Mexico: Top hitman for Knights Templar gang nabbed
Baku, July 14 (AZERTAC). Mexico`s federal police have caught the top hitman for the Knights Templar drug gang in the western state of Michoacan, authorities said Wednesday.
Federal police allege that suspect Javier Beltran Arco oversaw murders for the meth-trafficking gang. Beltran Arco is known by the nickname "El Chivo," or The Goat.
A federal police statement said that two suspected cartel lookouts had been detained with Beltran Arco, along with three assault rifles and about two pounds (0.8 kilograms) of methamphetamines.
Police also found books, clothing and banners referring to the Knights Templar, the statement said.
The gang split off recently from La Familia, a Michoacan-based drug cartel that also uses quasi-religious rhetoric and instructional material.
Also in Michoacan, authorities announced the seizure of 44 metric tons of chemicals used to produce methamphetamine. The material was found at the Lazaro Cardenas seaport in two containers that had been shipped from Shanghai in China.
In the northern Mexico border city of Ciudad Juarez, prosecutors raised Tuesday`s total of homicides to 21 from a previously reported 18. That made it the bloodiest day of 2011 so far, surpassing the 20 killings reported Feb. 18.
Ciudad Juarez, which sits across the border from El Paso, Texas, is a sprawling industrial city that has been plagued by violence as rival drug cartels fight over turf and smuggling routes.
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