'El Mencho,' wanted in Mexico and the US.

The governments of Mexico and the United States have raised the rewards offered for the leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes.

Mexico is offering 30 million pesos (about US $1.6 million) for any information that leads to Oseguera’s arrest, while the United States is offering up to $5 million, Mexican authorities told the newspaper El Financiero.

The rewards are part of a series of actions aimed at securing Oseguera’s arrest and part of a broader binational crackdown on violence and strengthened security on both sides of the border.

A binational security team met yesterday in Illinois and the full extent of the agreements reached are to be announced later today.

Acting Attorney General Alberto Elías Beltrán led the Mexican team, joined by high-ranking officials from the Mexican army and navy.

Oseguera, also known as “El Mencho,” is considered to be the principal instigator of violence in Mexico. The drug lord has been behind the expansion of the CJNG over the last three years, putting the organization in direct confrontation with rival gangs throughout the country, sparking violent turf wars for the control of territory.

The cartel’s confrontations with security forces from the three levels of government have also cost the lives of many officials.

Anyone with information about Oseugera can call (55) 5346 3867 and (55) 5346 0000, extension 3825, in Mexico City, while elsewhere in the country the toll-free number is 01 800 831 3196.

Information can also be provided by email to denunciapgr@pgr.gob.mx. </s> "The Attorney General of the Republic (PGR) offers 30 million pesos to anyone who provides accurate and useful information for the location and arrest or apprehension of Ruben Oseguera Cervantes and/or Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes and/or Nemesio Oseguera Ramos, Alias 'El Mencho,' suspected of organized crimes and other offenses," the prosecutor's office said in a statement.

Attack on the helicopter was committed during a large-scale operation of the authorities against the cartel.

In response, the bandits not only shot down the helicopter, but also arranged riots in the streets of Mexico's second-largest city of Guadalajara, burned dozens of cars and gas stations and destroyed bank branches.

Also, a popular 17-year-old blogger, nicknamed Pirate from Culiacan, was allegedly shot after an offensive remark of a sexual nature toward El Mencho.

Since 2006, over 200,000 people have been killed or disappeared in Mexico amid the ongoing war between country’s drug cartels. </s> Mexican authorities announced they have raised the bounty on one of the country’s most prominent cartel kingpins, Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, known as “El Mencho”.

The announcement came at a joint press conference in Chicago, where officials from the Mexican government and representatives from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency unveiled new plans to combat Mexican drug cartels.

Underlings of “El Mencho” have deployed waves of violence to thwart attempts at detaining him. Officials announced they are offering 30 million pesos, which amounts to 1.56 million dollars, for information on Oseguera, the leader of the power Jalisco New Generation Cartel, which makes, moves, and deals large amounts of met amphetamines and has expanded its control over the Mexican West.

Oseguera Cervantes’ wife was arrested in late May in suburban Guadalajara.

The DEA’s director for North and Central American Region, Matthew G. Donahue, also shared the agency’s new plan in coordination with Mexican authorities.

“The new game plan is… pick up the speed and arrest more people, faster,” he told AP ahead of the press conference.

Newspaper The Guardian reports that the new strategy also includes closer scrutiny on cartel finances and a new enforcement group, which will focus on international investigations. </s> MEXICO CITY: Mexico is offering a 30 million pesos (£1.2 million) reward for information leading to the arrest of drug lord Nemesio Oseguera whose cartel is blamed for driving heroin shipments to the United States, the attorney general said on Wednesday.

Known as "El Mencho," Oseguera has risen to become Mexico's most-wanted drug lord after Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman was extradited to the United States last year to face trial.

In March, U.S. agents in Chicago named El Mencho public enemy No. 1 and blamed his gang for using "extreme violence" to expand their share of the heroin trade. The United States is offering US$5 million (£3.9 million) for information leading to his capture.

Oseguera's Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generacion is considered by authorities to be the most powerful Mexican drug cartel, with operations in the United States, Latin America, Africa, Europe and Asia.

The Cartel Jalisco Nueva Generacion "is known to produce multi-hundred kilogram quantities of methamphetamine and heroin, and traffics in multi-ton quantities of cocaine," according to the U.S. Department of State.

Mexico arrested Oseguera's wife in May on charges of laundering funds for his cartel. </s> Mexican authorities have arrested the wife of the leader of Jalisco New Generation, one of the country's fiercest drug cartels.Interior Minister Alfonso Navarrete said at a Sunday press conference that marines arrested Rosalinda Gonzalez Valencia the night before in the western city of Zapopan.She's the wife of Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, known as "El Mencho."Gonzalez is accused of managing the cartel's finances, a role previously held by her brother Abigael, who was arrested by Mexican authorities in 2015.In March, ABC7's Chuck Goudie and the I-Team spoke exclusively with Drug Enforcement Administration Special Agent in Charge Brian McKnight , who unofficially branded "El Mencho" as Chicago's public enemy number 1.McKnight says that Rubén Oseguera Cervantes, known as "El Mencho," has taken over a sizable chunk of Chicago's illicit drug trade.El Mencho is a ruthless, billionaire killer who sits atop the CJNG cartel, known as "New Generation," according to McKnight. That Mexico cartel, that splintered from El Chapo's Sinaloa group, has established drug trafficking routes across six continents and has now established a stronghold in Chicago, DEA investigators say. </s> Mexican authorities have arrested the wife of a powerful drug cartel leader in the city of Guadalajara, the interior minister said on Sunday.

Rosalinda Gonzalez Valencia, the wife of Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, alias “El Mencho,” was taken into custody by Mexican navy agents, the minister said.

“This woman is a likely administrator of both economic and legal assets of this criminal organization. She had been sought on an organized crime warrant,” Interior Minister Alfonso Navarrete told a news conference.

Gonzalez was put into preventive detention and has been brought before a judge, Navarrete said.

Security forces, civil defense and emergency medical services were put on alert in case of retaliatory attacks by the cartel, sources in the Jalisco state prosecutor’s office said.

Troops were deployed to guard approaches to the city, Mexico’s second largest.

On Monday, Guadalajara was shaken by the attempted assassination of Jalisco Labor Secretary Luis Najera, a former state prosecutor who was attacked by armed men in a restaurant in the city center.

Assailants torched a passenger bus after the attack, killing an eight-month-old baby.

Najera suffered only minor injuries but seven other people were more seriously wounded. One of the attackers was killed.

The Mexican government estimates that the Jalisco New Generation cartel has amassed a $50 billion fortune. It has a strong presence in nine Mexican states and connections with criminal organizations in the United States, Europe, Asia and Latin America.

In recent years, it has carried out attacks against military and police targets, including the 2015 downing of a military helicopter in which 20 soldiers and a policewoman were killed.

In December of that year, authorities said police and soldiers arrested Antonio Oseguera Cervantes, El Mencho’s brother, months after arresting Nemesio Oseguera’s son, Ruben Oseguera Gonzalez, known as “El Menchito.” </s> Mexican authorities have raised the bounty on one of the country’s most bloodthirsty cartel kingpins – Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, known as “El Mencho” – whose underlings have deployed waves of violence to thwart attempts at detaining him.

Officials announced on Wednesday that they are offering 30m pesos ($1.56m) for information on Oseguera, leader of the powerful Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG,) which deals heavily in making and moving methamphetamines, and has expanded its reach across Mexico as rival criminal groups splinter.

The announcement came as the US Drug Enforcement Administration and Mexican officials prepared to unveil plans to deepen cooperation against the cartels. The new strategy includes closer scrutiny on cartel finances and a new enforcement group, which will focus on international investigations.

“The new game plan is ... pick up the speed and arrest more people,

faster,” Matthew G Donahue, director for the DEA’s North and Central American Region, told the AP.

Oseguera is one of the most powerful figures still on the loose, having eluded capture for nearly a decade. The CJNG has launched coordinated shows of strength across western Jalisco state by blocking roads with hijacked vehicles as federal forces close in on its leader.



His wife, Rosalinda González Valencia – who is accused of overseeing the cartel’s finances – was arrested in late May in suburban Guadalajara.

The CJNG emerged in 2010 after a prominent Sinaloa Cartel boss, Nacho Coronel, was killed by federal forces and Oseguera won the ensuing power struggle.

The cartel has earned notoriety for its violence and its willingness to confront state forces in open battle: CJNG gunmen are accused of ambushing a police convoy in an attack which killed 15 officers. They later shot down an army helicopter.

Analysts say the cartel has disputed territories previously controlled by the Sinaloa Cartel, whose leader Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán was captured in 2016 and extradited to the United States the following year.

But recently the CJNG has itself reportedly split, leading to more fighting between former allies.

More than 200,000 have been killed and 30,000 have gone missing in Mexico’s militarized war on drugs which was launched in December 2006. Violence reached record levels in 2017 with 29,168 homicides registered.

President-elect Andrés Manuel López Obrador has promised to rethink the country’s anti-narcotics strategy by offering amnesties to low-level figures forced into the illegal drugs business and tackling what he considers the root causes of crime: poverty and corruption.

His nominee for public security secretary, Alfonso Durazo, has promised to discard the the so-called “kingpin strategy” of capturing or killing senior cartel figures, telling Mexican media Wednesday: “It hasn’t produced the best results.”

Critics of the strategy say that it only create more violence as new crime bosses emerge and fight for the spoils of the drug market.

“Of 122 prime targets, 120 have been detained. Insecurity has increased, however,” Durazo said. “For us it is much more important to pursue narcotics traffickers’ money rather than narcotics traffickers themselves, because what gives narcos their operational ability … are resources to corrupt and operate.”

But Donahue defended the kingpin strategy, saying authorites in the two countries will “always go after the top dog” in a cartel and “always go after the entire organization”. </s> U.S. and Mexican officials are putting a new multi-million dollar bounty on the leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel or CJNG, Nemesio Rubén Oseguera Cervantes, also known as "El Mencho."The CJNG is a violent criminal organization that grew in power in the wake of the 2016 arrest of notorious drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman. "Unfortunately our country is now faced with a new menace," said DEA Regional Director North and Central Americas Region Matthew G. Donahue. Donahue called the CJNG a "rapidly expanding brand" in Chicago and worldwide; a Mafia-style organization based on bloodshed and violence.In a downtown press conference Wednesday, top-ranking Mexican and U.S. law enforcement officials announced that they are teaming up in a new Chicago-based law enforcement group that will target top cartel drug criminals. DEA Chicago Special Agent in Charge Brian M. McKnight said the new Chicago based group will work with Mexican law enforcement on "high value targets" in an effort to stop the flow of illicit drugs from Mexican cartels into the city. The DEA says law enforcement in Chicago has seized 300 kilos of heroin and illicit fentanyl and $20 million of drug money so far this year. "Today, we begin innovative action plans to solve this problem," said McKnight. In addition to teaming up on cartel leaders in Mexico, McKnight says a new Chicago-based, DEA-led drug taskforce made up of federal agencies, the Chicago Police Department and the Illinois State Police will target "local gangs that are involved in drug distribution in the hotspot areas throughout the city of Chicago." "To be crystal clear, the drugs are being manufactured in Mexico and the Mexican cartels control the routes into the United States for distribution," said McKnight. In March, the I-Team first reported that the leader of CJNG, Nemesio Rubén Oseguera Cervantes, also known as "El Mencho" is the Chicago DEA's new "most wanted" drug criminal. DEA officials say the CJNG has now established a stronghold in Chicago. Osgeuera Cervantes is already under indictment in Washington D.C. and believed to be directing his cartel from a Mexican mountain hideout.Chicago Police Department Superintendent Eddie Johnson was appreciative of the new collaborative cross-border effort, saying, "we can't do it alone at CPD. "It's not just a Chicago problem," said Superintendent Johnson, "it's an international problem." </s> CHICAGO -- U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration officials unveiled new strategies in combating Mexican drug cartels Wednesday in Chicago alongside members of the Mexican government, military and federal police, who said one priority was to capture the leader of the increasingly powerful Jalisco New Generation Cartel.

A joint news conference with the officials side by side was a display of bilateral cooperation amid ongoing tensions over President Donald Trump's trade and immigration policies, including over his vow to build a wall along the nearly 2,000-mile U.S.-Mexican border.

The new plans include putting greater emphasis on attacking cartels' financial infrastructure and calling for a new enforcement group based in Chicago that will concentrate on international investigations of cartels.

The targeting of cartel drug lords will remain a core component of bids to disrupt the powerful syndicates, for instance. The biggest trophy in the long-standing kingpin strategy was Sinaloa Cartel leader Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, extradited to New York in 2017 to face U.S. trafficking charges.

Among the cartels cutting into Sinaloa's drug-market share is the Jalisco New Generation Cartel led by Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, also known as "El Mencho." The cartel once shot down a Mexican military helicopter with a rocket launcher.

Last year, a DEA drug-threat report called the Jalisco New Generation Cartel "one of the most powerful and fastest growing [cartels] in Mexico and the United States." It said the cartel's primary product is methamphetamine, with main U.S. distribution hubs in Los Angeles, New York, and Atlanta.

At Wednesday's news conference, Felipe De Jesus Munoz Vazquez, a Mexico's deputy attorney general, said "one priority is the capture of the head of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel." Also Wednesday, officials in Mexico announced a $1.6 million reward for the capture of Cervantes.

Matthew Donahue, director for the DEA's North and Central American Region, said Tuesday that the U.S. wants to rely more on recent changes in the Mexican legal system designed to make evidence gathering and prosecutions more efficient.

"That's what we're really trying to push -- the cooperation that we currently have with Mexico to be a little more efficient, a little bit more aggressive," Donahue said.

In turn, he said the U.S. intends to do more to help stem the flow of guns into Mexico that contributes to deadly violence in the country. Donahue said around 31,000 people were killed in Mexico last year, a record for a single year.

A 2018 report by the University of San Diego's Justice in Mexico said Guzman's takedown "dramatically reshaped the landscape of Mexican organized crime," including by clearing the way for the rise of the Jalisco cartel. It added the cartel's 52-year-old leader "has a reputation as a ruthless killer." He migrated to the U.S. in the 1980s and was deported back to Mexico after a trafficking conviction.

The same report urged policymakers not to rely as much on a strategy of going after kingpins and extraditing them to the U.S., saying it often had a "hydra-effect," in which a new series of drug lords emerge and without reducing the overall menace of cartels.

Information for this article was contributed by Peter Orsi of The Associated Press.
The Mexican government announces that they are offering up to MXN$30 million (equivalent to US$1.56 million) for anyone who provides information that leads to the arrest of Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes (alias "El Mencho"), the suspected leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel and one of Mexico's most-wanted.