Mexican officials arrested a major figure in the powerful Sinaloa drug cartel this past weekend, authorities reported. Cesar Gastelum Serrano was arrested Saturday in Cancun while carrying a pistol and 700 grams of cocaine.
According to Mexico’s national security commissioner, Monte Alejandro Rubido, Serrano had been trying to stay off the radar in the resort city. “He moved around the area with a low profile, without bodyguards,” said Rubido. “He did not carry any identification, not even false ones, to avoid detection.”
Serrano was “one of the most prolific cocaine suppliers for Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel,” according to the U.S. Treasury Department, who placed him on the list of drug kingpins in December. Nicknamed La Señora, he ran “a vast criminal network to lead a cocaine trafficking organization capable of moving tons of cocaine per week through Honduras and Guatemala to Mexico,” according to a press release.
Rubido said Serrano had operated in Honduras, where he masked his drug running business behind a family scaffolding company. He is thought to have worked with other major players in the Sinaloa Cartel, like infamous cartel leader Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada Garcia, and has been linked with the killings of several Honduran law enforcement officials.
Serrano’s arrest comes weeks after the capture of another prominent drug kingpin, Ramiro Perez Ramos, a leader of Las Zetas cartel. Mexico is apparently cracking down on drug cartel members after the national outrage surrounding the disappearance of 43 students last September.
