Yesterday six more persons were accused of complicity in the July 15 car bombing on Ave. 16 de Septiembre in Juarez, which caused widespread fear throughout Juarez, severely dampening commercial activity in the area. If you are not familiar with the case see my posting on it here, and you might look at several follow-up postings I made in the days that followed.
They arrests were made during an operation in which 14 alleged members of La Linea were apprehended while packaging cocaine. Noé Fuentes Chavira, also accused of involvement in the bombing, was captured on August 13.
Among those captured yesterday was Fernando Contreras Meraz, (see photo at right) accused of being the intellectual author of the bombing. He is alleged to have coordinated and supervised the attack, aimed at federal police agents, and is alleged to have made the cell phone call that detonated the bomb. on July 15.
Luis Cárdenas Palomino, Regional Security Coordinator of the Federal Police, speaking at a press conference at a command center in a suburb of Mexico City, asserted that La Linea, the armed force of the Juarez Cartel, has for all practical purposes been dismantled. This is the first time, he said, that a cartel has been "dismantled from bottom to top." It might be worth noting that Diario, the flagship newspaper in Cd. Juarez, did not include these remarks in its coverage today of the arrest (click here), although most newspapers throughout Mexico did (see, for example El Universal story here). Diario included photographs of the fourteen persons arrested, and it named each one by name, role within the organization, and sometimes nickname and age.
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