Powerful Mexico Gang Leader Arrested

Mexican security forces have arrested the leader of the Santa Rosa de Lima gang who spread violence through north-central Mexico and fought a years long turf battle with another powerful criminal cartel and the officials in the state of Guanajuato said Jose Antonio Yepez Ortiz, better known by his nickname "El Marro", which means

"The Sledgehammer", was captured on Sunday along with some five other people. Security forces rescued a kidnapped local businesswoman during the operation and also secured an "arsenal" of weapons, Guanajuato attorney general's office said. Security Minister Alfonso Durazo also said Yepez would be taken to the Altiplano

penitentiary, a maximum-security prison where drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman was housed before he also escaped through a tunnel in the 2015. Guzman was recaptured in 2016. Yepez's arrest is considered a major coup for Mexican President Lopez Obrador, who pledged during his 2018 campaign to bring down record

levels of violence plaguing the country. Instead, gang violence has further increased during his presidency, with homicides reaching a record rate in 2019. Yepez's Guanajuato-based gang has been engaged in a bloody struggle for the criminal control of the state with the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), and one of the

country's most powerful and violent groups. The turf battle with the Jalisco turned the industrial hub, with its foreign auto plants and parts suppliers, into the most violent state in the Mexico. Yepez is considered one of the Mexico's most wanted bosses and has appeared in expletive laden videos threatening his enemies. He built

his gang's wealth also by drilling into the pipelines that crisscross the state and then selling the the fuel on the black market, as well as robbing trains. In June, a clip of an emotional Yepez lamenting the arrest of his mother and sister, who were taken into custody with 30 gang members, was widely broadcast on national media. The

women were freed days later and both claimed they had been tortured. On July 24, the authorities also arrested a top Yepez lieutenant and head of one of the group's cells, Jose "El Mamey" Guadalupe.