After the kidnapping and disappearance of the 43 normalista students from Ayotzinapa in 2014, the Secretary of National Defense (Sedena) issued a report linking 20 mayors of Guerrero with drug trafficking and organized crime, two of which They are still active in local politics.
The report prepared by the Deputy Chief of Intelligence of the National Defense General Staff (EMDM) was sent by email to the then head of the Criminal Investigation Agency (AIC) of the Attorney General’s Office (PGR), Tomás Zerón de Lucio , in November 2014, in the context of the investigations that sought to find the whereregardings of the disappeared students.
The document to which Aristegui Noticias had access is part of the more than 4 million emails extracted by the Guacamaya collective following hacking the Sedena servers.
The file includes the names of the former mayor of Iguala, José Luis Abarca Velázquez; the former mayor of Cocula, César Miguel Peñaloza Santana, and the former municipal president of San Miguel Totolapan, Saúl Beltrán Orozco, who in the 2015 elections obtained a local deputation from the PRI.
However, the PGR only proceeded once morest the former mayors of Iguala and Cocula for their alleged relationship with the criminal group “Guerreros Unidos” and the participation of their directors of Public Security, as well as their municipal police, in the attacks once morest the normalistas from Ayotzinapa, an action that left six dead, including four students, and the disappearance of 43 young normalistas.
Former PRD member José Luis Abarca is currently subject to criminal proceedings for the crime of organized crime, but he has already decreed his freedom in the criminal case he was facing for the crime of forced disappearance of persons to the detriment of the 43 normalist students.
As regards Peñaloza Santana, he was acquitted by a federal judge in 2019 on the grounds that they did not provide sufficient evidence that he was linked to “Guerreros Unidos”.
Meanwhile, Saúl Beltrán was accused of being part of the criminal group “Los Tequileros” and of ordering the murder of a worker in the Totolapan city hall, for which he requested a license from the position in May 2017 to try to avoid his removal, he obtained a suspension of amparo to stop his detention before the end of his term as legislator and since mid-2018 he has not appeared publicly once more.
The accusations once morest the mayors are part of the #SedenaLeaks together with an Executive Diagnosis on the Criminal and Social Agenda of the State of Guerrero, dated February 2020, in which it is noted that two years ago said entity had the presence of five national or regional criminal organizations and 15 criminal groups of court state that have been splitting from the national or higher impact cartels.
Currently, the organized crime organizations that operate in Guerrero are the Pacific Cartel, Beltrán Leyva, La Familia, Jalisco New Generation Cartel, Knights Templar and Guerreros Unidos, which continue to enjoy complicity with local and federal authorities.
The mayors singled out for alleged links to drug trafficking in 2014 are:
1.-Iguala: José Luis Abarca, PRD.
Linked to “Guerreros Unidos”, to whom he provided protection, in addition to collaborating in their criminal activities. At the time of the report, he was a fugitive and is currently the only prisoner for his criminal ties.
“In addition to the above, his wife, María de los Ángeles Pineda Villa, is accused of maintaining close ties with members of the Beltrán Leyva family,” the report explains.
Two of his brothers Alberto and Mario Pineda Villa were assassinated in 2009, while a fourth member of the dynasty, Salomón, has remained a fugitive since the disappearance of the normalistas.
2.- Cocula: César Miguel Peñaloza Santana, PRI.
He was detained between 2015 and 2019 on charges of organized crime, but was acquitted by a federal judge. According to Sedena, he provided support and protection to members of the criminal group “Guerreros Unidos”, whom he recognized as supposed rural policemen.
3.- Arcelia: Taurino Vázquez Vázquez, PRI.
He was linked to “La Familia” and to criminal leader Johnny Hurtado Olascoaga, alias “El pez”, at that time leader of “La Familia” and currently one of the main generators of violence in Guerrero and the State of Mexico. , an entity that offers a reward for his capture for participating in attacks on elements of the State Police.
4.- Apaxtla of Castrejon: Ephraim Peña Damasio, PRD.
He is another of the townspeople linked to “Guerreros Unidos”, according to Sedena. The agency cataloged him as a promoter of the self-styled “Movimiento Apaxtlense Adrián Castrejón”, created at the initiative of an operator of “Guerreros Unidos”. After completing his term as mayor, there is no more news of him.
5.- Coyuca of Catalan: King Hilario Serrano, PRD.
Sedena links him to the criminal group “Los Caballeros Templarios”. According to Military Intelligence, he provided preventive municipal police to serve as escorts for Euclides and Eli Camacho, both linked to the Knights Templar.
Despite the accusations once morest him, he was Director of Transparency of the Guerrero Congress in 2019 and in 2021 he was Morena’s candidate for mayor, an aspiration he resigned due to alleged threats from organized crime.
6. Everardo Wences Santamaria, PRI.
He was also linked through citizen complaints to the leader of La Familia in Guerrero, Johnny Hurtado, “El Pez.” When his term as mayor ended in 2015, he did not return to public life.
7.- Pungabarato: Reynel Rodríguez Muñoz, PRI.
The Sedena report indicates that he owned a hotel called “Real de la Loma” that was used to allegedly launder the money of the criminal group “Los Caballeros Templarios”; in addition to the fact that he was seen “frequently at parties and social gatherings, in the company of Luis Navarro Peñaloza, alias” El Zarco “, operator of said criminal group.
He is currently a federal deputy for the PRI and his term will end in 2021. He arrived as a representative of Ciudad Altamirano, where the hotel in his name is located.
8.- Taxco de Alarcón: Salomón Majul González. BREAD.
He was linked to “Guerreros Unidos”, a criminal group that financed his political campaign on the orders of Mario Casarrubias Salgado, alias “El Sapo Guapo”, former leader of that criminal group and another of those accused of the disappearance of the 43 normalista students.
He died on July 27, 2021 from Covid, while waiting to be sentenced for various crimes. He is also linked to Alexander Palacios, alias “El Cholo Palacios”, alleged plaza boss of “Guerreros Unidos” in Iguala, Guerrero, who was arrested in 2015 and later released, for which he returned to his criminal activities.
9.- Huitzuco de los Figueroa: Norberto Figueroa Almazo, PRI.
That municipality has been identified by the Commission for Truth and Access to Justice as one of the places to which they took one of the three groups of disappeared normalistas.
For Sedena, the former mayor was linked to “Guerreros Unidos” and would also be linked to “El Cholo Palacios”, so his police officers would also have participated in the kidnapping and disappearance of the 43 Ayotzinapa students. After completing his term in 2015, he was disqualified from holding public office, but was never investigated by the PGR.
10.- Buenavista de Cuéllar: Elías Salgado Sámano, PT.
He is another municipal president who is linked to “El Cholo Palacios”, plaza boss of “Guerreros Unidos” in Iguala. In the past elections for governor, he supported Morena’s candidate, Evelyn Salgado.
11. General Canuto Neri: Eleuterio Aranda Salgado, PRD.
Sedena links him to “La Familia Michoacana”, since he has recorded internet videos in which he sings corridos in support of that criminal group. In addition, Sedena points him out for praising “the courage” of “La Familia” and for him through his songs. Michoacán family.
Known as “El Solitario del Sur”, he used to show up at meetings and parties organized by that same criminal group and in 2106 he was arrested with other members of “La Familia” for the murder of a former mayor of the same town he governed.
12.- General Heliodoro Castillo (Tlacotepec): Mario Alberto Chávez Carbajal, PRI.
Linked to “Guerreros Unidos”, he was accused by Sedena of being financed “by members of organized crime; He maintains close ties with the brothers Onesimo and Javier Marquina Chapa, who were at the service of “Guerreros Unidos” in that municipality known for being one of the places that housed large poppy crops and the production of opium gum.
He collaborated with the transfer of drugs according to Military Intelligence and was murdered on September 9, 2021 in Chilpancingo, Guerrero.
13.- Teloloapan: Ignacio de Jesús Valladares Salgado. PRD.
Sedena affirms that this former mayor had links with “Guerreros Unidos”, particularly with the Bernabé brothers, David and Gerardo Lagunas Contreras, alleged drug money launderers and owners of hotels, ranches and the San Andrés Teloloapan bullring.
In 2013, he released a video to denounce threats and extortion from the criminal group “La Familia Michoacana”, for which he requested federal protection.
14.- Ixcateopan de Cuauhtemoc. Filiberta Honelia Barrera Bahena, PRD.
Presumably linked to “La Familia”, Sedena had complaints that it provided protection to members of that group.
15.- Pilcaya: Sandra Velázquez Lara, PAN.
She was singled out in citizen complaints for alleged links to José López Vences, alias “El Chanis” of the criminal group “La Familia Michoacana”, which operated between the borders of the state of Guerrero and the State of Mexico.
In June 2021, she was re-elected to govern that municipality that she had previously governed in the three-year periods 2012-2015 and 2018 and 2021. In August of last year she suffered an attack from which she emerged unharmed, because she was traveling in an armored van. However, two municipal police officers who acted as her escorts lost their lives.
