MEXICO CITY — Soldiers raided a house in central Mexico on Saturday and captured the alleged leader of a drug cartel accused of spreading terror across much of the country. They also found evidence that his brother, the gang's alleged co-leader, was dead.
With Benjamin Arellano Felix under arrest and his brother Ramon presumed dead, "the cartel of the Arellanos has been completely dismantled," Attorney General Ramon Macedo de la Concha told a news conference.
"It seems that this is a great triumph for justice," President Vicente Fox said as he congratulated the army and the Justice Department.
U.S. and Mexican authorities say the brothers led a Tijuana-based operation that smuggled tons of cocaine, amphetamines and marijuana into the United States and murdered hundreds of people over the past 15 years.
"We've been seeking his apprehension for years," U.S. Drug Enforcement Administrator Asa Hutchinson said Saturday of Benjamin Arellano Felix. "It was our top priority."
Ramon Arellano Felix is on the FBI's 10 most wanted list, with a $2 million reward for his capture.
Still, the breakup of other major gangs in the past has had little or no long-term effect on the flow of illegal drugs into the United States.