Drug cartels' "boss of bosses" killed by Mexican security forces

Mexican authorities had been closing in on Beltrán Leyva in recent months, capturing and killing his junior associates. They raided a lavish party in the colonial town of Tepoztlan, near Cuernavaca, last week and killed three alleged Beltrán Leyva cartel members. Performing at the party was Ramón Ayala, a popular Texas-based singer, whose attorney denied that his client had any ties to organized crime. [On Thursday, a judge ordered Ayala jailed for up to 40 days pending investigation, the Associated Press reported.] In another near-miss, Beltrán Leyva associates were arrested after attending a baptism he hosted in Acapulco…

Mexican and U.S. drug officials had hinted for two months that authorities would soon capture some “big fish” in Mexico. The death of Beltrán Leyva follows a strategy pushed by officials on both sides of the border to go after his cartel’s leadership.

“They are the big thinkers. . . . At the minimum, this will cause quite a bit of dislocation in the organization, and it is possible it could cause a power struggle within the cartel,” said Tony Payan, a professor at the University of Texas at El Paso and an authority on drug trafficking.