One of the most feared Mexican drug lords - a man who dissolved more than 300 people in acid and signed his name with headless corpses - was nabbed Tuesday.
It was a huge win for the often-overmatched Tijuana cops warring with the increasingly savage cartels. Teodoro (El Teo) Garcia Simental was arrested in La Paz, officials said.
Details were not immediately available. Garcia is blamed for much of the border bloodshed and had a $2.1 million price on his head.
Authorities say he runs a massive kidnapping ring, holding victims in cages, and is behind an explosion of violence that has littered Tijuana with an average of five bodies a day.
Last week, a kidnap victim was found with his face sliced off and stitched onto a football, with a note directed at police saying, "Happy New Year, because it will be your last."
Last January, Santiago Meza, known as Garcia's "stew maker," was arrested and told reporters he was paid $600 a week to dissolve corpses - at least 300 over 10 years.
The Los Angeles Times, which closely follows the border drug wars, reported that Garcia often left the disintegrated remains in barrels on busy streets with messages threatening to turn his rivals into pozole, a thick Mexican soup.
He is a mystery man. His birth date is unknown - he is in his 30s - and only one photo of him has ever been published. He started out as an enforcer in the Arellano Felix cartel and grew powerful by turning the kidnapping of doctors, politicians and businessmen into a multimillion-dollar industry, the LA Times reported.
He split dramatically with the cartel in 2008 - a shootout on a Tijuana expressway left 14 dead.
Since then, his reign of terror has included slicing off the face of one victim, hanging others from highway overpasses and Many of the bodies carry messages boasting they are Garcia's work.
The Mexican gangs are the major supplier of marijuana, methamphetamine, cocaine and heroine to the United States.
Mexican President Felipe Calderon launched his offensive against the cartels in December 2006, which escalated into the increasingly gruesome war.
More than 15,000 people have been killed and many of the victims were tortured or mutilated to send a message to police and rival gangs.
Police have been killed, and their families murdered.
In October 2008, the corpses of three decapitated police officers were arranged along with six other headless bodies to spell "3 L" - Garcia's nickname: "Tres Letras."
Garcia's arrest is the second major victory for the government in a month. Drug lord Arturo Beltran Leyva died in a military shootout in December.
NY Daily News
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