentra con los otros generales en una celda de detención que pertenece a la Procuraduría General de la República (PGR).

Aunque no se han presentado acusaciones formales, la ... Read More

Un juez federal decretó prisión preventiva por 40 días a dos militares retirados del Ejército Mexicano señalados por presuntos vínculos con el narcotráfico e investigados por la Procuraduría General de la República.

Un funcionario de la Procuraduría, que pidió no ser identificado por políticas internas de la dependencia, informó que el general Ricardo Escorcia Vargas y el teniente coronel Silvio Isidro de Jesús Hernández Soto pasarán 40 días bajo “arraigo”, la figura jurídica para mantener en prisión preventiva a una persona mientras se amplían investigaciones antes de presentar cargos formales.

En la detención de miembros de las fuerzas armadas más grande de los últimos años, la semana pasada la Procuraduría federal detuvo a cuatro militares vinculados con investigaciones civiles.

Los otros dos detenidos, el general retirado y ex subsecretario de la Defensa Tomás Angeles Dauahare y el general en activo Roberto Dawe González, también se encuentran en prisión preventiva mientras avanzan las investigaciones ... Read More

MEXICO CITY—Mexico’s army said it had detained a third general for questioning after a judge placed two other officers under a form of house arrest pending an investigation for possible links to the Beltrán Leyva drug cartel.

A Defense Department statement didn’t say specifically whether retired Gen. Ricardo Escorcia was detained in connection with same allegations pending against the other two generals, who were brought in on Tuesday.

But it did note that the detention order for Gen. Escorcia’s was issued “simultaneously with the two previous detentions, with the aim of having him testify in the investigations” being carried out by civilian prosecutors.

Gen. Escorcia retired from active service in 2010 after reaching mandatory retirement age. He previously served as head of the military base in Cuernavaca, a city just south of the Mexican capital that has been considered Beltrán Leyva territory.

The leader of the cartel, Arturo Beltrán Leyva, was killed in a ... Read More

EDUARDO CASTILLO

Mexico’s army said it had detained a third general for questioning on Thursday, hours after a judge placed the two other officers under a form of house arrest pending an investigation for possible links to the Beltran Leyva drug cartel.

A Defense Department statement did not say specifically whether retired Gen. Ricardo Escorcia was detained in connection with same allegations pending against the other two generals, who were brought in on Tuesday.

But it did note that the detention order for Escorcia’s was issued “simultaneously with the two previous detentions, with the aim of having him testify in the investigations” being carried out by civilian prosecutors.

Escorcia retired from active service in 2010 after reaching mandatory retirement age. He previously served as head of the military base in Cuernavaca, a city just south of the Mexican capital that has been considered Beltran Leyva territory.

The leader of the cartel, Arturo Beltran Leyva, was ... Read More

JORGE FERNANDEZ MENEDEZ

No hay, al momento de escribir estas líneas, información suficiente como para sacar conclusiones, pero estoy convencido de que la PGR y la Secretaría de la Defensa Nacional no hubieran divulgado la presentación en la SIEDO del general retirado Tomás Ángeles Dauahare y del general brigadier Roberto Dawe González, sin contar, por lo menos, con elementos sólidos que justificaran esa acción. Tomás Ángeles es un hombre de peso e historia en el Ejército Mexicano y no estaría hoy detenido, presuntamente acusado de relaciones con el crimen organizado, por simples sospechas. Pero insistimos, falta información.

Desde hace años me precio de ser amigo del entonces secretario de la Defensa, el general Enrique Cervantes Aguirre, uno de los militares más talentosos que ha dado el Ejército Mexicano. En sus oficinas conocí al general Ángeles, que era entonces su secretario particular y se decía, no sin fundamento, que manejaba buena parte de la inteligencia militar, particularmente en ... Read More

MEXICO CITY –  Two army generals, including a former assistant defense secretary, were detained by anti-drug prosecutors and are being questioned for alleged links to drug traffickers, authorities said Wednesday.

Soldiers detained retired Gen. Tomas Angeles Dauahare and Gen. Roberto Dawe Gonzalez, the Attorney General’s Office said in a brief statement released late Tuesday. The office gave no other details.

An official at the Attorney General’s Office said the officers are being investigated for alleged links to a Mexican drug cartel, but he would not say which cartel. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not allowed to discuss the case.

President Felipe Calderon named Angeles Dauahare as assistant defense secretary in 2006. He left the post in 2008, when he retired.

Dawe Gonzalez is currently assigned to a military base in the western state of Colima.

President Felipe Calderon deployed 50,000 soldiers and other military personnel to fight organized crime shortly after ... Read More

El general retirado Tomás Ángeles Dauahare, quien fue subsecretario de la Defensa Nacional, fue detenido por elementos del Ejército Mexicano y la PGR para que rinda declaración ministerial por presuntos nexos con la delincuencia organizada.

Asimismo fue asegurado el general brigadier Roberto Dawe González, actual comandante jefe de Estado Mayor adscrito a la 20/a. Zona Militar (Colima, Col.), quien junto con el exsubsecretario rinde su declaración ministerial ante la Subprocuraduría de Invesigación Especializada en Delicuencia Organizada (SIEDO). Ambos están en calidad de presentados.

La Secretaría de la Defensa Nacional informó que el mando, quien pasó a situación de retiro el 1 de marzo de 2008, está sujeto a investigación de la Procuraduría General de la República.

“La Sedena reitera su compromiso con la sociedad mexicana que de ninguna manera tolera actos contrarios a la leyes, y cuando alguno de sus elementos no se conduce conforme a derecho, sus actos se investigan y en ... Read More