Zeta drug lord continued to control cartel from inside a Mexican prison, says US indictment

FILE - This file photo shows a mug shot, released on July 15, 2013 by Mexico’s Interior Ministry, of Zetas drug cartel leader Miguel Angel Trevino Morales after his arrest in Mexico. (AP Photo/Mexico’s Interior Ministry, File)

Updated 6:10 PM CDT, October 16, 2024

MEXICO CITY (AP) — A U.S. indictment unsealed Wednesday in the District of Columbia claims that the leader of one of Mexico’s most violent gangs continued to run an offshoot group, the Northeast Cartel, from inside a Mexican prison.

Miguel Angel Treviño Morales, alias “Zeta 40,” was a founder and leader of the notorious Zetas cartel. He has been in a Mexican prison since his arrest in 2013.

Together with the killing of the Zetas’ other top leader in 2012, the old cartel, which spread terror throughout Mexico with bloody massacres, basically fell apart.

The indictment says the new Northeast Cartel was created and run by Treviño Morales and his brother Omar — who was arrested in 2015 — as a successor organization to the Zetas. The brothers allegedly got their relatives to run day-to-day operations for the new gang.

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Drug lords in Mexico usually fight extradition tooth and nail, in part because they can continue to run their gangs if they stay in Mexican prisons.

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