THREE HELD IN DEA AGENT'S DISAPPEARANCE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000706710013-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 13, 2011
• Sequence Number: 13
• Publication Date: February 26, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/12/13: CIA-RDP90-00965R000706710013-0
ART{ALE APPFAREDJ
OHPAA
WASHINGTON POST
26 6ebruary 1985
'three He- Id in DEA
By Marv Thornton
Mexican authorities yesterday
announced the arrest of a former
federal security agent and two oth-
er men in connection with the dis-
appearance of an American drug
agent and ordered an investigation
into charges that Mexican police
had aided the escape of another key
suspect.
A suspect identified as Tomas
Morlet Borquez, said to be a former
official in the Mexican Department
of Federal Security, was arrested
with two ober men in northwest-
ern Mexico, special correspondent
William A. Oahe Jr. reported from
Mexico City. Their alleged role in
the abduction was not disclosed.
The charge of complicity came
Sunday from the head of the U.S.
Drug Enforcement Administration,
Francis M. Mullen Jr., who added in
an interview yesterday that Mex-
ican law enforcement officials have
attempted to thwart other DEA
investigations in Mexico.
"Mexico hasn't arrested a major
drug trafficker in eight years," Mul-
len said.
"They were happy to have us
come in and make a big headline
once in a while ... but when it fi-
nally started to hurt, when they
thought we were getting danger-
ously close [to the traffickers], they
backed off." Other U.S. law enforce-
ment officials, who asked not to be
identified, confirmed ? a report in
Newsweek magazine this week that
a key suspect in the kidnaping of
DEA agent Enrique Camarena Sa-
iazar was tracked by the DEA to an
apartment in Mexico City on Feb.
14, but that Mexican officials failed i
to act for three days. By then, they'
said, he was gone.
Mullen said on Sunday that on
Feb. 9, two days after the Ca-
marena kidnaping, the DEA asked
Mexican authorities to detain an
airplane belonging to reputed Mex-
ican narcotics czar Rafael Caro
Quintero at the Guadalajara airport.
Members of the federal security
Disappearance
agency, Mexico's equivalent of the
CIA, were guarding the plane, Mul-
len said, and allowed itto ,take off
after talking at the scene with Fed-
eral Judicial Police, the Mexican
equivalent of the FBI.
"They let the suspects get away.
Then they, start the raids," Mullen
said in frustration yesterday.
In Mexico City yesterday, Attor-
ney General Sergio Garcia Ramirez
said officials are gathering informa-
tion on the incident and will make a
public explanation as soon as pos-
sible.
U.S. Ambassador John Gavin was
expected to discuss the affair at a
meeting last night with President
Miguel de la Madrid. In Guadala-
jara, judicial police agent Fernando
Inda offered local reporters bis ex-
planation-of the Caro Quintero de-
Inda said he and several DEA
agents had traveled to the airport
Feb. 9 on a tip that suspects were
fleeing by private aircraft.. There,
he said, they stopped eight armed
men who were about to board a pri-
vate plane. The men displayed cre-
dentials of the Department of Fed-
eral Security and the Jalisco State
Judicial 'Police, and Inda approved
their departure, he said.
Other accounts state that as
many as 50 men were at the airport
guarding Caro Quintero with auto-
matic rifles, only some of whom
produced police identification,
Orme reported. Inda "did not tell
the whole story," one U.S. source
said. "There is a whole lot more to
it than that."
Other federal officials here said
that witnesses in the Camarena
case have been threatened and
ents
warned not to talk to the DEA. The
officials said that some of the
threats came from drug traffickers,
and others were made by Mexican
police.
Mullen said that frustration with.
Mexican drug enforcement efforts
started long before the Camarena
disappearance.
Last November, he said, Mexican
officials initially tried to direct DEA
agents away from a large plantation
in Chihuahua where 10,000 tons of
marijuana-the largest single sei-
zure ever made-was found.
"The only statistic we have so far
in that case is the prosecutor-who
was assassinated," `Mullen said, .
Meanwhile, an internal State De-
partment memo indicates that Ca-
marena was one of seven Amer*
cans, including a group of four Je-
hovah's Witnesses, who have dis-
appeared in Mexico this year. An-
other 15 were abducted or disap-
peared last year.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/12/13: CIA-RDP90-00965R000706710013-0