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 News Around the Republic of Mexico | May 2005 
High-Profile Inmate Escapes
 Wire services
| | The disappearance of the 40 year-old Guatemalan came after a series of escapes and scandals in Mexico's prison system. |
Mexico City - The alleged leader of a Guatemala-based drug trafficking organization sought by U.S. authorities has escaped from a jail in Mexico City, authorities said on Saturday.
Guards noticed Otto Roberto Herrera Garcํa was missing from a jail in southern Mexico City on Friday evening, prompting an allnight search of the premises, Mexico City officials said.
Before his arrest in April 2004 at Mexico City's International Airport, Herrera and his organization allegedly moved tons of cocaine each month from Colombia to the United States through El Salvador, Guatemala and Mexico, according to the U.S. State Department.
The disappearance of the 40 year-old Guatemalan came after a series of embarrassing escapes and scandals in Mexico's prison system, which has been contending with pervasive corruption and security lapses.
Mexico City authorities detained at least 45 jail employees, including the facility's director. Scores of family members gathered outside the Mexico City prosecutor's office, where the jail workers were first taken.
"We support you. ... you are not alone," the crowd yelled as jail workers were transported to a new location on a bus escorted by at least five federal police cars.
City authorities were considering whether jail employees may have collaborated in the escape.
"What we have been able to determine is that there are no signs of climbing out or that he had scaled any of the perimeter walls," said Hazael Ruiz, director of Mexico City's jail system. "We could presume that he left through one of the checkpoints, though it is not clear whether it was a checkpoint for vehicles or for people." City government spokesman Jesus Zambrano said, "The escape must have occurred with the assistance of someone or some persons in charge of security." A U.S. request to extradite Herrera on drug trafficking and organized crime charges has been on hold while Mexican officials considered appeals.
Zambrano acknowledged that inmates in such high-profile drug cases are ordinarily held at maximum security prisons.
"As a dangerous prisoner detained by Mexican authorities for extradition, it is odd that federal officials did not request his transfer to a high-security prison," he said.
Contacted Saturday, the federal attorney general's office had no comment on the recent escape.
The attorney general's office still is investigating how nine inmates escaped from a prison in western Mexico earlier this month. At least 15 employees from the prison in Sinaloa state have been flown to Mexico City to face prosecutors. |
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