FBI: Zetas arming for confrontation with U.S. authorities

McALLEN -- Recent U.S. efforts to disrupt drug smuggling routes through the Rio Grande Valley have prompted threats of retaliation against authorities on this side of the river, according to an FBI intelligence report.

Vowing to maintain control over valuable trafficking corridors such as those in Reynosa, Matamoros and Miguel Alemán, the Gulf Cartel and its paramilitary enforcement wing, Los Zetas, have begun stockpiling weapons, reaching out to Texas gangs and issuing orders to "confront U.S. law enforcement agencies to zealously protect their criminal interests," the report states.

The organizations' encroachment north of the border marks a troubling shift in strategies, federal and local authorities say.

Prior to now, smugglers largely maintained a non-engagement policy with law enforcement here, even as they carried out hundreds of assassinations and violent attacks on authorities in Mexico.

"It's finally coming together - the cartels, the violence, the gangs," said one local law enforcement official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about recent cartel intelligence. "It's going to get worse here before it gets any better."

DISTURBING INTELLIGENCE

An Oct. 17 FBI intelligence report obtained by The Monitor charts the development of this more brazen strategy for the Zetas.

In direct response to recent arrests and seizures in Texas, regional leader Jaime "El Hummer" González Durán has ordered dozens of reinforcements to Reynosa and urged his operatives to protect their turf at all cost.

"These replacements are believed to be armed with assault rifles, bulletproof vests and grenades and are occupying safe houses throughout the McAllen area," says the document, which was distributed to local law enforcement officials late last month.

The FBI's McAllen office refused to confirm the report's details Tuesday. But recent law enforcement actions seem to address many of its findings.

Following an attack from across the Rio Grande on U.S. Border Patrol agents near Mission earlier this month, Hidalgo County Sheriff Lupe Treviño announced his deputies would return any fire that came from the other side of the border.

Last week, the FBI joined dozens of Valley police chiefs to discuss the growing threat of gangs in the region and their connection to Mexico's criminal organizations.

"Let's face it," Laredo police Chief Carlos Maldonado said at a news conference after the meeting. "The only people that recognize jurisdictional and international boundaries are us."

LAW ENFORCEMENT CRACKDOWN

This latest intelligence on the Zetas comes as a direct result of the recent successful U.S. and Mexican efforts.

Just last month, U.S. federal authorities swept up more than 175 cartel operatives and associates working in the United States. The long-term investigation - dubbed "Project Reckoning" - netted several key players in cartel smuggling networks reaching from the Valley to states such as Georgia, New York and North Carolina.

In Starr County, 22 alleged members of a Roma-based cell - including its purported leader, Juan Carlos Hinojosa, and Sheriff Reymundo "Rey" Guerra - have been arrested since last month.

Other key operatives such as the purported top Zeta, Heriberto Lazcano Lazcano, and the alleged head of the Gulf Cartel, Jorge Eduardo Costilla Sánchez, were indicted on conspiracy and drug trafficking charges in a Washington, D.C., federal court. Both men remain at large.

These efforts north of the border come while Mexican President Felipe Calderon continues his two-year crackdown on his country's entrenched criminal organizations whose tentacles reach into local and federal law enforcement there.

Since taking office, his administration has extradited the former Gulf Cartel leader Osiel Cárdenas Guillen to face criminal charges in the United States and has arrested or killed several of the organization's major players.

The Gulf Cartel and the Zetas, who control the country's northeast smuggling routes stretching from Matamoros to Nuevo Laredo, have sustained particular damage under the current campaign - so much so that Zetas like González have reportedly taken over cartel operations. His sphere of control is now believed to stretch from Rio Bravo to Miguel Alemán.

FUTURE THREAT?

So far, the Gulf Cartel's dominance along Mexico's northeastern border has largely spared cities like Reynosa and Matamoros from the daily brutality suffered in places such as Ciudad Juarez - across the river from El Paso.

There, clashes between feuding cartels and with federal authorities have left a body count stretching into the thousands this year. 

But law enforcement officials fear their success in thwarting smugglers in the Valley has already resulted in smaller - but still significant - forms of reprisal.

"Once we catch on to certain techniques, they get frustrated and adopt more aggressive ones," said Will Glaspy, a local spokesman for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.

Recent federal intelligence suggests González, the Zeta member purportedly running operations in Reynosa, may have recently planned an attack - ultimately thwarted - on the U.S. Consulate in Nuevo Laredo.

And as recently as last month, he and several alleged accomplices were implicated in the kidnapping of two men in Mission for debts owed to the cartel. Search warrants executed this month uncovered assault rifles, bulletproof vests and several paintball weapons at an alleged cartel stash house outside of the city.

To combat this threat, local and federal authorities must work together like never before, said Treviño, the Hidalgo County sheriff. And so far, he is encouraged by what he has seen.

"Ten years ago this kind of collaboration would not have happened," he said. "We may never have a complete victory, but I believe with continued cooperation we can really get a handle on the problem."

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Jeremy Roebuck covers courts and general assignments for The Monitor. You can reach him at (956) 683-4437.