Brother of Sinaloa Cartel Boss Caught at Arizona Border

PHOENIX, Arizona — The brother of a top Sinaloa Cartel boss, who recently made a failed-power grab for the entire criminal organization, is now in U.S. custody after being arrested at an international bridge in Arizona.

U.S. authorities arrested Alvaro Lopez Nunez, the brother of Sinaloa Cartel boss Damaso “El Licenciado” Lopez Nunez, last week at an international bridge in Nogales Arizona, information provided to Breitbart Texas by the U.S. Attorney’s Office revealed.

The 38-year-old cartel associate is expected to be moved to San Diego, California, where he is named on a multi-count drug trafficking indictment related to the Sinaloa Cartel. Lopez’s arrest comes days after his nephew, Damaso “Mini-Lic” Lopez Serrano, turned himself in to authorities in California, Breitbart Texas reported.

The arrests seem to follow a failed power grab in the Sinaloa Cartel faction led by the elder Damaso Lopez with his son, relatives, and associates against the factions controlled by the sons of the infamous Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who is in U.S. federal custody awaiting trial.

The elder Damaso Lopez was a Mexican law enforcement official who had helped El Chapo escape from prison and since became one of his closest allies. After his most recent capture and extradition, Lopez apparently sided with Guzman’s rivals in a hostile takeover of the Sinaloa Cartel. Damaso was recently captured by Mexican authorities near Mexico City and his faction appears to have lost most of its power.

Robert Arce is a retired Phoenix Police detective with extensive experience working Mexican organized crime and street gangs. Arce has worked in the Balkans, Iraq, Haiti, and recently completed a three-year assignment in Monterrey, Mexico, working out of the Consulate for the United States Department of State, International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Program, where he was the Regional Program Manager for Northeast Mexico (Coahuila, Tamaulipas, Nuevo Leon, Durango, San Luis Potosi, Zacatecas.)