SAN DIEGO — Dozens of people accused of working for a Mexican drug cartel were arrested Wednesday in a multistate bust that has netted more than $45 million in cash and tons of cocaine, heroin and marijuana, federal officials said.
The suspected leader of the cartel, Victor Emilio Cazares Gastellum, was indicted in San Diego federal court on multiple drug and money-laundering charges. He remains in Mexico and has not been arrested, said Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.
Cazares Gastellum, who is from Mexico's Sinaloa state, is not widely known, but U.S. authorities said he is a rival of the Tijuana-based Arellano Felix cartel, which rose to power in the 1980s and has fallen on hard times recently. He is an ally of two better-known Mexican traffickers — Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman and Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada.
"Today's operation is a serious blow to one of the largest and most significant trafficking organizations," Gonzales said at a news conference.
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The U.S. will seek Cazares Gastellum's extradition if he is arrested, Gonzales said.
"Just because he has been unknown until the last few years does not mean he is small-time," said Michael Kaplan, a federal prosecutor in San Diego. "He is emerging as a very significant Mexican narco-trafficker."
The cartel drove, shipped and flew drugs from Colombia and Venezuela to Mexico, authorities said. The drugs entered the U.S. in the California desert border town of Calexico, about 120 miles east of San Diego, and were broken down in San Diego and Los Angeles before being distributed in more than 25 states across the country.
At least some of the drugs were carried over the border on a bridge made from sandbags partially submerged in the Colorado River outside of Yuma, authorities said.
The cartel also crossed the border through California's Imperial Sand Dunes, a desert playground for dune-buggy riders, Kaplan said. They often stashed drugs in secret compartments in Chevrolet Avalanche pickup trucks and drove them through border crossings in Calexico.
Cazares Gastellum's clan is believed to have smuggled about 5 tons of cocaine into the U.S. every month, Kaplan said.
In all, the 20-month sting, code-named "Operation Imperial Emperor," so far has swept up 402 of the cartel's alleged lieutenants and foot soldiers, including 66 who were arrested Wednesday in California, Arizona and Illinois.
Cazares Gastellum's top lieutenant and son-in-law, Jose Oscar Del Castillo Gallardo, from Sinaloa, was arrested Jan. 20 during a ski trip to Big Bear Lake, Calif., Kaplan said. Another top associate, Carlos Cuevas Jr. of Calexico, was arrested the same day.
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