I went to a meeting with Rocha and Cuen and they kidnapped me there, says ‘El Mayo’; well, if that’s what they told him, he fell into a trap, responds the governor. According to Ismael Zambada García’s version, the former UAS rector was murdered in Huertos del Pedregal, during a meeting attended by Governor Rubén Rocha.
A statement by Ismael Zambada Garcia would demolish the official version that Hector Melesio Cuen Ojeda died after being shot at the gas station in the community of La Presita, on the night of July 25. In a letter released yesterday, Saturday, by his lawyer Frank Perez, Mayo assures that the ex-rector of the UAS was killed “at the same time and in the same place” where he was kidnapped, that is to say in Huertos del Pedregal, an area of country estates, located in the town of Bellavista.
In this place, located northwest of the city of Culiacan, according to the two-page missive, written on a computer and in English, El Mayo assures that he was summoned by Joaquin Guzman Lopez to a meeting with Governor Ruben Rocha Moya and Cuen Ojeda, as well as Ivan Archivaldo Guzman Salazar. The objective was to “resolve” a dispute that exists between the two politicians “over who should lead” the UAS. The conflict had been going on for two years.
The meeting was to take place at 11:00 a.m. on Thursday, July 25, but Zambada Garcia says he arrived earlier, without specifying a time. There he saw the founder of the Sinaloa Party, who was “an old friend,” accompanied by one of his aides, whom he greeted briefly. He also observed a large number of armed men in green military uniforms who he assumed “were gunmen of Joaquín Guzmán and his brothers”.
The drug lord said he arrived guarded by four of his security agents, one of whom was the commander of the “Judicial Police of the State of Sinaloa,” Jose Rosario Heras Lopez, who is a state investigative police officer.
After greeting Cuen and accompanied by the policeman and Rodolfo Chaidez, a member of his security team, El Mayo said he followed Joaquín Guzmán López, whom he has known “since he was a child,” to a room in Huertos del Pedregal, which had a table with fruit. Once inside, Chapo Guzman’s son gestured for him to follow him to another darkened room, where he was “ambushed.
“A group of men assaulted me, threw me to the floor and put a dark-colored hood over my head. They tired me out, handcuffed me and then forced me into the bed of a pickup truck. Throughout this ordeal, I was subjected to physical abuse, resulting in significant injuries to my back, knees and wrists. I was then taken to an airstrip about 20 to 25 minutes away, where I was forced to board a private plane. Joaquin removed my hood and strapped me into the seat. There was no one else on board the plane except Joaquin, the pilot and me,” he said.
“The flight lasted between 2 1/3 and 3 hours, non-stop until we arrived in El Paso, Texas. It was there, on the tarmac, that U.S. federal agents detained me. The notion that I surrendered or cooperated voluntarily is completely false. I was brought to this country by force and under duress, without my consent and against my will.”
In the document, Zambada Garcia rejects the version of Sinaloa state authorities that Cuen Ojeda was shot the night of July 25 at a gas station by two men on a motorcycle, who wanted to steal his truck.
“That is not what happened. They killed him at the same time and in the same place where they kidnapped me. Hector Cuen was an old friend of mine and I deeply regret his death, as well as the disappearance of Jose Rosario Heras Lopez and Rodolfo Chaidez, whom no one has seen or heard from since,” he charged.
“I think it’s important that the truth comes out. This is what happened, not the false stories that are circulating. I call on the governments of Mexico and the United States to be transparent and provide the truth about my kidnapping to the United States and about the deaths of Hector Cuen, Rosario Heras, Rodolfo Chaidez and all the people who lost their lives that day”.
The text ends with a call from the 76-year-old drug lord to the people of Sinaloa to “have moderation and maintain peace in our state. Nothing can be solved with violence. We have been down that road before and everyone loses.”
Ruben Rocha’s response
Following the release of the letter, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador told the media that he would wait for more information and Rubén Rocha’s statement.
Later, during the inauguration of the General Hospital in Culiacán, attended by López Obrador and Claudia Sheinbaum, Governor Rubén Rocha Moya denied having been summoned to the meeting with El Mayo Zambada and that he had no ties to any organized crime group.
“What it says there (letter) is that Rubén Rocha Moya, governor of the state, was summoned to that event, among others, and that was the reason, perhaps the hook for Mr. Ismael Zambada to go to that event. I want to tell you one thing without any strings attached, first of all, I was not in Sinaloa that day…, two, nobody from organized crime has to summon me to a meeting to solve a problem, we are talking about the problem of the university, there is no need, there is no reason. The problems that concern the government are solved by the government institutions,” he said.
RUBEN ROCHA. I was not summoned to any meeting.
“We do not have complicity with anyone and that is precisely professing the president’s policy, there is no complicity. Therefore, if they said that I was going to be there, they lied to them and if you believed them, you fell into the trap, you did not have to, I do not have to. I already said, those problems that are of the government we solve them in the institutions.”
Without referring directly to the death of Cuen Ojeda, Rocha Moya said that it has nothing to do with the violence of the night of July 25, and asked the president to intervene so that the crime is taken over by the Attorney General’s Office.
López Obrador gave his support to Rocha Moya and said that Mayo’s letter is no coincidence after the day before he requested information on the issue from the U.S. government.
“We have all the confidence in Mr. Rocha, all the confidence in Governor Rubén Rocha Moya…. and I congratulate him because he shows his face, he did not leave any day, because it is no coincidence, we, yesterday morning we were asking for information, at noon the ambassador gave the version that they have of these events here in Sinaloa and today this letter appears and it turns out that we are here today in Culiacán, and at once we are going to talk about the subject, and how good that you have clarified what the situation is, where you were and that you were never summoned to any event, clear as water”.
Rocha flew to LA on Vizcarra’s plane
Governor Rubén Rocha Moya informed yesterday, Saturday, that on Thursday, July 25, when El Mayo and Joaquín Guzmán were arrested in El Paso, Texas, he was out of the state and that he returned until the morning of Friday, July 26.
Rocha Moya traveled to Los Angeles in a Bombardier Learjet 75, registration XA-SKA, owned by Jesus Vizcarra Calderon’s company SuKarne.
According to the website flightaware.com, which allows flight tracking worldwide, the Vizcarra plane on which Rocha allegedly flew took off at 9:02 a.m. on Thursday, Thursday 25, from Culiacán International Airport and landed at 11:06 a.m. at Los Angeles International Airport.
On Friday 26, Rocha returned to Culiacán on the same plane which took off from Los Angeles at 5:01 am.
Article published on August 11, 2024 in issue 1124 of the weekly Ríodoce.
