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MEXICO CITY – A top drug gang enforcer says he ordered the killing of a U.S. consulate worker because she helped provide visas to a rival gang in the border city of Ciudad Juarez, federal police said Friday.
Jesus Ernesto Chavez, whose arrest was announced on Friday, leads a band of hit men for a street gang tied to the Juarez cartel, said Ramon Pequeno, the head of anti-narcotics for the Federal Police.
Pequeno said Chavez ordered the March 13 attack that killed U.S. consulate employee Lesley Enriquez and her husband as they drove through the violent city toward a border crossing to the U.S. Pequeno said Chavez told police that Enriquez was targeted because she helped provide visas to a rival gang.
The suggestion that drug gangs may have infiltrated the U.S. diplomatic mission runs counter to previous statements by U.S. Embassy officials that Enriquez was never in a position to provide visas and worked in a section that provides basic services to U.S. citizens in Mexico.
And U.S. officials who looked into the possibility of corruption involving Enriquez shortly after her killing found no evidence that she was involved in illegal activity at the consulate, said a federal official in the U.S. who is familiar with the investigation. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak about the case.
He said the motive behind the attacks remains unclear to U.S. officials.
"The 'why' has not been answered" in the killing of Enriquez, her husband and the husband of a co-worker, the official said.
The attack on Enriquez — within view of the Texas border — and a nearly simultaneous attack that killed the husband of a Mexican employee of the consulate raised concerns that Americans and U.S. government personnel were being caught up in drug-related violence.
Jesus Ernesto Chavez, whose arrest was announced on Friday, leads a band of hit men for a street gang tied to the Juarez cartel, said Ramon Pequeno, the head of anti-narcotics for the Federal Police.
Pequeno said Chavez ordered the March 13 attack that killed U.S. consulate employee Lesley Enriquez and her husband as they drove through the violent city toward a border crossing to the U.S. Pequeno said Chavez told police that Enriquez was targeted because she helped provide visas to a rival gang.
The suggestion that drug gangs may have infiltrated the U.S. diplomatic mission runs counter to previous statements by U.S. Embassy officials that Enriquez was never in a position to provide visas and worked in a section that provides basic services to U.S. citizens in Mexico.
And U.S. officials who looked into the possibility of corruption involving Enriquez shortly after her killing found no evidence that she was involved in illegal activity at the consulate, said a federal official in the U.S. who is familiar with the investigation. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak about the case.
He said the motive behind the attacks remains unclear to U.S. officials.
"The 'why' has not been answered" in the killing of Enriquez, her husband and the husband of a co-worker, the official said.
The attack on Enriquez — within view of the Texas border — and a nearly simultaneous attack that killed the husband of a Mexican employee of the consulate raised concerns that Americans and U.S. government personnel were being caught up in drug-related violence.