MEXICO CITY – A Mexican judge has issued warrants for the arrest of 19 former federal police officers under the latest government, including a former state capital police officer, for proven organized crime and money laundering, officials said Tuesday.
According to three officials, former Mexico City police officer Jesús Orta and 18 others are suspected of doubling millions of dollars in time in federal police under the 2012-2018 presidency of Enrique Peña Nieto.
One official spoke on condition of anonymity and said the suspects were wanted for creating a criminal network of more than three people, defined as organized crime.
President Andrés Manuel López Obrador told a news conference that the arrest warrants were the result of an investigation into the accounts of the former Interior Ministry, which then controlled the federal police. He gave no details.
Orta, who was general secretary of the federal police at the beginning of the Peña Nieto administration, later served as chief of police in Mexico City, the capital, under current mayor Claudia Sheinbaum until his resignation in October last year. .
Among the 18 others wanted is Frida Martínez, another former general secretary of the federal police in Mexican media described as a protégé of Miguel Angel Osorio Chong, who was interior minister for most of the Peña Nieto administration.
Neither Orta nor Martínez could be reached immediately for comment.
Sheinbaum is a close ally of Lopez Obrador and is a member of his political party, the Left National Regeneration Movement, or MORENA.
Orta also held important positions in the city government under current Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard when he was mayor of Mexico City from 2006-2012, after Lopez Obrador.
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