Tomas Yarrington, ex Governor of Tamaulipas arrested in Italy

Translated by Otis B Fly-Wheel for Borderland Beat from two Milenio articles and video from Riodoce

Subject Matter: Tomas Yarrington, Ex Governor of Tamaulipas, CDG, Los Zetas
Recommendation: No prior subject matter knowledge required.

Reporter: Ruben Mosso
The Ex Governor of Tamaulipas, Tomas Jesus Yarrington Ruvalcaba, was detained in Italy, he is required by the authorities of Mexico and the United States for allegedly receiving money from the Cartel del Golfo and Los Zetas.

In our country, there is an existing arrest warrant against the ex Governor for his alleged responsibility in crimes against health in his term in office.


The warrant was raised due to the interchange of information between the United States and Mexico in May of 2012, the United States Department of Justice presented two demands in Federal court to decomission properties of Yarrington which had presumably been acquired in Texas under false names and with funds of illicit origin.




Four months before, under the management of Marisela Morales Ibanez before the PGR, SEIDO consigned the expediency and the Judge conceded that order against the Tamaulipeco.

In November of 2016, the PGR offered a reward of 15,000,000 pesos for information that led to the capture of the ex Governor Tomas Yarrington.

The PGR informed that this Sunday, deriving from a collaboration of the Assistant Attorney General of International Affairs, the Criminal Investigation Agency, as well as the Governmental authorities of Italy, achieved the location and arrest of Yarrington.

The detention was achieved was achieved thanks to a red alert from Interpol, who applied an arrest warrant from the Judge of Federal Penal Processes in the Second District of Tamaulipas, for the crimes of organized crime, operations with gains from illicit purposes, among others.

It is hoped that the next few days he will be repatriated to our country for the Attorney General, in coordination with Italian authorities.

Tomas Yarrington Ruvalcaba, the ex Governor of Tamaulipas, was in the view of United States authorities for allegedly facilitating during his period in office, of the trafficking of drugs of the Cartel del Golfo and Los Zetas.

In 2012, the DEA accused the ex Governor of receiving payments on the part of the criminal groups to allow their operations, and of laundering this money in property estates in Texas.

Yarrington was Federal Deputy in 1991, Municipal President of Matamoros in 1992 and 1995, and Governor of Tamaulipas in 1999 to 2004, departing from the job in 2005, to concentrate on his job as an assessor.

In 2013, the magazine Forbes, published a list of the 10 most corrupt people in Mexico, Yarrington occupied 6th place, being just under Elba Esther Gordillo, ex leader of the SNTE; Carlos Romero Deschamps, leader of Pemex, Raul Salinas de Gotari; Genaro Garcia Luna, ex Secretary of Public Security and Andres Granier, ex Governor of Tabasco.

On the 2nd of December of that year, Yarrington was accused in Texas, United States, for supporting narco traffickers and accepting enormous payments, some months before in May, in the pending case.

Two months after, on 27th of February of 2014, a Federal Judge in Mexico denied the ex Governor an amparo against the arrest warrant solicited by the PGR, which allows him to be detained in Mexico and a further 189 countries.

In November of 2016, the PGR offered a reward of 15,000,000 pesos for information leading to the detention of the ex Governor and on 16th of December of the same year, the PRI, of whom he was a member, expelled him from their ranks.

Today the PGR informed that Yarrington was detained in Italy, at the request of Mexican and United States authorities



Original article in Spanish at Milenio