A notorious Mexican cartel leader who became one of the country’s most wanted criminals by stealing oil has been sentenced to 60 years in prison, prosecutors said.
José Antonio Yépez, the crime boss known as “El Marro” (The Mallet), was arrested in 2020. Yépez is considered responsible for a huge surge in violence in the once-peaceful state of Guanajuato.
The narco’s bust was considered a major coup for President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who had vowed to reduce violence and also stem rampant theft of petroleum from pipelines of the state-owned oil giant Pemex.
Yépez led Guanajuato-based Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel, which waged a bloody turf war with the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, one of Mexico’s most powerful and violent gangs.
Besides stealing fuel to boost income, the Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel engaged in an array of other criminal activities, including drug smuggling to kidnapping.
The attorney general’s office of Guanajuato said Friday on Twitter that a regional court “found him and his co-authors guilty of the crime of kidnapping,” according to Reuters
With Post wire services