Ignacio Morales Lechuga, attorney general in the Administration of President Carlos Salinas de Gortari (1988-1994), will never star in the
Narcos
series
,
but his presence silently flies over some chapters of the Netflix series, especially those that focus on the years more convulsed in the relationship between Mexico and the United States.
During his time at the head of the PGR, between 1991 and 1993, he had to deal intensively in the United States with two old acquaintances: the DEA, the omnipresent anti-narcotics office, and the current attorney general William Barr.
Both lead the persecution against General Salvador Cienfuegos, the Secretary of Defense during the Government of Enrique Peña Nieto.
Morales Lechuga refused in 1992 to hand over to the United States three high-ranking government officials accused of being the “masterminds” of the 1985 murder of undercover DEA agent Enrique
Kiki
Camarena.
In addition, he vigorously protested the abduction committed by the DEA of Dr. Humberto Álvarez Machaín, the alleged doctor of the Guadalajara cartel, who was taken from Jalisco with a black bag on his head to be seated in a New York court.
The former prosecutor recalls in an interview that since then the DEA wanted to take revenge on the Army and began working with the Navy.
"Things have remained very tense because the DEA accused the Army of having been taking care of El Búfalo, the ranch where tons of marijuana was being planted," Camarena discovered.
At that time, Morales Lechuga, born in Veracruz 73 years ago, discussed these matters with his counterpart, William Barr, who currently occupies the same position and whom he describes as a man eager for popularity and “very given to putting together files with clues, not even with proofs and evidences, but with clues ”.
Three years later, a New York judge concluded that the alleged torturer was innocent.
In December 2018 during the trial of Joaquín
El Chapo
Guzmán, a former Colombian drug trafficker said that he bribed Morales Lechuga to obtain police protection in his drug trafficking operations.
Morales Lechuga denied the accusation and announced legal action against the witness.
Question
.
Is the DEA wrong too?
Answer
.
Yes and they manipulate witnesses.
And I give you an example.
In 1992 during a dinner in San Antonio (Texas) I met with the American attorney, William Barr, with the head of the FBI, William Sessions and with the director of the DEA, Robert Bonner.
They said they had evidence against three senior secretaries of state from the governments of [Miguel] De la Madrid (1984-1988) and Carlos Salinas (1988-1994).
We told them that we knew those witnesses and we knew that they were paying them $ 5,000 each and that they did not pass the minimum test to be witnesses.
But we told them that if they had more evidence, we would act against those people if we found suspicious elements, but we answered that we would not just hand over those who said they were Mexican and because their evidence was only pale indications that did not meet the requirements for a trial.
Q.
Who were you suspected of?
R. They
asked me that Mexico extradite former Secretary of the Interior Manuel Bartlett, Secretary of Defense Juan Arévalo, and former Deputy Attorney General Enrique Álvarez del Castillo, whom they blamed for being the intellectual authors of Camarena's murder, but they had no evidence.
Q:
When did you meet prosecutor William Barr?
R
.
He was attorney general of the United States in 1992, when a very controversial case was presented about Dr. Álvarez Machaín (a supposed doctor of the Guadalajara cartel) who was accused of participating in the murder of agent Camarena.
The DEA kidnapped him in Mexico and transferred him to the United States, where he was detained for three years awaiting trial.
The US Court ruled after a claim from Mexico that the United States could make these extraditions because the treaty did not prevent the kidnapping of people and taking them out of the country.
This incredible resolution led to the review of the extradition treaty, so that the DEA did not act in the country as a collaborative agency and not a local police.
When the judge reviewed the witnesses that were presented against Álvarez Machaín, he immediately dismissed the case because the witnesses were not suitable.
P
.
How do you remember Barr?
R.
An ambitious person eager to stand out.
He wanted to carry out actions that would allow him to satisfy the death of Camarena with the arrest of three people from the Government.
It is characterized by conducting investigations based on evidence rather than hard evidence.
Q.
Did you act in revenge?
R. He was
looking for evidence to satisfy the American public opinion
P
.
How should the DEA have acted in the Cienfuegos case?
R.
The DEA should have notified the Mexican Government, notified the data it had during the collaboration phase and in good faith and abstained from telephone or BlackBerry conversations.
The DEA acts in Mexico as if it were a police force, violating sovereignty and powers.
This system of 'collaboration' is not even seen in Europe even though there is a European Union.
P.
But that's how the DEA has always done
R
.
Because the last governments have allowed it.
It is a resignation of the Mexican Government to exercise and defend its sovereignty.
Q.
But it was the general who came to Los Angeles ...
R.
But they invade powers of the Mexican authorities, which are the only ones authorized to prosecute crimes and intercept telephones and messages.
The 1992 agreement speaks of "cooperation and information" but not of "operation."
Every operation must be reported.
Q.
Could the Government of Mexico do more for Cienfuegos?
R. There is
a protest by López Obrador for the violation of the extradition and cooperation treaty between Mexico and the United States and a wake-up call because the DEA is operating as a police officer.
This is a habit of the past but it is never too late to claim that it is operating outside the law.
P.
Has the Administration been lukewarm?
R
.
Yes, he has changed his position three times on this issue.
López Obrador, who claims to be the most informed man in Mexico, plays uninformed as a political attitude.
Q.
What will the Cienfuegos trial be like?
R.
We do not know what evidence the Prosecutor's Office has.
The defense will seek to invalidate the evidence and this will depend on the investigation they do.
In an oral system, the defense will have to become almost an investigator to review point by point.
P
.
If he was an excess of the DEA and he is innocent.
How long will Cienfuegos be incarcerated?
R.
The period prior to filing the trial could last about four months.
The opening of the process a similar time and the trial that could be one year.
I estimate that about two years.