Whereabouts of notorious drug lord nicknamed "La Barbie" unknown as Mexico presses U.S. for answers
DECEMBER 1, 2022 / 6:19 AM / CBS/AP
Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on Wednesday urged the United States to reveal the whereabouts of a notorious drug trafficker whose name has disappeared from the U.S. prison register.
Edgar Valdez Villarreal, a Mexican-American nicknamed "La Barbie" for his fair complexion, was captured by Mexico in 2010 and extradited to the United States, where he was sentenced to 49 years in prison.
Media reports recently revealed that the former henchman of the Beltran-Leyva cartel no longer appears in a search of the Federal Bureau of Prisons' online register of inmates.
Edgar Valdez Villareal aka 'La Barbie' (C) of the Beltran Leyva drug cartel, is presented to the press at the Federal Police headquarters in Mexico City, on August 31, 2010.
ALFREDO ESTRELLA/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES
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According to prosecutors, Valdez began his drug trafficking career in Laredo, Texas, and soon developed cocaine customers in New Orleans and Memphis. He eventually entered into a relationship with Arturo Beltran-Leyva, who was then associated with the Sinaloa Cartel and Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman in Mexico, prosecutors alleged.
Valdez, prosecutors said, then began coordinating shipments of cocaine into Mexico using speedboats and airplanes, while also paying bribes to local law enforcement officials. The cocaine was then allegedly transported across the border into the U.S.. Prosecutors said Valdez became a top-level enforcer for the cartel and coordinated a war against his rivals, the Gulf Cartel and Zetas in Mexico.
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