Mexican authorities have arrested the former mayor of a rural community in the border state of Coahuila in connection with the kidnapping, murder and incineration of hundreds of victims through a network of ovens at the hands of the Los Zetas cartel. The arrest comes after Breitbart Texas exposed not only the horrors of the mass extermination, but also the cover-up and complicity of the Mexican government.
On Thursday morning, Coahuila state authorities arrested Sergio Alonzo Rodriguez, the former mayor of Allende, Coahuila, on the charge of aggravated kidnapping, information provided to Breitbart Texas by the Coahuila government revealed. Rodriguez was the mayor of Allende, Coahuila in March, 2011, when a commando of Los Zetas kidnapped dozens of people who were then murdered and incinerated.
Earlier this year, Breitbart Texas published the results of a three-month investigation into how Los Zetas were able to kidnap, torture, execute and incinerate approximately 300 victims–including women and children–between 2011 and 2013. Approximately 150 of the victims were taken to the Piedras Negras state prison where cartel members used 55-gallon drums to incinerate the human remains.
Mexican court documents obtained by Breitbart Texas revealed that the wave of terror unleashed by Los Zetas began as an internal spat between Los Zetas, resulting in the leadership ordering the murder of every individual related, connected or associated with two former members. The kill list included women and children. Court documents and testimonies from victims’ relatives revealed that while the kidnappings began in 2011, they continued well into 2013 when the crimes came to a temporary halt.
Despite the magnitude, news outlets in both the U.S. and Mexico largely ignored the story as cartels continued to reign in that country with impunity. After Breitbart Texas’ exposé, authorities charged a handful of Los Zetas members in connection with the incinerations inside the prison, but public officials had managed to escape scrutiny.
The governor at the time of the massacre, Humberto Moreira, was accused and later released in Spain for having been a surrogate of the Los Zetas cartel–however he, too, has managed to avoid facing a judge in Mexico. Moreira had various assets seized by U.S. courts.
The arrest of the former mayor comes just one day after CNN’s Jake Tapper tweeted out Breitbart Texas’ exposé on the incineration of hundreds of victims in Allende. Tapper’s tweet set off a social media storm among U.S. journalists who have largely ignored the horrors carried out by cartels in Mexico.
Ildefonso Ortiz is an award winning journalist with Breitbart Texas. He co-founded the Cartel Chronicles project and you can follow him on Twitter and on Facebook.
“J.M. Martinez” from the Cartel Chronicles project contributed to this report.
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