Mexican Marines capture Gulf cartel leader for DEA

Sources say it signals end to war with Zetas

Stage set for a war with the Sinaloa Cartel and Zetas in U.S.  

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Tampico - The Mexican Navy said it would give more details about the arrest of the man it believed to be the head of the Gulf Cartel, Jorge Costilla, alias "El Coss," when it parades him in front of the media early today. 

A government security official said Costilla, 41, was detained in Tampico in northeastern Mexico, where the cartel is active, without putting up a fight. The U.S. State Department has a reward of up to $5 million for his capture. 

No other details were immediately available. 

Mexican Marines grabbed the capo barely a week after capturing Gulf Cartel member Mario Cardenas, alias "Fatso," also in the state of Tamaulipas where Costilla was caught. Weakened by a violent turf war with the Zetas, a gang formed by army deserters which acted as enforcers for the cartel before breaking with their employers in 2010, the Gulf Cartel is in a diminished capacity to fight back. 

Top officials in the cartel's stronghold of Tamaulipas have been accused of taking money from local drug gangs. "All these politicians who were getting money from the Gulf Cartel ought to be very worried now because this information is going to come to light in Mexico or the United States," said a private security service executive. 

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Costilla features prominently on a wanted list of 37 kingpins the Mexican government published in 2009. Well over 20 on that list have now been captured or killed. Knowledgable obervers expect Costilla to be extradited to the United States, where his testimony could prove damaging to officials in Tamaulipas and neighboring Veracruz. 

The FBI said Costilla is believed to have taken over the daily operations of the cartel after his former boss Osiel Cardenas was arrested and jailed in Mexico in 2003. It said a federal arrest warrant was issued for Costilla in Texas in 2002, and that he was charged with drug offenses, threatening to assault and murder federal agents, and money laundering. 

There have been more than 55,000 drug-related deaths during President Felipe Calderon's six-year offensive against cartels.

EVERY DURN BIT OF THIS TROUBLE WAS CAUSED BY GOVERNMENT POLICY - THERE WOULD BE NO NEED OF ALL THIS TROUBLE IF IT WERE NOT FOR THE LAW - THE LEGENDARY