FARC Arms Trafficker "El Indo" Captured

Colombian authorities have captured FARC member and alleged arms and drug trafficker alias "El Indio," the brother-in-law of alias "Gafas," responsible for kidnapping three American contractors.

According to Director of Citizen Security Jose Roberto Leon Riaño, Aurelio Vasquez Serrano, alias "El Indio," was arrested while traveling towards Buenaventura, northwest of Cali on the Pacific Coast, on a public bus, with the alleged objective of "exploring drug trafficking routes," newspaper El Tiempo reported Thursday.

According to police, El Indio was an arms supplier for the FARC's 36th front, operating mainly out of the department of Antioquia, and 38th front operating mainly out of the Voyaca and Casanare departments, and also negotiated exchanges of cocaine for arms for the organization.

He is also a family member of FARC member alias "Gafas," currently serving 19 years in prison after being arrested in the military's Operation Checkmate, in which three U.S. contractors and the now infamous Ingrid Betancourt were rescued from the guerrilla organization.

El Indio was located by police after months of investigation, reportedly through a cell phone call he made from the bus, and has five arrest warrants against him for charges of terrorism, homicide, supplying weapons, extortion and drug trafficking.

The Rest @ Columbia Reports

Marco Antonio Guzman Captured

MEXICO CITY — Federal authorities detained a former police officer accused of leading the armed wing of the violent Juarez Cartel in northern Mexico, the government said Thursday.

Marco Antonio Guzman, who had several aliases including "El Brad Pitt," was captured Wednesday in the U.S. border state of Chihuahua along with two alleged accomplices, according to a federal police statement.

Guzman, 34, was brought to the Mexican capital Thursday and shown, handcuffed, to the news media.

Police said Guzman was involved in the June 15, 2010 car bomb explosion that killed a federal police officer and two civilians.

They also accuse him of being involved in drug-trafficking operations across Chihuahua. The state is one of the worst-affected areas of the drug war. It is the state of deadly Ciudad Juarez, where an estimated 3,100 people were killed in 2010 alone.

A federal official who was not authorized to speak on the record said Guzman's nickname "El Brad Pitt" comes from a disguise he wore when he served as a lookout for the Juarez cartel.

To go unnoticed, he tried to look like a tourist wearing his hair long, a baseball cap and a camera around his neck. According to the official, gang associates said Guzman looked like Pitt in a scene from the American film "Spy Game" about CIA agents, in which the actor wore a similar outfit.

The nickname apparently stuck.

Guzman had a $42,000 (500,000 pesos) reward for his capture, and may have been planning another such bombing; federal police said in a statement that he had been responsible for acquiring another load of explosives seized in Ciudad Juarez on April 25.

The Rest @ Huffington Post