Mexican drug lord and top leader of the criminal drug trafficking organization known as the Gulf Cartel. He was among Mexico’s most-wanted drug lords.
He joined the ranks of the Gulf Cartel in the late 1990s after he had served as a policeman in Matamoros, Tamaulipas. Under the tutelage of Osiel Cárdenas Guillén, Costilla Sánchez became a lieutenant for the cartel and started controlling several drug trafficking activities for the organization. In 1999, two U.S. federal agents were stopped at gunpoint in Matamoros by several gunmen of the cartel while conducting an investigation. Among the dozen heavily armed men were Cárdenas Guillén and Costilla Sánchez. After the tense standoff, the agents persuaded the gunmen to let them go but Costilla Sánchez and the other cartel members earned a U.S. indictment.
When Cárdenas Guillén was arrested and extradited to the United States in 2003 and 2007 respectively, Costilla Sánchez took the control of the cartel along with Antonio Cárdenas Guillén, who was later killed in a gunbattle in November 2010. Amid the power struggles, Los Zetas separated from the cartel to work independently, transforming northeastern Mexico into a “war zone” with daily confrontations and gruesome assassinations.
The Mexican Navy arrested Costilla Sánchez on 12 September 2012 at the residential Lomas de Rosales neighborhood in Tampico, Tamaulipas without firing a single bullet. Costilla Sánchez was presented on camera on the morning of 13 September 2012, handcuffed and wearing a long-sleeve shirt. Ten bodyguards of Costilla Sánchez were also arrested during the operation. Ernesto Banda Chaires, one of the detainees, is believed to be the regional boss of the cartel in Tampico. Costilla Sánchez is currently detained at the installations of the SIEDO, Mexico’s intelligence agency. It is likely that Costilla Sánchez will be extradited to the United States, raising political implications for the top politicians in the states of Tamaulipas and Veracruz who have been accused of taking bribes from the Gulf Cartel.
Link to Wikipedia biography