Zetas drug cartel heir ‘equally ruthless’

Mexico City -

The captured leader of Mexico's Zetas drug cartel is a tough act to follow, a man feared for his penchant for beheading victims, boiling rivals and tormenting migrants.

His arrest raised hopes that the cartel's reign of terror has finally ended, but the man tipped to succeed Miguel Angel Trevino is his younger brother, who also boasts a blood-stained resume that includes claims of killing 1 000 people, according to US court documents.

Former US law enforcement officials say Omar Trevino, alias “Z-42,” is the likely heir apparent to “Z-40” since his brother was captured by Mexican marines on a dirt road near the northeastern city of Nuevo Laredo last Monday.

And the 39-year-old sibling, who was Z-40's right-hand man, is expected to replicate his brother's violent ways to assert his authority over the cartel and fend off rivals, according to two former US officials who worked in Mexico.

“Omar is equally ruthless as his brother, though he doesn't have the organisational skills that his brother had,” said Mike Vigil, a former chief of the US Drug Enforcement Administration's international operations.

“He was nurtured and tutored by Miguel Angel Trevino in terms of using wholesale violence to intimidate other criminal organisations and security forces,” Vigil told AFP. “He's an individual who will probably use the same tactics as his brother in terms of consolidating power.”

Omar Trevino would likely face challenges to his rule on several fronts at the head of a cartel present in huge swaths of the northeast as well as Central America, experts say.

The Zetas have been warring with the powerful Sinaloa drug cartel of Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who may see an opening to raid Nuevo Laredo, a city highly coveted by drug traffickers because it lies at a major Texas border crossing.

Mexican security forces may also ride the wave of their successful capture of Miguel Trevino to relentlessly pursue his younger brother.

On top of it, the toppling of a drug lord often leads to internal wars of succession, and the Zetas, who were founded by former elite troops, may not be appreciate a new civilian boss, although Miguel Trevino was never a soldier himself.

But Davy Aguilera, a former special agent for the US firearms and explosives agency ATF, said Omar Trevino is the “logical successor because everybody was so afraid and intimidated by Miguel.”

“There were indications that if something happened to him, Omar was his successor. Nobody wanted to betray Miguel,” Aguilera said. “Like Miguel, (Omar) will surround himself with the worst of the worst, the most violent criminals” to tighten his grip, he added.

Little is known about Omar Trevino and interior ministry spokesman Eduardo Sanchez told AFP he knew nothing about him.

But former US officials say the younger Trevino, born in Nuevo Laredo, began his life in the criminal underworld as a “small-time thug” who committed petty crimes like robberies and extortion - always by his brother's side.

He rose through the ranks of the Zetas thanks to his older brother, who made him his top lieutenant when he took over the cartel last year after kingpin Heriberto Lazcano was killed in a gunfight with troops.

While Miguel Angel Trevino reportedly melted victims in a 55-gallon “stew” and is accused of ordering the murder of 265 migrants, his sibling has his own checkered past.

In 2010, Omar Trevino told an informant that he had killed more than 1 000 people while Miguel had killed 2 000, according to an affidavit filed in a US court for a search warrant on the property of another Trevino brother in Texas.

He is named in US indictments for cocaine and marijuana trafficking and the US State Department, which offers a $5 million reward for information leading to his arrest, says he is allegedly responsible for several abductions and murders in Nuevo Laredo.

After 43 kidnap victims were released in Nuevo Laredo in May 2005, witnesses testified that Omar Trevino had killed one of the hostages in front of the others, according to a former official in the Mexican attorney general's office.

“He always worked by Miguel's side. They were very violent,” the official said.

While experts agree that Omar would inherit a weakened cartel, they warn that the Zetas can't be written off just yet.

“It remains to be seen if the Zetas enter a period of crisis or an internal succession war,” said Ricardo Ravelo, a Mexican journalist who has written a book about the Zetas.

But he warned: “The Zetas are very well established. The blow to Trevino doesn't mean the Zetas are over.” - Sapa-AFP