Relatives and other people close to the Ecuadorian drug trafficker José Adolfo
Fito
Macías have been arrested early this Thursday in Argentina.
The Argentine authorities have not yet provided official information, but local media claim that among those detained are the drug trafficker's wife and his children.
The relatives of the criminal, who has been on the run since the beginning of the month and is considered one of those responsible for the wave of violence that Ecuador is experiencing, were arrested during an operation in the city of Córdoba, in the center of the South American country, according to the Efe agency.
The detainees had rented a house in a private neighborhood on the outskirts of the city of Córdoba and paid in cash with dollars, according to the newspaper
La Voz del Interior,
which cites Criminal Intelligence sources of the Córdoba police, in charge of the investigation together to the Anti-Drug Police Force (FPA).
The Minister of National Security, Patricia Bullrich, is scheduled to give a press conference in the next few hours to report on the operation, which began four days ago.
José Adolfo Macías Villamar, alias
Fito
, is 44 years old, has 14 judicial proceedings for different crimes, such as robbery, organized crime, possession of weapons and murder, totaling 34 years in prison.
The criminal had been imprisoned for 12 years when he escaped in early January.
Considered the most dangerous criminal in Ecuador, Macías is the leader of the Los Choneros gang, the operational arm of the Mexican Sinaloa cartel.
The drug trafficker was accused of ordering the murder in August of Fernando Villavicencio, a presidential candidate known for investigating links between gangs and politics.
He is now in the spotlight for the wave of violence that Ecuador is suffering these days after the takeover by a group of gang members of the public television channel TC TV and the murder of César Suárez, an important Ecuadorian prosecutor who investigated criminal groups.
It is not the first time that Macías escapes.
In February 2013, he and 15 other prisoners from the Los Choneros gang, including the then leader of the group, Jorge Luis Zambrano, escaped from the maximum security prison called La Roca, which is within the same prison complex.
For 10 months they were the most wanted criminals in the country, until they were found by the Police.
[News in development.
There will be an update soon]
Subscribe here to the
EL PAÍS América
newsletter and receive all the key information on current events in the region.