“Sol Prendido” for Borderland Beat
For the first time, a witness in the trial of Genaro García Luna implicates former President Felipe Calderón in the conspiracy to protect drug leaders, in this case “El Chapo” Guzmán; the reference came from former Nayarit prosecutor Édgar Veytia.
The former prosecutor of Nayarit, Mexico, Édgar Veytia, implicated former President Felipe Calderón in the protection orders for Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera, in the midst of the war between drug traffickers.
Veytia, also known as “El Diablo,” claimed that his then boss, former governor Ney Gonzalez, and his nephew had met in Mexico City with former President Calderon and former Public Security Secretary Genaro Garcia Luna, who allegedly told him that “El Chapo” and his associates in the Sinaloa Cartel should be protected.
“That the line was El Chapo,” Veytia said tersely about the result of that meeting, which he did not attend, since he was on a tour with Luis Cardenas Palominos, a former high-ranking police official – and people close to Garcia Luna – of El Búnker, an area of the Secretariat where state-of-the-art technology for surveillance and espionage operated.
The former prosecutor of Nayarit, Mexico, Édgar Veytia, implicated former President Felipe Calderón in the protection orders for Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera, in the midst of the war between drug traffickers.
Veytia, also known as “El Diablo,” claimed that his then boss, former governor Ney Gonzalez, and his nephew had met in Mexico City with former President Calderon and former Public Security Secretary Genaro Garcia Luna, who allegedly told him that “El Chapo” and his associates in the Sinaloa Cartel should be protected.
“That the connection was El Chapo,” Veytia said tersely about the result of that meeting, which he did not attend, since he was on a tour with Luis Cardenas Palominos, a former high-ranking police official – and people close to Garcia Luna – of El Búnker, an area of the Secretariat where state-of-the-art technology for surveillance and espionage operated.
There was an objection from the defense, led by Cesar de Castro, but Assistant U.S. Attorney Saritha Komatireddy rephrased the question, and Veytia confirmed.
“The order was to protect Los Chapos, not the Beltrán Leyva,” said the eighth cooperating witness of the García Luna trial.
The prosecutor asked Veytia if he asked his boss about that decision since Gonzalez was protecting Hector Beltran Leyva, who was then in charge of that criminal group.
“The governor is not asked for an explanation,” Veytia justified. He said he then contacted “El Chapo’s” people, a guy known as “El Pelocho,” who controlled the plaza.
However, previously “El Chapo” Guzman’s lawyers had gone to Nayarit to tell Veytia that they wanted to “buy the plaza”, that is, to have the protection of authorities and pay them for it in order to operate freely.
Gonzalez and his people resisted, but the pressure from the federal government was greater and, on one occasion, there was a confrontation between state and federal police over the detention of a van with an unidentified person in it.
According to a report from the Beltran Leyva family, “El Chapo” was in the vehicle.
Veytia said he questioned the federal agent in charge, Jorge Anguiano Terríquez, who convinced him to let the vehicle go with the promise of an explanation. The next day Veytia visited Anguiano Terríquez in his office, who handed him the phone with a call in progress.
“Thank you very much…anything with Terríquez,” the caller told him.
“Who was that on the phone?” the prosecutor asked Veytia. “Mr. García Luna,” he answered.
Other witnesses have exposed that Garcia Luna’s decision to support “El Chapo” was part of the war between leaders of different criminal organizations.
Edgar Veytia