One of the men who could replace ‘El Mencho’ is from Southern California

GUADALAJARA- The notorious drug lord was sick, his kidneys were failing.

Nemesio Rubén Oseguera Cervantes, known as “El Mencho,” delegated day-to-day control to several top lieutenants to ensure smooth management of his multibillion-dollar cartel while he underwent dialysis.

Each ruled a separate territory, had its own group of hitmen, and developed its own fearsome reputation.

Mexican soldiers killed Oseguera in a raid on his remote mountain hideout on Sunday. Appointed commanders immediately ordered a nationwide terror campaign: Cartel fighters launched arson attacks, blocked roads in more than a dozen states, and ambushed security guards, killing 25 National Guard members.

The fires are now out, but important questions remain.

What will happen to the Jalisco New Generation cartel and its fragile coalition of ruthless leaders?

Will they agree to share power? Or will you elevate a single man as president?

Many Mexicans fear a third troubling scenario: a bloody power struggle that tears apart the cartel, opening new fronts of conflict in an already unstable criminal landscape.

The photograph of Nemesio Rubén Oseguera Cervantes at center, known as “El Mencho,” was provided by federal prosecutors.

(US District Court)

“What comes next will not look like a clean succession,” said Ghaleb Krame Hilal, a former security adviser in the state of Tamaulipas. wrote In the online Small Wars Journal. “There will be a struggle within the organization over who has the center of gravity, and that outcome is not predetermined.”

The scenario is complicated because Oseguera’s only son, Rubén Oseguera González, known as “El Menchito”, is serving a life sentence in the United States on drug charges.

Juan Carlos Valencia González is seen in a wanted photo released by the US State Department in 2021. As the leader of the Jalisco New Generation cartel, he is one of the possible successors of “El Mencho”.

(US Department of State)

This leaves Oseguera’s cadre of regional commanders as the most unlikely heirs to his drug empire.

Perhaps the most powerful of them all is Oseguera’s stepson. Juan Carlos Valencia GonzálezIt is known as 03. Other nicknames include El Pelon, El JP and Tricky Tres.

Valencia, 41, is a commander of the paramilitary Grupo Elite and belongs to a clan that runs the cartel’s money laundering operation.

Her mother, Rosalinda González Valencia, was arrested in Guadalajara in November 2021 and accused by Mexican authorities of being a “financial operator” for the Jalisco cartel. His biological father was a co-founder of the now-defunct Milenio cartel, which was Oseguera’s starting point.

Valencia was born in Santa Ana, Orange County, one of many sons and daughters of high-level cartel figures born in the United States in recent years. After Valencia’s father went to prison, Oseguera married her mother.

The U.S. State Department is offering a reward of up to $5 million for information leading to Valencia’s arrest.

A group of Jalisco New Generation cartel fighters.

(Juan José Estrada Serafín / For The Times)

Here are the other contestants:

Ricardo Ruiz, alias RR, is known for masterfully producing cartel propaganda, including a viral social media video showing dozens of cartel fighters dressed in fatigues next to a column of armored vehicles and homemade tanks. “We are Mencho’s men!” they shout as they fire automatic weapons into the sky.

Authorities blamed Ruiz for the death of Valeria Márquez, a 23-year-old model and beauty influencer who was shot and killed while livestreaming on TikTok last year.

Audias Flores Silva, a leader commonly known as “El Jardinero,” controls methamphetamine factories in the states of Jalisco and Zacatecas, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration. U.S. officials say he has a fleet of planes and tractor trailers used to smuggle drugs from Central America to the United States.

Flores is believed to have engineered the Jalisco cartel’s recent alliance with a faction of the warring Sinaloa cartel led by two sons of jailed drug lord Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán.

And then there’s 29-year-old Abraham Jesús Ambriz Cano, nicknamed “El Yogurth.” Ambriz assembled a small army of foreign mercenaries, mostly Colombian veterans with experience in bomb-making and counterinsurgency tactics. Some of these fighters say they were brought to Mexico under false pretenses and forced to fight.

Together these men help lead one of the most powerful and feared cartels in history; A criminal organization that trafficks tons of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, and fentanyl into the United States, but also profits from extortion, fuel theft, illegal mining, logging, and timeshare fraud in Mexico.

Avocado fields in the Mexican state of Michoacán, where the Jalisco New Generation cartel and other criminal groups tax producers and own their own crops.

(Gary Coronado/Los Angeles Times)

Security analysts say the group’s horizontal, franchise-like structure enabled it to quickly respond to Oseguera’s killing and will allow it to continue business as usual in the coming months.

Many believe the remaining leaders of the cartel will try to work together for now.

“They perceive a big common enemy right now: the Mexican government,” said David Saucedo, who advises local and state governments on security policy.

But Saucedo warned: “It is possible that the cartel will break up at some point when conflicts arise over control of profits, smuggling routes and contact with political officials.” Personal conflicts and encroachment by rival cartels can also cause problems, he added.

The inner workings of cartels are deliberately opaque to the outside world.

Analysts and authorities track social media postings, changes in drug flows and outbreaks of violence to understand shifts within gangs. Many watch closely for narco corridos or drug ballads that describe cartel politics.

Saucedo noted that many songs recently describe Flores as Oseguera’s successor. Another song pays homage to Valencia (“Born in Orange County, where the sun burns differently,” it begins.)

It is unclear whether any of the current leaders will have the gravitas of Oseguera, who wielded unquestioned authority even when his health deteriorated and he was forced to live on the run. This is partly due to his unflinching desire to violently punish anyone who threatens or opposes him.

He was blamed for the 2020 assassination attempt on Omar García Harfuch, then Mexico City’s police chief and now the top public security official under President Claudia Sheinbaum. During the government’s previous attempt to capture Oseguera in 2015, cartel fighters used rocket-propelled grenades to shoot down an army helicopter and kill nine soldiers.

Last year, at a ranch near Guadalajara that was apparently used to train Jalisco soldiers, activists discovered the remains of hundreds of missing people.

Born to farmers in the state of Michoacán, Oseguera immigrated to the United States illegally in his youth. He was first arrested for selling methamphetamine in San Francisco when he was 19 years old. His reputation grew as he rose from small-time drifter to the myth-shrouded ringleader of a seemingly invincible cartel operating in most Mexican states and countries in South America, Asia and Europe.

Mexico’s recent history is filled with stories of once-powerful unions (among them gangs in Guadalajara, Tijuana, and Ciudad Juárez) falling apart, being absorbed by other gangs, or withering away when the big guys were captured and killed. Colombia’s infamous Medellin cartel was another gang that went extinct after the death of Pablo Escobar in 1993.

Linthicum reported in New York, Hamilton in Guadalajara, and McDonnell in Mexico City.