Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium11/19/14, 9:58 AM In 1985, a murky alliance of drug lords and government officials tortured and killed a DEA agent named Enrique Camarena. In a three-part series, legendary journalist Charles Bowden finally digs into the terrible mystery behind a hero’s murder. By Charles Bowden and Molly Molloy Illustrations by Matt Rota https://medium.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 1 of 23 Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14, 9:58 AM Chapter One ABSOLUTION He curls up in the oxblood leather chair and stares off to the side. He is speaking softly as faces and screams rise up from the past. He seems gone now to some other place. His eyes are way off in Sinaloa, Mexico. The firefight has taken hours, later they will calculate that 20 thousand rounds are fired. A man goes down. He crawls to him. He is safe now, a man speaking softly about the time when the guns fired. He is in a nice house now. Out the window, the horses feed beside the Shetland pony he keeps for the grandkids. When someone jumps too fast from one corpse in his past to another, he says, “Whoa, pony, whoa.” The big thoroughbred is 17 hands high, the brown body glistens with sheets of muscle. Sometimes, when the nights are bad, he walks down to the paddock “Did you know they sleep standing up? They really do.” But the cries and screams don’t go away. The trials do not go away. The man in the dark leather chair is suddenly crawling to the Mexican federal police officer. The raid on a drug ranch with the cooperation of Mexican federal police turned up a ton of coke and tons of marijuana, but now three federales are wounded. There is blood on the corn leaves. He stares at the red blood and remembers his mother’s warning. When she was 15, her own mother had cast her from the house for being with child and she lived with the gypsies in Mexico. They taught her to see the future in palms, read the cards, to stare into a crystal ball. So she tells her son who is now a DEA agent in Mexico that she sees danger, there is blood on the corn in the fields. That’s all she can say. https://medium.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 2 of 23 The fight is celebrated by Berrellez’s agency. When the firefight ends — because the Mexican army finally comes after a three-hour delay — Hector Berrellez is alive. He manages to pull the federal policeman to safety and has him flown up to a hospital in San Diego. the DEA. is impressed by these actions and befriends Berrellez. Things string together in a way that is hard to see at first. 9:58 AM And he remembers it as he crawls to get the wounded Mexican federal cop.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 3 of 23 . and soon he is https://medium. A man named Guillermo González Calderoni. a Mexican federal police comandante who works at the beck and call of the elite and does their killings. he goes public with his allegations about the CIA. Sometimes. The blood is on the corn. 1985. he gets a real warning. Takes supplements. He hits the weight room. plans on adding chickens to his suburban ranch. and by the morning of February 9. https://medium. Special Agent Hector Berrellez was assigned to the case.S. By September 1989. I was not a hero in DEA. he had been in that firefight. he was dead. 9:58 AM in Washington having a medal pinned on him by the attorney general.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 4 of 23 .Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. 1989.. he’d shown in his work that he knew Mexico — why else would he get death threats? And when his hard work on the Camarena investigation leads him back from Mexico to D. He will plant a garden. By April 1994. Special Agent Enrique Camarena was abducted in Guadalajara. The big flat screen is blank at the moment. maybe they thought I was not a team player. His higher-ups in Washington think of Berrellez when a high-profile murder investigation of a DEA agent named Enrique Camarena seems to stall. tortured.” He grows wistful as he remembers the distance between what he became and what he hoped he would be. “I get depressed when I talk about the Camarena case. After all. The initial investigation led to arrests and convictions in Mexico and the U. On January 3. He has a treadmill and stationary bicycle in the garage. He will feed them grain like his grandmother did.S. On February 7.C. Berrellez was removed from the case. Berrellez continues his tour in Mexico and that leads to threats against his life and his family’s lives and so they are all pulled out and brought back to the U. In October 2013. one he could not dismiss: that he’d better back off because his own government was behind this particular killing. he learned from witnesses of CIA involvement. Berrellez watches news and things but he can’t make it through a movie. Things will feel clean again. Two years later he retired with his career in ruins. and put him in charge. Got the horses. Or why he was killed. but never determined exactly who killed him. Someone in their family gets cancer. an investigative agency patterned on the FBI and trained by the CIA.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. He moves up to the highway patrol. 9:58 AM He comes from the barrio of South Tucson. He ends up arresting people he came up with in his neighborhood. Then he says to the other two prisoners. his mother tells fortunes. One of the Mexican cops says. He is not a suit. and the other brother finds heroin and is in and out of prison for decades. the Mexican Directorate of Federal Security. one works construction. He explains that in the DEA there are the suits. or they get hooked on the needle and then they take to robbing and petty drug dealing. Then DEA. He thinks they are going to scare them. and the gunslingers. Hector’s first job is as a small-town cop. and boots him out. https://medium. he is working with the federal police force and the DFS. we’re going to throw you out of the plane. one becomes a teacher. Arizona. If you don’t know. Hector believes in the law but he’s not blind to the hard choices people face. They pick up three drug traffickers and fly out over the ocean. In Mazatlán. There is a ranch with a load of marijuana and the three know where it is.” Berrellez figures they will take a guy to the edge of the open door and lean him out. His father lays bricks. takes the bound prisoner to the door.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 5 of 23 . “You guys want to go out or you want to talk?” They give up the half-ton load. The cop gets up. “We are not joking. Two brothers go into law enforcement. but the airplane toss felt much colder. He is not a suit.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. look at my Sig. When Berrellez was in DEA. “I loved being undercover. 9:58 AM Berrellez had seen guys murdered. Now it is a different world. I loved being an actor and playing the part.” Now guys come out of the academy bragging about their laptops. and they gave me this machine gun.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 6 of 23 .” https://medium. This is the DEA that formed him. the new guys out of the academy would show off their weapons — “Hey. “I was no hero. Lines ring in Berrellez’s head. Chapter Two OPERATION LEYENDA https://medium. eventually. It is a painting of his grandchildren and his son.” Now he is ready to talk.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 7 of 23 . He says. He remembers listening to the tapes of Camarena’s torture over and over — tapes collected after the murder.” In the living room hangs an oil painting of his failure. but he insisted then that everything was off the record. “I thought the case would make my career but it destroyed my career. Please comandante don’t burn me anymore.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. Berrellez first took me into the Camarena case one evening in 1998. “I was very afraid. who shot himself. to DEA. “I was a coward.” He pauses. When I got the case I thought I was going to be a shooting star. 9:58 AM But then. Other agents were jealous of me because I was meeting with the attorney general.” He says. something changed. He says. which eventually passed from Mexican authorities to the CIA and. Camarena morphed into a hero. Red Ribbon week . 9:58 AM Interrogator: No. which were attended by 20 military men in uniform plus members of the federal police and of DFS. Lawn says. His bosses noted his initiative. and elementary schools across the country hold events to warn children about the dangers of drugs. Berrellez had caught the eye of some of his higher-ups when he was asked to kidnap a cousin of Rafael Caro Quintero. After his death. we’ve been running this case for four years. you son of a bitch! (Blow) Camarena: No. Lawn grows frustrated with the lack of progress in the Camarena murder case.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 8 of 23 . head of DEA. He was awarded the Administrator’s Award of Honor — the DEA’s highest — and his picture was on the cover of Time magazine.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. It was to be a black operation without the knowledge or consent of the Mexican government or of DEA in Mexico City. what I remember from the report. Berrellez noted this intervention by his superiors. A national commemoration . one of the founders of the Guadalajara drug business along with Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo. Berrellez set up the abduction through his contacts in the Mexican military.” Berrellez tells Lawn the big people involved are Mexican federal agents. I need witnesses who were actually at the torture house. That is your first priority. Then came the call from Jack Lawn. he came out of the FBI to become acting deputy and then the boss. But then it was blocked by Washington. The head of DEA in 1989 is Jack Lawn. He says that he’d seen meetings for example in Mazatlán between the governor of Sinaloa and the trafficker El Cochiloco (the crazy pig). you aren’t telling me anything. is established in his memory. https://medium. that is what I am reading. “Hector. ” “Pick your team.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 9 of 23 .Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14.” https://medium. 9:58 AM “I need Spanish speakers who have worked in Mexico and know the culture and the corruption. ” “Why so much money?” “So we can recruit army generals. federal agents. Interrogator: Do you want me to make you remember? Camarena: Hay! Hay! As the case rises up from the shadows in Mexico.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 10 of 23 .” He’s rolling. He will report directly to Washington. And a snitch budget of $3 million a year. Berrellez leans on a DEA https://medium.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. 9:58 AM “I’ll need 20 agents.” He is told to go to the DEA office in Los Angeles and set it up. or they will be killed. The first year he exceeds his $3 million budget. Chapter Three WITNESS IN THE KILLING ROOM Interrogator: Stand up! Camarena: I don’t know. Soon Berrellez has his agents and his snitches. I don’t know. “I was getting more information than the CIA. And once we use up an informant we must move them to the U.S. and drug people. I don’t know. Berrellez must find people who were in the torture room. Twenty years later. Godoy assumes he is being taken into the woods to be executed. especially those in the drug business. https://medium. one of the other founders of the Guadalajara cartel. While Berrellez is driving him to the safe house at Big Bear in the mountains east of Los Angeles. he has to get inside the killing ground. Berrllez calls Godoy from Los Angeles. as a bodyguard and body servant. Berrellez tries to calm him. 9:58 AM informant. says that he is a very religious person and he promises Godoy that if he comes up to the United States he will be paid and will not be arrested. Godoy comes. He hears about a man who owns a string of brothels in Guadalajara and regularly supplies women for the many parties thrown by drug capos of the area. Gárate knows everyone. Caro Quintero. comandante Antonio Gárate Bustamante of the Jalisco State Police. But he is not enough. which Berrellez to Jorge Godoy. To get the answers he needs. Godoy trembles as he recalls his fear during that ride. including Fonseca Carrillo. He asks Godoy if he believes in God. He has this man recruit informants. and Manuel Salcido Uzueta. Gárate becomes a factory for recruiting witnesses in the Camarena case.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 11 of 23 . who worked for Fonseca Carrillo. Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. officiates as padrino de bodas — best man — at his wedding. El Cochiloco. Felix Gallardo. In Mexico. His torture is not significant. they will not have a chance to compare stories. And often the same person works for the police and for the traffickers. you will be tortured. Enrique Camarena was a foreign agent in their country poking into their business. 9:58 AM Godoy is part of a small army of witnesses who are kept isolated from one another and who usually have no idea that others are stashed in the U. it is well known by everyone that if you are picked up by the police.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 12 of 23 . If you are picked up by the drug traffickers. They will be fresh. you will be tortured. Godoy is a perfect example: He is a policeman for the state of Jalisco who is assigned by his https://medium.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14.S. and have also become informants. They know little of the investigation because it asks questions that hardly matter to them. Prosecutors hesitate to put a man on the stand who had been part of a team that tortured and murdered two American couples. Such assertions allow these men to hang on to shreds of conscience. None of this is unusual in a criminal justice system that makes deals with the devil every day. Because they were in the room. his breath on my face. not in the back. the witnesses produced by recruiters Berrellez paid in Mexico. Only in the front. Berrellez finally decides out of a hundred informants maybe 10 could be used as witnesses. it was not because of the crimes of the witnesses. 9:58 AM comandante to be Ernesto Fonseca’s personal bodyguard. not the back. because Fonseca is a caring boss. They take the investigation into that room where Enrique Camarena is screaming.S. over 200 of them. leaning forward. Berrellez understood that there is only one way to get to the actual killers — the powerful men who live in safety and who order their murders done for them — and that is through people like Jorge Godoy. But when the Camarena case began to rupture. on a good career track with bonuses. And some of the key witnesses had killed U. they are unsavory to most people because they have made careers out of crime. Godoy leans forward.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. And this DEA agent Enrique Camarena fell into his life like a live grenade and blew it up. The others are simply too compromised to withstand crossexamination.” He is standing. citizens without regrets. The case ran into trouble because of what the witnesses said and the people they talked about. no. The informants. whether it is true or not.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 13 of 23 . “Look at me. raping the wives in front of their husbands first. look at my eyes” — he points two fingers at his eyes — “do they look like the eyes of a man who shoots someone in the back of the head? No. I only shoot in the front. Years later. https://medium. He is on official assignment. This matters. his eyes bulging. There are rules for DEA agents in Mexico. did two years in the Marines.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. He favors a lot of street work. and in 1974 he joined DEA. but only during the day. a foreign tour was essential for advancement. and the agency suddenly bloomed from several hundred to several thousand. 9:58 AM Chapter Four KIKI Hector Berrellez and Enrique (Kiki) Camarena never met in person. The place was known to be a hangout for the drug capos and it was dangerous. The DEA was the perfect arena for the ambitions of agents like Berrellez and Camarena. building a case informant by informant. Mexico was a natural for them because of their language skills and because Anglo agents could hardly go undercover. Both were hyphenated Americans who were going to prove they were red white and blue. Camarena was born in Mexicali. His ticket was punched. He learns https://medium. They would talk on the phone about mutual cases.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 14 of 23 . just to see if they can provoke the narcotraficantes into a shoot-out. but they knew each other. In 1980. they shared certain things. worked as a firefighter and cop. he was assigned to Guadalajara. President Richard M. Kiki Camarena was not a gunslinger. They can carry a weapon. Camarena was brave but he would never have done anything so stupid as taunting the drug people. So the two new agents go to La Langosta for lunch every day for a couple of months. In the fall of 1984 two men are assigned to help in Guadalajara. Nixon had just declared the war on drugs. In DEA. They are warned by Camarena and by the head of the station to avoid La Langosta restaurant. And they can’t fire unless fired upon. determined to rise in the newly minted DEA. Rafael Caro Quintero. He plans in one operation to produce 1. he uses two or three choppers up near the border to ferry his crops into the States.5 tons per hectare. one of the heads of the Guadalajara business. Except the actual location of the fields. 9:58 AM of huge marijuana plantations growing in the state of Zacatecas.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. about 2. this at the very same time in 1984 that the United States is touting the success of its marijuana eradication program in Mexico. and he’s worth possibly a billion. https://medium. laborers get triple their normal wages.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 15 of 23 . Camarena starts off slowly. gathering information and reporting everything on inner-agency DEA-6 reports. Three different types of marijuana are grown. The supervisors on the ranches make $290 to $580 a month. gives a comandante in the Mexican military 50 million pesos to buy some ranches and provide protection.5 acres. But this much is known: Caro Quintero is still in his 20s. The documents from those spring months in 1984 relate endless details on the booming marijuana operation. That remains a secret. Sonora. and racks of AK-47s for protecting the crop. acreages. One farm just brought in 16 tractors. 9:58 AM Camarena learns that at least 10 groups are putting in big growing operations — including one organization that is cultivating 11. The investors are drilling water wells everywhere for $100.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 16 of 23 . Caro Quintero sends 60 tons of fertilizer for his fields.000 each. The DEA-6s become lists of names.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. Small notes appear: “Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo had a ton of cocaine stashed in Caborca. The reports become an inventory of fields and equipment as Camarena records an economic boom out on the land — a beehive of activity denied by two governments. cars.250 acres. Five hundred laborers arrive from Culiacán in Sinaloa. https://medium. ” The maids in Hotel El Camino in Caborca saw automatic weapons when they cleaned the rooms.S. where the wells must be dug and how wide apart the rows should be — three feet — for proper cultivation and harvest. details of the toil and calculation necessary to bring in the crop. what seeds should be bought and how many. close to $900 U. https://medium. When he was told the price.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. 9:58 AM Mexico. he wrote the first two numbers on a check and then handed it over to the Learjet salespeople with instructions to fill in the right amount of zeros. any crop. one about when Caro Quintero bought a Learjet in Tucson. There are always the cherished stories — for example. The detail collected by Camarena in the spring of 1984 is the driving wheel within the world of cartels. and the War on Drugs. But beneath this folklore is the cold calculation of how many tons of fertilizer is required. Arizona.000peso tip for the hotel cook.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 17 of 23 . Once the marijuana traffickers left a 150. drug lords. And there is work and risk. com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 18 of 23 . 1984. The party ends in late May when DEA in Mexico pressures the Mexican authorities to take action against the operation in Zacatecas. Camarena learns that Caro Quintero has arrived in Fresnillo. Actually. have made over-flights to locate the fields. He will later be indicted for the murder of Enrique Camarena and Mexican authorities will claim he was found with a kilo of cocaine in his desk. Alfredo Zavala Avelar. The head of Interpol in Mexico leads the raid. He brings with him 360 million pesos and starts handing out bonuses to the staff.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. He comes with 60 DFS agents traveling in nine vans and 15 Mercury Gran Marquis. 9:58 AM On May 11. at the time of his arrest in March 1990. Camarena and a Mexican pilot. Zacatecas. he was talking with Berrellez about coming north to testify for Operation https://medium. He had wiretapped his phone. Camarena has an idea that he puts into the hopper of possible DEA tactics. Comandante Guillermo Gonzalez Calderoni. something he could surely do since he attended the meetings that planned the crime.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14.S. as he later told Hector. he could hardly allow an agency chief to come north and spell out the direct links between the Mexican state and the drug organizations. heard the conversations with Berrellez and. He has busted huge loads and this does not matter. He has taken down big operations and this does not matter. Chapter Five FOLLOW THE MONEY After the Zacatecas raid. who Berrellez befriended after the raid in the cornfield of Sinaloa. There is never a shortage of product since nothing can come close to the money to be made in growing marijuana or poppies or moving cocaine. 20 tons of marijuana are seized and enough seed confiscated to plant 6. 9:58 AM Leyenda and tell all about the kidnapping and murder.500 acres. It is the turf that Kiki Camarena wanders while making drug cases in Mexico and it is the treacherous ground that gets him killed. During the raid. There is never a shortage of people willing to run the risk of moving a load to the U. About 177 people are arrested. And prison matters not at all. The head of Interpol vanishes for years into the silence of the Mexican prison system.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 19 of 23 . had planted the cocaine. This digression is not a digression. but a tip from Mexican police enables almost everyone of consequence to get away. Mexico offers such a bleak future to so many of its citizens that a prison cell or a coffin are worth the https://medium. It was into this murky world — thanks to the initiative of Kiki Camarena — that Operation Padrino begins to drain millions from secret drug-fueled bank accounts in the U. however slim. there are sudden seizures of money from bank accounts belonging to the Guadalajara drug bosses in cities across the U. of finally getting ahead. He appears perfectly calm about this reality. He spends most of his time with Camarena. and Europe. So.S. the DEA court documents always cite an unnamed informant.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. Ten months later. To justify the seizures. the term of art inside the agency is SOI — source of information. a month before the raid on Zacatecas. and Europe. Vacuum their bank accounts. This is the origin of Operation Padrino. So why couldn’t they stop the leak that was draining off their hardearned profits? The drug bosses also knew that they paid for and worked under the protection of Mexican DFS and that DFS was trained by and functioned as an arm of the CIA in Mexico.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 20 of 23 . https://medium. he will be dead. and that CIA had people embedded within DEA. Focus on the money.S. He soon notices that every time he and Kiki go out. the drug guys had to wonder: Who was this SOI tipping off DEA and enabling them to seize money from their overseas accounts? The leaders of the billion-dollar drug industry in Mexico had their own sources inside DEA. Let the capos raise their crops and harvest their product. Phil Jordan of DEA is visiting Guadalajara to inspect the DEA station there. Camarena explains that the tail is DFS. 9:58 AM risk if there is a chance. they are tailed. Starting in 1983. In April of 1984. So Camarena suggests going after the money. com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 21 of 23 .Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14. 9:58 AM Part II: Blood on the Corn — Part II https://medium. 9:58 AM The investigation of a murdered DEA agent plunges deep into the drug world. where power is everything medium.com and death is one… Part III: Blood on the Corn — Part III The final installment of Charles Bowden’s true-life crime epic.com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 22 of 23 . medium.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14.com Getting the story: Chuck Bowden’s Final Story Took 16 https://medium. com/matter/blood-on-the-corn-52ac13f7e643 Page 23 of 23 . 9:58 AM Years to Write Here’s why it took so long and meant Follow Matter on Twitter | Like us on Facebook | Subscribe to our newsletter Matter Written by Charles Bowden and Molly Molloy Email me when Matter publishes stories Follow https://medium.Blood on the Corn — Matter — Medium 11/19/14.