The family of a DEA agent who was tortured and killed in 1985 have filed a lawsuit in San Diego federal court against the Sinaloa Cartel and the leaders allegedly responsible for his death.
The lawsuit was filed following President Donald Trump’s designation of the cartel as a foreign terrorist organization, opening the door for the family of Enrique “Kiki” Camarena to pursue an anti-terrorism lawsuit of this kind.
Along with the Sinaloa Cartel, the suit names alleged drug kingpins Rafael Caro-Quintero, Ernesto Fonseca-Carrillo and Miguel Angel Felix-Gallardo as defendants.
According to the complaint, all three are founding members of the Guadalajara Cartel, which dissolved, with its drug trafficking activities later assumed by the Sinaloa Cartel.
Camarena, 37, and his pilot, Alfredo Zavala-Avelar, were abducted in Guadalajara by gunmen on Feb. 7, 1985. Camarena was on his way to meet his wife for lunch when he was kidnapped across the street from the DEA’s offices inside the U.S. Consulate.
Both men were interrogated and tortured for more than a day and then murdered sometime on Feb. 9, the complaint states. Their bodies were discovered in a shallow grave on a ranch about 60 miles southeast of Guadalajara.
Plaintiffs include Camarena’s widow, Geneva “Mika” Camarena, along with several other family members, including Camarena’s son, San Diego Superior Court Judge Enrique Camarena Jr. The agent was a father of three.
He graduated from Calexico High School in 1966, and two years later he joined the Marine Corps. After leaving the Marines, Kiki first became a fireman, then a police officer in Calexico, before joining the Imperial County Sheriff department. He left that position to take a post with the Drug Enforcement Administration in 1974.
Caro-Quintero was convicted in Mexico of Camarena’s murder and sentenced to 40 years in prison, but was released after a Mexican appellate court ruled that state murder charges were pursued against him incorrectly because he was tried in federal court.
He was released from custody in 2013, but re-arrested nearly a decade later after an appellate court reinstated his conviction.
Caro-Quintero was transferred to U.S. custody last month to face charges for Camarena’s murder, among others.
Fonseca-Carrillo and Felix-Gallardo were convicted in Mexico for Camarena’s kidnapping and murder and each sentenced to 40 years in prison.
