By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com
Mexican police arrested a 77-year-old man accused in the 1985 torturing and killing of DEA Agent Enrique “Kiki” Camarena Salazar.
The arrest of Ezequiel Godinez Cervantes is major break in what was the first time a cartel had murdered a DEA agent.
The FBI tipped off Mexican authorities that Godinez had crossed the border.
“The killing of an American agent on foreign soil was a huge game changer for the United States,” Gretchen Von Helms, a criminal defense attorney who has no ties to the case, told NBC 7 San Diego. “They were obviously very interested in protecting their agents down there and at the time the DEA operated in Mexico much like it was in the United States. You didn’t believe that you could be killed.”
Camarena was working undercover in February 1985 when he disappeared. His body was found a month later on a ranch in Guadalajara, Mexico.
The Guadalajara Cartel accused the agent of taking down a marijuana plantation.
“His name has morphed into a symbol of the drug wars between the United States and Mexico,” Von Helms told NBC 7.
Camarena was depicted in the Netflix show “Narcos: Mexico.”
Godinez, who also is accused of killing two Americans he mistook for DEA agents, was handed over to immigration officials for planned extradition to the U.S., where he will be charged.
The article reads ,:The FBI tipped off Mexican authorities that Godinez had crossed the border.:What border exactly, and in which direction was he headed? This is incredibly unclear.