The Vicious Cycle of Decommisioning Narco Planes

In 2008, a Cessna 210 registration XB-JSO , white with blue strips, was secured in a Culiacán International Airport hangar and nine years later, on Monday Sept 11, 2017 they found it with 400 kilos of cocaine abandoned in Guanajuato. SEDENA secures many small planes linked to narco trafficking, which are then recovered by their owners and ultimately reseized. There is one plane seized in 2008 that was , once again secured at the airport in La Palma, Navolato, Sinaloa in 2015.

The aircraft was one of the 103 that the Mexican Army and the Attorney General's Office (PGR) seized in the hangars of the airport in February 2008. That year in Sinaloa, the Ministry of National Defense (SEDENA) was constantly deploying operations at aerodromes and airports as part of the strategy to combat drug trafficking. There are others that were seized prior to 2008.

That day in February 2008, the Army took over all the hangars and the terminal in the hangar area of
the Culiacan International Airport. After reviewing all aircraft; 103 planes, three helicopters and six hangars were secured by the PGR. In the review of databases, it has been found that at least 21 were returned to their owners , 7 were auctioned by 2009 by the Service of Administration and Property Disposal.

Last Monday this same Cessna 210 was found in the municipality of San Felipe, Guanajuato along with a million dollar drug shipment. Inside there were 400 kilos of cocaine worth more than 50 million pesos, ( nearly $3 million USD ) the largest drug seizure made in that state.

In the Mexican Aeronautical Registry of  Civil Aeronautics of the Secretary of Communications and Transportation, updated until 2015, the aircraft appears to be registered as insured status in Culiacan. The name of the last owner registers it as private.

According to the National Safety Commission, Sunday night the staff of the Federal Police was alerted by an anonymous call that a plane was on a flight in an irregular area and manner. The aircraft made an emergency landing at the aerodrome La Junta, apparently because it ran out of fuel and was left abandoned.

When federal agents arrived, they did not locate any of the crew members. Inside the vehicle there were 356 packages of cocaine weighing 400 kilos. Until Friday, elements of the federal forces were maintained to safeguard the airfield and the plane that was still in place.

The Guanajuato delegation of the PGR announced that they have opened investigations to the origin and destination of the aircraft as well as who is the owner of the aircraft and drugs.

In 2008, the aircraft was listed in the preliminary investigation opened which was called: Operation Illicit Resources .AP / SIN / CLN / 178/2008 / MI, on charges of Violation of the Aeronautics Act, Violation of the General Aviation Act and Violation of the General Telecommunications Law. The Public Prosecutor of the Federation assigned to the Bureau of Criminal Procedure I "A", decreed securing the aircraft located in Culiacán, including the registration XB-JSO, on June 2, 2008.

By August, no one had laid claim to the Cessna 210 and since the prosecution did not know the name and address of its owners, by edict, a social representative of the Public Ministry was called to take charge and the plane was determined to be claimed within  90 days or otherwise it would be deemed property of the Federal Govt .

After due diligence, The Public Ministry reported that they had exhausted their efforts on the aircraft. The planes had not been declared unusable, and were turned over to the administration. All aircraft were available to the Delegation of Management Services and Disposal of Public Sector Assets under custody and supervision of the Army.

Goods available to the Administration and Transfer Service when unclaimed, are sold at public auctions. In SAE auction catalogs from 2009 to 2016 the Cessna 210 with the registration XB-JSO does not appear.

Between 2009 and 2015, at least five of the planes seized were returned to their owners through court-ordered amparos. District Judges considered that there were irregularities in the seizure procedure and ordered the return the aircraft.

The plane was secured when the army kept operating at aerodromes and local airports to "clip the wings" of the aerial narco trafficking routes. The strategy of attacking the aerial fleet of criminal groups was directed by then commander of the Ninth Military Zone, Noe Sandoval Alcazar.

A month earlier they had secured 15 aircraft at the aerodrome La Perla, 28 at the base La Luna and six at  Tapacal, all in the receivership of Villa Juarez, Navolato. At the La Perla base five small planes that had been secured were stolen and days later found on a ranch in the receivership of Villa Adolfo López Mateos, El Tamarindo, in Culiacan. The same day 46 other aircraft were seized at the Los Mochis Airport.

Months later, the actual landing strips of the three airfields were released by the Feds and returned to operation , but all the planes seized remained available to the PGR.

From Culiacán to Venezuela:

In June 2009, the Bolivarian National Guard located a small plane and arrested a Sinaloan and two Venezuelans in the state of Zulia, Venezuela. The aircraft is a Cessna registration XB-JQF, which in February 2008 had been seized at the Culiacán airport.

The arrested Mexican is Tirso Chimal Sánchez, originally from Guamúchil and accused of crimes of conspiracy to commit a crime, illicit trafficking in narcotic and psychotropic substances and the diversion and obtaining trafficking routes all to the detriment of the Venezuelan State. According to the accusations filed in the Criminal Accusation Room of the Supreme Court of Justice of Venezuela, the aircraft would be used to transfer drugs to Mexico.

La Guardia reported that they received a call that referred to an aircraft flying low in the community Guaru Guaru, so they went to the place and located the Mexican plane on land, with the doors open. In the vicinity they observed three men that circulated in motorcycles, for which reason why they initiated a persecution until they were able to reach them.

One of the detainees was the Mexican and the other two, Venezuelans Jovanny Ramón Rivas Rodríguez and Oswaldo José Rodríguez Jiménez.

Chimal Sánchez had already been detained in Mexico City in 1999, when federal agents detected the take off of a light aircraft that followed an unusual route in Caborca, Sonora, whereupon they began an aerial chase and in Guamúchil they forced the pilot to land. Chimal Sanchez was traveling as a co-pilot of the aircraft in which they found marijuana.

Confiscation, three years later:

Another plane, with registration XB-KPA was also returned to its owners and in 2015 was resecured  during the operations that federal forces made after the second escape flight of Joaquin "El  Chapo" Guzman. The Cessna 210 aircraft was seized along with 12 other aircraft by elements of the Army, at the La Palma, Novalato, Sinaloa airport, located in Campo Berlin, at the Villa de Ángel Flores.

With this siezure and that of a house in Colonia Miguel Hidalgo, in Culiacán, the Office of the Specialized in Investigation of Organized Crime initiated a preliminary investigation. That confiscation was part of the operations that were carried out in the state by the state in the wake of "El Chapo"s escape from the  Altiplano Prison, in July of that year.



In the aerodrome a pilot named Héctor Ramón Takashima Valenzuela, the presumed private pilot at the service of "El  Chapo "was detained, who was also an active member of the PRI.


Secured for the second time:

By 2008, at least three of the light aircraft had already been seized. One of them is the registration plate XB-HCA, originally confiscated in April of the year 2000. The aircraft was located by members of the PGR, in the municipality of Caborca, Sonora. On a reconnaissance flight they detected a clandestine runway and the small plane. About a mile away was a camp, a pick-up truck, and agricultural machinery to level the land.

Way back in August of 2004, they seized three small planes and a clandestine runway in Guasave.
According to the PGR, the radars detected a small plane in the air space of San Felipe, Baja California, that took direction to Sinaloa. Days later federal elements investigated the destination of the small airplane and located a clandestine track and three aircrafts, in the town El Retiro, in Guasave.

One of the light aircraft was the registration plate XB-XCB, seized again in 2008 in Culiacan.

In Mocorito, way back in November 2005, the Army found a plantation of marijuana of 18 thousand square meters. A few miles from the field they found the Cessna  XB-HLW  along with marijuana residue, on an illegal runway. That plane was also confiscated at Culiacán airport three years later in the 2008 operation.

In the Aeronautical Register, current up until 2015, these three airplanes appear with "secured " status.