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This article is prohibitionist propaganda, POV to the extreme. The man was sent on a fool's errand, killed, and now he's a propaganda poster. It need cleanup, and a more balanced point of view. If it weren't for drug prohibition, the man would not have been killed by some group of Al Capones like he was. ( 24.68.140.36 ( talk) 22:04, 25 October 2008 (UTC))
It is a well-known fact to any LEO involved with Mexican drug activity that corruption exists, from the lowest rurale right up to the top, in Mexico's government. The U.S. government and U.S. Chamber of Commerce have willingly turned a blind eye to this in their greed for profits at the expense of both the American and Mexican citizens. People like Enrique Camarena, Ignacio Ramos and Jose Campean pay the price for that greed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.11.104.98 ( talk) 17:56, 25 November 2008 (UTC)
Where was he born? Why no one mentions the book "Desperados" —Preceding unsigned comment added by Galindes ( talk • contribs) 10:21, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
--> Update information about this entry. According to recent data, the DEA was responsible for the murder of Camarena (
http://www.proceso.com.mx/?p=355283) — Preceding
unsigned comment added by
62.82.178.50 (
talk) 07:48, 15 October 2013 (UTC)
Can we have some argument to delete these conspiracy theory claims? I followed the link and there just aint nothing to prove any of what it claims, and to put a misbegotten and ridiculous conspiracy theory on the same level as fact seems too much relativism even for wikipedia... and, how do I put this? the unstable comments by the people up above lead me to think they're the ones responsible for this hijacking
thanks - Eli
I think it's important to include the conspiracy theory as it has received wide currency throughout Latin America ie: https://diario1.com/zona-1/2014/09/crimen-ordenado-aqui-partio-el-mundo-de-carteles-de-drogas/?fbclid=IwAR1om8fHtXkj8phcMuTieT3BoC_GWUtRAfBDWCHD4xRZaGMIoD989h39l1o — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jpmcphaul ( talk • contribs) 17:15, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
this article states that: "On 1984, acting on information by Camarena, 450 Mexican soldiers backed by helicopters destroyed a 1000-hectere marijuana plantation known as 'Rancho Búfalo', where more than 3,000 farmers worked these fields,[1] the annual production which was later valued at $8 billion"
how ever, another one thats talking about Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, person who was running Rancho Búfalo, states that "An undercover agent from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, Enrique Camarena managed to infiltrate deep into the drug trafficking organization and had become close to Félix Gallardo. On 1984, acting on information by Camarena, 450 Mexican soldiers backed by helicopters destroyed a 1000-hectere marijuana plantation known as 'Rancho Búfalo', where more than 10,000 farmers worked these fields, the annual production which was later valued at $8 billion."
So witch is it 3,000 or 10,000 theres a huge difference —Preceding unsigned comment added by Uku1234 ( talk • contribs) 19:31, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
Cheers, BatteryIncluded ( talk)
The golf tournament held in honor of Mr. Camarena is held in Miami, not Fresno. There is a tournament in Fresno affiliated with the Camarena Health Center, however that has nothing to do with this individual. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 23.29.4.205 ( talk) 22:44, 16 March 2013 (UTC)
references indicate his nickname was kiki, not kike, regardless of whether this is a feminine name in spanish. any evidence that his nickname was not kiki should be presented first. And, to anyone completely ignorant of this word, kike is a slur against jews, so there better be a good reason (ie better references than the DEA) for replacing this nickname. Mercurywoodrose ( talk) 02:34, 29 October 2010 (UTC)
Enrique Camarena was not a Jew, so I am sure you realize that his nickname was used in a completely different context. Kike is the nickname used for the name Enrique and is a very common nickname in Latin America. Some references to Enrique's nickname being Kike:
Next are some references specific to DEA agent Enrique Camarena Salazar being nicknamed Kike:
Cheers, -- BatteryIncluded ( talk) 01:27, 26 November 2010 (UTC)
A memorial statue of Enrique Camarena sits in the lobby of the public library in Vallejo, California. Why Vallejo?
Georgejdorner ( talk) 22:00, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
WhisperToMe ( talk) 23:45, 2 September 2011 (UTC)
John McPhee "The Gravel Page." The New Yorker 71:46 (29 January 1996), 44ff. McPhee (in one of 3 stories about forensic geology) describes the FBI forensic geologist's work that proved that Camarena's body was not unearthed at the place that the Mexican Federal Police announced when they produced the body. The geologist's ability to locate the actual original burial site (a dozens and dozens of miles away) by analyzing soil clinging to the body for it's mineral content and unique characteristics is fascinating and compelling, and the Police had not counted on this. The evidence, presented by the FBI geologist in court, lead directly to the convictions. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RhyoliteTopaz ( talk • contribs) 05:02, 12 June 2012 (UTC)
Is there any consensus on renaming the article to his given name? It should be enough to mention it (his alleged nickname) in the lede, especially given concerns above concerning the arguably (not that Id be inclined to do so - incidentally the 'spanish version' is a slur in English, to the best of my knowledge) borderline slur in addition to use of diminutive for a murder victim apparently because the gentleman had a spanish sounding name, etc. I'm just not convinced wikipedia is a venue for adding insult to injury, arguably unless someones going to argue this was his cover story for witness protection. We all have our motivations but I'm not seeing any reasonable person needs to see this devolve to the point of childishness. I'd also think Giulio Regeni warrants a mention, if not Wayno Simmons. As well as the other agent(s) relatively recently. What do you think. I'd also think Micheles glorification of violence is relevant at some point, even if it only illustrates the mentality which causes these sorts of problems at the highest levels. I've had all sorts of runins with these guys myself but even I'm unconvinced we have to keep kicking them even after they're dead. Incidentally, what was the deal they refused to name the training center after him but put his name on a golf competition instead? Seriously. Personally I think this guy was set up or scapegoated, if not the witness protection mentioned above. Plus with this 'the CIA did it' I'd think we'd be looking at someone like Wayne Simmons. If he's who I think he is, he's nothing nice when it comes to things like torture. 55378008a ( talk) 18:24, 31 December 2016 (UTC)
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Although Camarena served in the Marines during the Vietnam War era, no reliable sources found as of yet state that he actually served in Vietnam during the war. Accordingly, Category:American military personnel of the Vietnam War was removed from the article. Semper Fi! FieldMarine ( talk) 11:54, 10 December 2018 (UTC)
I've found a host of high-quality academic sources that discuss the role of the CIA in Camarena's killing in detail. The section that we have on this topic should not be a single article from El País, even if that is Spain's flagship newspaper. Here, I'm posting a paragraph from a review of a number of books on the topic. The review is titled "Spies, Assassins, and Statesmen in Mexico’s Cold War", is published in Revista Europea de Estudios Latinoamericanos y del Caribe (Amsterdam Iss. 103, Jan/Jun 2017, pp.143-155) and is written by professor Wil Pansters, head of the Department of Social Sciences of University College Utrecht.
In May 1984, the influential journalist and columnist Manuel Buendía was brutally shot in the back in the centre of Mexico City... In a painstaking investigative process, the authors along with other journalists in Mexico and the U.S. became convinced that the Buendía and Camarena killings were linked, and much of the book is about the Bartleys trying to put the different pieces together. The most important element is that the interests behind both killings go beyond criminal interests and reach into the political domains on both sides of the border. In the mid-1980s, Mexico's one party regime confronted serious challenges, while the Reagan administration was deeply involved in a Cold War battle against the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. Buendía and DEA agent Camarena had each separately discovered that the CIA was running a dark network, which involved Mexican and Central American drug traffickers that imported cocaine into the U.S. and facilitated the movement of arms to the contras. Nicaraguan contras were trained at a Mexican ranch owned by one of the country's most notorious capos. CIA pilots flew many of the planes. The DFS functioned as the go-between, and hence involved the Ministry of the Interior. The Mexican army provided the necessary protection, and got a bite of the pie. Since the overriding concern of the CIA was the anti-Sandinista project, it trumped the DEA's task of combating drug trafficking, and covertly incorporated (or pressured) parts of the Mexican state into subservience. Buendía had found out about the CIA-contra-drugsDFS connection, which seriously questioned Mexican sovereignty, while Camarena learned that the CIA had infiltrated the DEA and sabotaged its work so as to interfere with the clandestine contra-DFS-traffickers network. They knew too much and were eliminated on the orders of the U.S. with Mexican complicity. Later official investigations attempted to limit criminal responsibility to the dirty connections between drug traffickers, secret agents and corrupt police, leaving out the (geo)political ramifications.
The review ends up quoting from "Eclipse of the Assassins. The CIA, Imperial Politics, and the Slaying of Mexican Journalist Manuel Buendía," by Russell H. Bartley and Sylvia Erickson Bartley. University of Wisconsin Press, 2015. That book concludes,
The preponderance of evidence... persuades us beyond any reasonable doubt that Manuel Buendía was slain on behalf of the United States because of what he had learned about U.S.-Mexico collusion with narcotics traffickers, international arms dealers, and other governments in support of Reagan administration efforts to overthrow the Sandinista government of Nicaragua. Camarena was... killed for the same reason.
I'll work to expand this section in the coming weeks. - Darouet ( talk) 21:16, 30 January 2019 (UTC)
On the issue of sourcing, I found this 2013 article by Steven Dudley and Michael Lohmuller of InSight Crime that came out shortly after the Fox News and Proceso reports. (Per the renowned Wilson Center: "InSight Crime, a joint initiative of American University in Washington, D.C., and the Foundation InSight Crime in Medellin, Colombia, which monitors, analyzes and investigates organized crime in the Americas" and Dudley is one of its co-founders.) A few snippets:
The story connecting Mexico’s infamous Guadalajara Cartel to the United States’ top spy agency in the 1980s is not fiction, even if the assertion that the agency helped kill a US drug agent probably is.
There is, however, little documentation to back up the claims of CIA involvement [in the death of Camarena] and the statements of the sources [i.e. Jordan, Berrellez, and Plumlee] are not all rock solid.
And while the story is still percolating via Proceso, it has not picked up momentum in the United States for reasons that are clear: it is still thin.
During his trial, neither [Matta Ballesteros] nor his lawyers ever raised the CIA’s possible connections to the cartel or the agency’s possible role in the murder of Camarena. Matta Ballesteros was eventually sentenced to multiple life sentences in a US prison where he remains to this day. So, conspiracy theories aside, the record shows an indirect connection between the CIA and the Guadalajara Cartel via Matta Ballesteros and possibly a more direct connection via the Mexican police. However, the assertion that the CIA presided over the murder of a DEA agent seems — with the documents that are publicly available now at least — more conspiracy theory than reality.
So, there is that for reference. - Location ( talk) 20:59, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
For future reference, I found this link to "Brought to Justice: Operation Leyenda" in the DEA Museum Lecture Series, October 29, 2013; the transcript is here. The panelists include "Former Administrator Jack Lawn, who led DEA during Operation Leyenda, retired Special Agent Jack Taylor, the Inspector in Charge of the Camarena kidnap/murder case in Los Angeles, and journalist Elaine Shannon whose research into the Camarena case resulted in the book Desperados, the basis of the NBC TV miniseries Drug Wars: the Camarena Story." On pages 39 to 41, the panel addresses a question submitted by a retired DEA agent:
There has been much recently said in the press that the CIA bears some responsibility for the murder of Special Agent Camarena. That it was linked in some way to the Iran Contra scandal. These claims come from former DEA Special Agents who claim they had a leadership role in the murder investigation. Please comment on these claims.
Without mentioning Berrellez or Jordan by name, Jack Lawn replies:
As a youth I read Aesop's Fables. This - this is another fable not worthy of individuals who would serve in DEA. Anyone who uh, knows who we are knows this investigation, and should know that when it came to our finding out what happened in this case, it was the CIA who told us about the tapes. It was indeed the CIA who came at one point and said, we are so proud of what you did in the case of Kiki Camarena. And, we hope that our organization would do like things if something happened to us. Our, cooperation - our coordination with CIA, in this case has always been above board. In drug cases as I recall uh, so uh, I - I feel it unfortunate that two of our former agents who had come to that conclusion, where, as I understand it, has no basis in fact.
Jack Taylor then states:
There was - there was - during my tenure investigating this case there was absolutely zero evidence of any involvement with the CIA uh, complicit with Camarena's death.
Elaine Shannon responds to Taylor's comment:
But, if I may follow up, the CIA did have a relationship with the DFS. Uh, this relationship uh, may not have included advance knowledge that somebody was going to kidnap and kill a DEA agent. What do you think, Jack?
Taylor replies:
I don't believe the CIA had advance knowledge, because their personnel is also in jeopardy in countries throughout the world. But, Elaine is absolutely right. When I - I talked about the interstate transportation of stolen motor vehicles with the DFS. Uh, the DFS, at least in that investigation, was working in Mexico with the CIA. They are counterparts in a number of investigations. Uh, but again, because uh, CIA also doesn't work with angels in the gathering of information, their working with the DFS is not surprising. Their mission there is to gather intelligence. And, if they can gather intelligence from corrupt people like DFS, they'll certainly do that. But, again, I would be shocked to learn at some point in the future, that CIA had advance knowledge of the taking of Camarena, and did not pass that information on. They were most cooperative during the investigation. They're good partners with us internationally. And, I think it's - it's shameful that anyone would draw them into this - this investigation at this point.
If the claims or Berrellez or Jordan are inserted into the article, then some part of their superiors' views of those claims should be provided, too. - Location ( talk) 15:40, 11 August 2020 (UTC)
I have started looking at Russell Bartley's book "Eclipse of the Assassins," mentioned in the section above. It will take quite a while to go through it, but it is already worth noting that Bartley lists Tosh Plumlee as a source. Plumlee was also a source for the 2013 Fox news story on CIA involvement in the Camarena kidnapping and murder, and was very likely a source for J. Jesus Esquivel's Spanish language book on the Camarena case (La CIA, Camarena y Caro Quintero: La historia secreta). Unfortunately, Plumlee is not a reliable source. He is best known for his claim to have worked with Mafioso Johnny Roselli as part of a CIA attempt to stop the assassination of JFK (see here). I don't yet know how central he is to Bartley's book, but I would not be in a rush to cite "Eclipse" in the article. Rgr09 ( talk) 15:02, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
@ Darouet: @ Rgr09: Speaking of stuff, we could make a Wikipedia article on the book itself. As per Wikipedia:Notability (books) a book may have an article if there are at least two or more independent secondary sources, which includes book reviews. Use the book reviews as sources and link to them, and it will be easy for the public and fellow Wikipedians to consult the book's reputation. WhisperToMe ( talk) 01:57, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
Jaydoggmarco, Darouet, Ringerfan23, and Classified20, please reach a consensus on the talk page (or a noticeboard) about the desired contents of the article, especially related to the section on the CIA's involvement. Feel free to ping me or any other admin before the 3 days' protection is up if there's a consensus and the article can be unprotected. Enterprisey ( talk!) 00:21, 15 May 2020 (UTC)
@ Jaydoggmarco: Would you be willing to participate in a "dispute resolution" process, Wikipedia:Dispute resolution? An experienced editor would mediate between our concerns to help us arrive at an agreement. @ Enterprisey: Last time this was an issue I went to WP:BLPN, where Nomoskedasticity was the only editor to comment and suggested I just add the content. Having gotten a favorable response there but with Jaydoggmarco adamant that Camarena sources are fringe, I guess I'll try WP:RSN now. - Darouet ( talk) 13:02, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
Comment from an otherwise uninvolved editor: I agree with Jaydoggmarco and Rgr09 on this. Any source that relies on Tosh Plumlee (claims to have been in Dealey Plaza during JFK assassination) or Richard Brenneke (known fabricator for claims about October Surprise conspiracy theory) should be treated with extreme skepticism. - Location ( talk) 08:35, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
References
Here's another peer-reviewed source we might consider: [17]. Relevant passage:
Fourth, the transformations discussed above acquired additional significance in 1985 when corrupt drug trafficking law enforcement relations led to the kidnapping and murder of DEA agent Enrique ´Kiki´ Camarena and his Mexican pilot Alfredo Zavala. The incident ushered in a new and prolonged phase of US pressure on Mexican authorities. The Camarena affair constituted a turning point in the recent history of state-crime governance in Mexico, as it brought to light the complicity between drug traffickers and the Dirección Federal de Seguridad (DFS), which enjoyed the support of or worked on behalf of the CIA.
Nomoskedasticity (
talk) 13:21, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
Year of high school graduation should be 1966 according to the source. Chrose1 ( talk) 08:56, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
There seems to be a split in views on the sources appropriate for the article. I suggest discussing some of the content that is getting inserted and removed so rapidly in the article. I hope we can come to a consensus on at least some of that material and get back to a more stable article. Please leave the disputed content up somewhere so that we can discuss it, I don't care where. Here is my list of things I would like to discuss about it. Since this is mostly Darouet's material, I hope D. could respond.
This is not right. The USA Today article (Updated 4:27 a.m. TST Feb. 29, 2020) says "former Mexican police officers Ramon Lira, Rene Lopez and George Godoy, who had worked as security guards for cartel kingpins spoke with USA TODAY and recounted that they told investigators a DEA official and a CIA operative were present at meetings where Camarena’s abduction was discussed." So this needs fixing if it is to stay. I hope there is consensus on that. Note that these were not police officers investigating Camarena's murder, they were police hired by the traffickers as gunmen.
First, who are the former cia agents (plural)? This is not answered anywhere in the article. Please explain and give a source so I can check it. Second, who are the Mexican journalists (plural)? They are not cited anywhere in the article. Please explain and give a source so I can check it. Third, who are the historians? are you referring to the Bartleys? Or do you include others? Do you include Panster in this group? If so, please cite where Panster explicitly says that he believes that Camarena was killed with the complicity of the CIA because etc. Fourth, who are the witnesses that say they believe Camarena was killed with the complicity of the CIA because etc. What were they witnesses to? Is this an opinion, or did they see or hear someone do or say something. Look forward to a careful, thorough discussion Rgr09 ( talk) 02:43, 6 August 2020 (UTC).
In a painstaking investigative process, the authors along with other journalists in Mexico and the U.S. became convinced that the Buendía and Camarena killings were linked, and much of the book is about the Bartleys trying to put the different pieces together. The most important element is that the interests behind both killings go beyond criminal interests and reach into the political domains on both sides of the border. In the mid-1980s, Mexico’s one party regime confronted serious challenges, while the Reagan administration was deeply involved in a Cold War battle against the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. Buendía and DEA agent Camarena had each separately discovered that the CIA was running a dark network, which involved Mexican and Central American drug traffickers that imported cocaine into the U.S. and facilitated the movement of arms to the contras. Nicaraguan contras were trained at a Mexican ranch owned by one of the country’s most notorious capos. CIA pilots flew many of the planes. The DFS functioned as the go-between, and hence involved the Ministry of the Interior. The Mexican army provided the necessary protection, and got a bite of the pie. Since the overriding concern of the CIA was the anti-Sandinista project, it trumped the DEA’s task of combating drug trafficking, and covertly incorporated (or pressured) parts of the Mexican state into subservience. Buendía had found out about the CIA-contra-drugsDFS connection, which seriously questioned Mexican sovereignty, while Camarena learned that the CIA had infiltrated the DEA and sabotaged its work so as to interfere with the clandestine contra-DFS-traffickers network. They knew too much and were eliminated on the orders of the U.S. with Mexican complicity.
The second half of the book uncovers the authors' proposed motive for the Buendía assassination: his knowledge of Mexico's connection to the Iran-Contra affair. According to the authors, Buendía learned that the Mexican government was aiding the CIA in its proxy war against Nicaragua's leftist government. Specifically, the CIA used a Veracruz airfield to transport weapons to the Nicaraguan Contras, and at the same time the agency trained Contras on the ranch of Guadalajara Cartel kingpin Rafael Caro Quintero. Bartley and Bartley find confirmation for these claims in US court case files, which include statements by ex-CIA and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents asserting that such operations involved the knowing collaboration of Mexican politicians, the DFS, drug traffickers, and the CIA, among others. Using these testimonies, which come from the trial for the 1985 murder of undercover DEA agent Enrique Camarena, the authors hypothesize that the United States played a role in the Buendía and Camarena murders to prevent the so-called “Veracruz link” from surfacing (p. 195). The evidence for US involvement is compelling but, as Bartley and Bartley acknowledge, circumstantial (p. 394).
"In a painstaking investigative process, the authors [Bartley and Bartley] along with other journalists in Mexico and the U.S. became convinced that the Buendía and Camarena killings were linked."Therefore ascribing this merely to Proceso is wrong. 4 Witnesses) The USA Today article [43] names three witnesses, but does not state that the named witnesses are all the witnesses described by the sentence,
"U.S. Justice Department agents and prosecutors obtained statements from witnesses implicating a Central Intelligence Agency operative and a DEA official in the plot to torture and murder Camarena, according to the witnesses, Camarena’s widow and others familiar with the case who were interviewed by USA TODAY."The LA Weekly [44] writes that
"Twenty-three informants from Operation Leyenda were murdered while Berrellez was supervisor or shortly thereafter. Nevertheless, he managed to bring over to the United States as many as 200 informants and place them in witness protection, quarantined from one another — indeed, unaware of who was in this country — as a precaution to prevent them from comparing notes. Ten of the informants were eyewitnesses to the kidnapping and murder of Kiki Camarena."5 Felix Rodriguez) I didn't say witnesses observed CIA agent Rodriguez involved in planning the abduction and torture (really, interrogation): that's what was reported by the Bartleys and journalists. 6 Historians) Yes, historians refers to the Bartleys, Pansters and Freije.
"the claim that Harrison was a CIA asset is basically unsourced in Bartley,"so that any conclusions that involve Harrison may also be suspect. However, Harrison describes himself as an employee of the CIA [45], and Pansters repeats this claim in his own voice [46]. c Rodriguez/CIA You write that Rodriguez was not seen torturing Rodriguez, merely interrogating him while he was tortured. You also write that Rodriguez might not have represented the CIA, and so any claim that the CIA was involved in Camarena's death because Rodriguez was is flawed. In response I must say that from the naive perspective of a biologist who has never been involved in torture, the moral distinction between interrogation and torture while torture is ongoing escapes me. I'll also note that in every one of the sources we're discussing, the authors very prominently state that the evidence indicates CIA involvement in Camarena's death, whether they discuss Rodriguez or not. That is, statements being made here rely upon exact phrases taken from reliable sources, not and not upon reading into Rodriguez's specific role. Lastly, you write that a lead sentence implicating the CIA d Cartel finances) implies that Camarena was not killed because of his impact on the finances of the cartels. In response, I'd just say that I don't think the text implies any such thing. And I think any educated historian / journalist / reader would understand that the CIA and cartels could theoretically both collaborate to kill a DEA agent for their own reasons. - Darouet ( talk) 16:33, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
I'm going to jump in here. Various versions of the lede have stated that "CIA agents" have claimed that Camarena was killed with the complicity of the CIA. There are various issues with this. First of all, the meaning of "CIA agent" is vague and I would think professional historians and journalists would be a bit more careful using the term. Robert "Tosh" Plumlee has claimed in various places that he was an employee of the CIA (i.e. a CIA officer) and as far as I can tell, Lawrence Victor Harrison did not make that same claim. Darouet cited the LA Weekly's interview of Hector Berrellez in writing "Harrison describes himself as an employee of the CIA". This is what the LA Weekly article states:
Harrison may have described himself as an employee of the CIA at some point in time, but the LA Weekly article only indicates that Berrellez said Harrison made that claim. In 1990, Harrison was reported to be a DEA informant who claimed he trained Guatemalan guerrillas at Rafael Caro Quintero's ranch. This AP report is in line with other news accounts of the time reporting on his testimony:
You would think that if Harrison claimed to be a "CIA agent", that would make it in to the story. (By the way, the AP report also states: "'The whole story is nonsense,' [CIA] spokesman Mark Mansfield said. 'We have not trained Guatemalan guerrillas on that ranch or anywhere else.'") So, on the point of whether Harrison was a "CIA agent" are we to believe Bartley and Bartley who are relying on Berrellez's claim (Pansters is clearly citing Bartley and Bartley), or are we to believe Harrison himself? And on the point of whether Tosh Plumlee was a "CIA agent" are we to believe Bartley and Bartley who are relying on Plumlee's claims, or are we to believe the SPLC who wrote:
I am curious to see suggestions on how to resolve these statements in sources that are quite divergent. - Location ( talk) 18:57, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
"disillusioned former CIA spy, Lawrence Victor Harrison"), a point repeated by Pansters in his 2017 review [48]
"a former CIA agent, Lawrence Victor Harrison", and Harrison tells journalists he was in the CIA too ( 2015 story)
"Harrison told his story. He said he was a CIA agent who was trained in Virginia."It's also repeated by Chuck Bowden in his 2015 piece [49]:
"It is a simple arrangement: He is a CIA operative embedded in DFS and assigned by DFS to assist and guard major drug people in Guadalajara."
Q: You indicated that it was learned by certain colleagues that Mr. Buendía had obtained information on certain members of the PRI who were assisting the CIA with arms smuggling and knew of the CIA link to narcotics traffickers. That is what is reported here.
A: Yes, Sir.
Q: Is that an accurate statement of what you told the agents?
A: Yes, that is an accurate statement of what I described to the agent.
Q: Could you tell us where you learned that information?
A: Also as part of the investigation that I told you I had made. I was relating to the agent the facts that I had uncovered, or the suppositions or the rumors that I uncovered, in support of this hypothesis only.
Q: Did you speak to any members of the American intelligence community in connection with your investigation?
A: I don’t know if I did or not.
Q: So you may have?
A: Anything is possible, Sir.
Q: Have you ever had any formal relationship with any American intelligence agency in Mexico?
A: Formal relationship? No, I haven’t.
Q: How about an informal relationship?
A: I don’t think so.
Q: Do you know where the CIA office was in Guadalajara, for example?
A: I have no idea. I don’t know if there was an office there.
"I was instructed to sit up there [on the witness stand] and act like a clown! They laid a mine field for me and I didn’t want to step on any mines. They told me to lie!"
Of more serious concern to executive branch spin strategists was a front-page, four column, 2,600-word illustrated feature article that appeared in the Washington Post the day Judge Rafeedie turned the trial over to the jury for deliberation. Written by Post foreign service reporter William Branigin and datelined Mexico City, the article focused on friction between the DEA and CIA around the Camarena case and, in effect, lent credence to Harrison’s testimony about CIA collusion with Mexican narcotics traffickers. “The trial in Los Angeles of four men accused of involvement in the 1985 murder of a U.S. narcotics agent,” read Branigin’s lead paragraph, “has brought to the surface years of resentment by Drug Enforcement Administration officials of the Central Intelligence Agency’s long collaboration with a former Mexican secret police unit [DFS] that was heavily involved in drug trafficking.”
I have caught up with comments from Darouet and Location on the talk page. My response follows, sorry for the delay. Anything else from me will take at least a week, sorry about that too. I will abide by any consensus reached in my absence, no problemo.
At this point I have to agree with Darouet. It's clear we aren't going to reach a consensus so we should launch an RfC to get outside opinions. Classified20 ( talk) 06:19, 28 August 2020 (UTC)
@ Rgr09: in response to your comments above, you state that all of the information connecting the Camarena case to the CIA and the contras comes from three people, "BJP." However, there are in fact three former DEA agents who have testified to this connection, two former CIA agents, multiple witnesses to Camarena's death who state that they worked for the cartels. Then we have five academics who are experts on Latin American drugs and politics who based on this testimony and their own expertise and research takes these claims seriously, and conclude they're almost certainly correct. Then in addition to this we have a host of newspaper reporters from outlets in the US and Mexico who report on this, some of whom describe years of work on the topic, and also take the allegations very seriously. And last but not least, the Justice Department has reopened their case on the matter. I'm not sure how we're supposed to weight academia and journalism versus your speculations here. - Darouet ( talk) 22:22, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
Harrison, Lawrence Victor—cover name assumed by George Marshall Davis (q.v.) when he was given a new identity by the CIA in the mid-1960s; served as a CIA “illegal” (deep-cover agent) in Mexico; has personal knowledge of the Manuel Buendía assassination, as well as agency collusion with Mexican drug traffickers and government officials in support of the Nicaraguan contras.
A crucial step in getting to this conclusion was the authors’ engagement with a former CIA agent, Lawrence Victor Harrison, who for a long time had worked under deep cover in the Mexican netherworld of the DFS, drug trafficking and political repression. He later became disenchanted with the agency and in conversations with the authors eventually spilled the beans about the relationships between organized crime, security agencies, law enforcement, and political interests in Washington, Mexico, and beyond. In his mind Buendía was murdered on the orders of the architect of the Iran-contra network, Oliver North (p. 331)!
The authors unearth new evidence of US intelligence assistance in Mexico’s dirty war. According to their interviews with disaffected ex-CIA agent Lawrence Victor Harrison, CIA operatives helped identify leftist “dissidents” and reported directly to Mexican intelligence officers such as Miguel Nazar Haro, notorious for ordering tortures and disappearances (p. 314).
Lawrence Harrison comes up to the U.S. in September 1989. In his initial debriefing, he explains that he holds a rank in DFS. He had handled all the communications for the drug leaders in Guadalajara — Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo, Rafael Caro Quintero, Miguel Félix Gallardo, and El Cochiloco. He says he attended classes at the University of California at Berkeley but was not officially enrolled and he also attended some classes in the law school there. Then, in 1968, he is recruited by the CIA, trained, and sent to Mexico... It is a simple arrangement: He is a CIA operative embedded in DFS and assigned by DFS to assist and guard major drug people in Guadalajara.
Once in the safety of Berrellez's office in L.A., Harrison told his story. He said he was a CIA agent who was trained in Virginia and assigned to pose as an English instructor at the Autonomous University of Guadalajara.
I wish people would stop adding AND deleting material under discussion. It is driving me nuts. Rgr09 ( talk) 06:41, 7 August 2020 (UTC)
Responding to Hipal's request, here is a list of references for the article with a dissatisfied note at the beginning. Unless stated, I have read the material cited.
The article is putatively about Enrique Camarena. It is radically truncated, with a few details of Camarena's life, a couple of sentences about his work, a confused account of his kidnap/murder, and omits most of the murder investigation in Mexico and America. It also omits most of the lengthy judicial process in both Mexico and the U.S. I regret that so much time has been spent on the talk page over what I think are marginal claims which have been poorly documented and presented, while central events and issues in Camarena's life and murder case are ignored.
Much of what I think is key content for the article can be supplied from two books I recently added to the article's reference section: Elaine Shannon's Desperados and James Kuykendall's O Plato O Plomo. I will not discuss them here. Other sources for key content include newspaper articles from the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and Washington Post. I would not dispute the inclusion of articles from these sources as long as they are relevant, properly sourced and accurately cited.
The dispute in the article is whether to include claims made by various people since 2013. Here are sources for some of these claims.
There are two reviews of Eclipse in academic journals:
There are also journalistic sources for some of the claims. These include:
I think these are the main references in the discussion on the talk page.
For those who have not yet seen Darouet's disputed addition to the article, I think the most recent version of it was here Rgr09 ( talk) 07:18, 27 August 2020 (UTC)
In 1985, a murky alliance of Mexican drug lords and government officials tortured and killed a DEA agent named Enrique Camarena. In a three-part series, Blood on the Corn, legendary journalist Charles Bowden finally digs into the terrible mystery behind a hero’s murder — his final story.
"extremely seriously", and also point out that arguments opposing inclusion are based almost wholly on WP:OR. Because your close so wholly disregards both the policy-based arguments and the overwhelming majority of editors here, I'm going to challenge your close at WP:AN, per policy. I'm informing you here first, as you've requested. - Darouet ( talk) 16:32, 22 December 2020 (UTC)
Should we include a section on possible CIA participation in Camarena's interrogation, and his case more broadly, using this text at least, [62] and based on these sources? - Darouet ( talk) 22:40, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
Academic
Newspaper articles
Reopened Justice Department Investigation
- Darouet ( talk) 22:40, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
"At least five academics have described CIA involvement as likely in this case"cannot be taken at face value. In fact, Darouet has just one academic source for this claim (Bartley & Bartley 2015), along with two book reviews that merely summarize it, noting that Bartley & Bartley rely on
"circumstantial"evidence to connect the CIA to Camarena's murder. Darouet argues that since the reviewers (Pansters and Freije) are mostly favorable, and do not expressly set out to disprove any of the content in Bartley & Bartley, that means they are additional sources independently corroborating Bartley & Bartley's findings. However, as Rgr09 has noted ( [70], [71], [72]), that is not entirely clear from the text of the reviews and the vast majority of the content in Bartley & Bartley is about the life of Mexican journalist Manuel Buendía, with much of the contentious material about the CIA and Camarena being relegated to a brief ~30 page epilogue in a book that Darouet himself states ( [73]) is
"around 500 pages long"and difficult to read in its entirety. I was very curious about Darouet's reference to Marshall 1991 as a "fifth" academic source that has
"described CIA involvement as likely in [Camarena's murder],"especially because it never seems to have come up in the preceding discussions (unless I'm missing something), yet now Darouet has conceded ( [74]) that
"Marshall does not write that Camarena was killed with CIA complicity."I do not think that anyone should support Darouet's proposed addition on the pretense that he has marshaled an array of academic historians representing a broad scholarly consensus in the field of contemporary Latin American history when he really just has a single academic source from a few years ago, that is under-reviewed and contains controversial findings that have not been proven or independently confirmed either by other academics or any of the legal trials involving this incident. None of this is to say that Bartley & Bartley 2015 is not a reliable source with attribution (despite its undisputed shortcomings) or not DUE for at least a short paragraph in this article, but if Darouet wants an RfC to effectively "vote" on his preferred version rather than drafting a consensus version in collaboration with Rgr09, then my inclination is to say no—primarily because of Darouet's tendency to overstatement. TheTimesAreAChanging ( talk) 02:29, 10 September 2020 (UTC)
There are so many sources on this topic, and yet none are in the article: this issue needs wider input from across the encyclopedia. I'll admit, I had never even read on Camarena until the last year. But I'm shocked that literally every reliable source from academia, and from recent newspaper reports on this topic, is being systematically removed from the article. Why is that happening? When I asked for comment previously at WP:RSN, the only uninvolved editors who commented [75], Horse Eye Jack and Nomoskedasticity, said that it should be fine to use this material with attribution. That advice has had no impact on this page however. - Darouet ( talk) 22:40, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
Harrison, Lawrence Victor—cover name assumed by George Marshall Davis (q.v.) when he was given a new identity by the CIA in the mid-1960s; served as a CIA “illegal” (deep-cover agent) in Mexico; has personal knowledge of the Manuel Buendía assassination, as well as agency collusion with Mexican drug traffickers and government officials in support of the Nicaraguan contras.
A crucial step in getting to this conclusion was the authors’ engagement with a former CIA agent, Lawrence Victor Harrison, who for a long time had worked under deep cover in the Mexican netherworld of the DFS, drug trafficking and political repression. He later became disenchanted with the agency and in conversations with the authors eventually spilled the beans about the relationships between organized crime, security agencies, law enforcement, and political interests in Washington, Mexico, and beyond. In his mind Buendía was murdered on the orders of the architect of the Iran-contra network, Oliver North (p. 331)!
The authors unearth new evidence of US intelligence assistance in Mexico’s dirty war. According to their interviews with disaffected ex-CIA agent Lawrence Victor Harrison, CIA operatives helped identify leftist “dissidents” and reported directly to Mexican intelligence officers such as Miguel Nazar Haro, notorious for ordering tortures and disappearances (p. 314).
Lawrence Harrison comes up to the U.S. in September 1989. In his initial debriefing, he explains that he holds a rank in DFS. He had handled all the communications for the drug leaders in Guadalajara — Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo, Rafael Caro Quintero, Miguel Félix Gallardo, and El Cochiloco. He says he attended classes at the University of California at Berkeley but was not officially enrolled and he also attended some classes in the law school there. Then, in 1968, he is recruited by the CIA, trained, and sent to Mexico... It is a simple arrangement: He is a CIA operative embedded in DFS and assigned by DFS to assist and guard major drug people in Guadalajara.
Once in the safety of Berrellez's office in L.A., Harrison told his story. He said he was a CIA agent who was trained in Virginia and assigned to pose as an English instructor at the Autonomous University of Guadalajara.
I am shocked that Darouet is shocked that his additions to article have not been generally accepted. I wrote earlier that I did not have time to discuss the article in detail, but that I had doubts about his sources. I was not in his rsn discussion because I had no time. Now I do. Wikipedia is full of this sort of back and forth, I have felt frustrated over it myself, but that is the way WP has evolved.
I first have some comments on the book by Bartley and Bartley. The full title is Eclipse of the assassins : the CIA, imperial politics, and the slaying of Mexican journalist Manuel Buendia. The subject of this book is the murder of Buendia. Its focus is Buendia's life and career, including his early biography, his later career, the political and historical background, Buendia's political views and roles, and, in detail, the investigation of his murder and the prosecution of the men accused of killing him. For Camarena, on the other hand, the book has no personal details, no discussion of his career, no discussion of DEA either in general or in Mexico, no discussion of drug traffickers or trafficking in general or in Mexico, no discussion of the circumstances of Camarena's murder, no discussion of the investigation of Camarena's murder in Mexico or in America, except as it relates to Lawrence Harrison, no discussion of the legal proceedings over the murder in Mexico or America except as it relates to Harrison. Harrison provides B & B with grounds to claim that CIA was involved in Buendia's murder. In fact, Harrison says Buendia was killed at the behest of Oliver North (p. 394). B & B are not interested in Camarena. The sole exception to this lack of matters relevant to Camarenais in the "Epilogue" section of the book, about 30 pages where the Bartleys discuss the 2013 claims of BJP. The main focus of this discussion is on whether the accusations fit in with their views of Lawrence Harrison. In other words, the book is barely relevant to Camarena at all, except for the 2013 BJP claims, which should not, at this stage, have a central or even peripheral position in the article. Rgr09 ( talk) 01:13, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
"not interested in Camarena,"and for a book that is
"barely relevant to Camarena at all."The book situates both the Camarena and Buendia murders in the context of international politics, which is what you'd expect from historians, and hope for in a Wikipedia article.
The preponderance of evidence now available in the public record, confirmed and further nuanced by our own cited sources and most especially by Lawrence Victor Harrison, persuades us beyond a reasonable doubt that Manuel Buendía was slain on behalf of the United States because of what he had learned about U.S.-Mexico collusion with narcotics traffickers, international arms dealers, and other governments in support of Reagan administration efforts to overthrow the Sandinista government of Nicaragua. The evidence we have developed also leads us to conclude that DEA S/A Enrique Camarena Salazar was abducted, interrogated, and killed for the same reason and that the two cases are therefore related. The import of this latter conclusion is that, contrary to the hero status accorded Camarena as an ostensible casualty of the "war on drugs," he was sacrificed by his own government in order to prevent exposure of a covert operation against the legitimate authorities of another country.
I also have some comments on the reception of “Eclipse” Who are the five academics? Russel and Sylvia Bartley, Pansters, Freije, and who else? Darouet writes “at least five academics have described CIA involvement as likely in this case.” Freije mentions Camarena only once in her review. “Using [testimonies] which come from the trial for the 1985 murder of undercover DEA agent Enrique Camarena, the authors hypothesize that the United States played a role in the Buendia and Camarena murders to prevent the so-called “Veracruz link” from surfacing (p. 195). The evidence for US involvement is compelling but, as Bartley and Bartley acknowledge, Circumstantial (p. 394).” The use of hypothesize and circumstantial contradicts Darouet’s claim that Freije described CIA involvement as likely. The description of Camarena as an undercover agent shows that Freije was not familiar with the Camarena case. Rgr09 ( talk) 02:57, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
The preponderance of evidence... persuades us beyond a reasonable doubt that Manuel Buendía was slain on behalf of the United States because of what he had learned about U.S.-Mexico collusion with narcotics traffickers, international arms dealers, and other governments in support of Reagan administration efforts to overthrow the Sandinista government of Nicaragua. The evidence we have developed also leads us to conclude that DEA S/A Enrique Camarena Salazar was abducted, interrogated, and killed for the same reason.
Since the overriding concern of the CIA was the anti-Sandinista project, it trumped the DEA's task of combating drug trafficking, and covertly incorporated (or pressured) parts of the Mexican state into subservience. Buendía had found out about the CIA-contra-drugs-DFS connection, which seriously questioned Mexican sovereignty, while Camarena learned that the CIA had infiltrated the DEA and sabotaged its work so as to interfere with the clandestine contra-DFS-traffickers network. They knew too much and were eliminated on the orders of the U.S. with Mexican complicity. Later official investigations attempted to limit criminal responsibility to the dirty connections between drug traffickers, secret agents and corrupt police, leaving out the (geo)political ramifications.
The Camarena affair constituted a turning point in the recent history of state-crime governance in Mexico, as it brought to light the complicity between drug traffickers and the Dirección Federal de Seguridad (DFS), which enjoyed the support of or worked on behalf of the CIA.
The product of [The Bartleys'] research, Eclipse of the Assassins, suggests that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the DFS, and high-ranking Mexican politicians collaborated to murder Buendía... The second half of the book uncovers the authors’ proposed motive for the Buendía assassination: his knowledge of Mexico’s connection to the Iran-Contra affair. According to the authors, Buendía learned that the Mexican government was aiding the CIA in its proxy war against Nicaragua’s leftist government. Specifically, the CIA used a Veracruz airfield to transport weapons to the Nicaraguan Contras, and at the same time the agency trained Contras on the ranch of Guadalajara Cartel kingpin Rafael Caro Quintero. Bartley and Bartley find confirmation for these claims in US court case files, which include statements by ex-CIA and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents asserting that such operations involved the knowing collaboration of Mexican politicians, the DFS, drug traffickers, and the CIA, among others. Using these testimonies, which come from the trial for the 1985 murder of undercover DEA agent Enrique Camarena, the authors hypothesize that the United States played a role in the Buendía and Camarena murders to prevent the so-called “Veracruz link” from surfacing (p. 195). The evidence for US involvement is compelling but, as Bartley and Bartley acknowledge, circumstantial (p. 394).... Eclipse of the Assassins offers important insights into Mexico’s dirty war and the US-Mexican relationship during the late Cold War... Bartley and Bartley have uncovered a chilling transborder history of government collusion to silence criticism and subvert dissidents.
One more comment. First, in defense of my doubts on Plumlee. This is not unique to me; as noted above, doubt is shared by Vincent Bugliosi who writes in Reclaiming History that Plumlee is "a fraud so pathetic that he is an insult to those who make their living by fraudulent means." I have defended my views on Harrison and Bartley's evaluation of him above, read it if you want. Finally, I disagree that I have put anything into the article remotely resembling original research. I have read three books: Shannon, Kuykendall, and Bartley-Bartley. I have read all of the content of these books and looked at the notes and checked some, though not all, quotes. I have looked at some legal documents on the Camarena case, but I have not put these in the article. This may be research, but I believe its the kind of research that WP requires, not proscribes. Rgr09 ( talk) 03:59, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
The use of hypothesize and circumstantial contradicts Darouet’s claim that Freije described CIA involvement as likely. This is absurd and wildly confused sophistry: the words do nothing of the sort, and any competent reader can recognize that. "Hypothesize" means they draw by inductive reasoning the conclusion mentioned, it is a statement of fact about the content of the book and implies no value judgement about the merits of the(ir) reasoning. The word circumstantial means that the evidence requires a logical step of reasoning; again it makes no value judgement about the merits of the reasoning. The Bartleys state that the evidence is of this type. The word in the relevant section of the review which does make a value judgement is "compelling", meaning "Not able to be refuted; inspiring conviction" (OED), or "convincing" (M-W). Cambial Yellowing ❧ 00:40, 15 September 2020 (UTC)
I added the official denials on this to the Felix Rodriguez article....it might be a good idea to use them here as well. Not sure how to address the problem of Plumlee's (obvious) credibility issues. He doesn't have a wiki article and inserting those issues might be awkward (since they are tangential to this particular one). Rja13ww33 ( talk) 22:43, 16 September 2020 (UTC)
I've not looked for better references yet, but the content being edit-warred over looks grossly undue at best. [92]. Maybe if we can find some high-quality, independent sources about it, but that New York Post article is not. -- Hipal/Ronz ( talk) 23:33, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
References
Hi, I see past discussion about murder of Camarena. This is transcript of proceedings from late '80s/90s (Camarena case, court in Los Angeles): http://www.reneverdugo.org/pdf/ Maybe it will help you.
There are official testimonies of men like Harrison, Berrellez, Godoy, Lopez and many, many other people. If you compare their testimonies with their words from The Last Narc (and other interviews), you will see the huge differences. Not only in big cases like 'corrupt Kuykendall', but also in small things like 'how Berrellez found Harrison':
In november 2020, Berrellez told at one interview that he talked with Harrison in Mexico. Harrison agreed with cooperation, but then he disappeared, so Berrellez was looking for him for one year and he finally found him in Mexico's mountains. In reality, as you can see in those transcripts, Harrison talked with Berrellez for the first time in California, when he was already recruited by Mexicans working for DEA.
At these transcripts, you can also find there that one of the witnesses told that he was imprisoned because he didn't lie, how Berrellez wants. Berrellez visited him in jail and told him that if he doesn't tell the court what he wants, he will never see his family again.
There were many doubts about credibility of all Berrellez's witnesses. Except one. There was only one Berrellez's witness, who was seen as trustworthy - Hector Cervantes Santos. And this is what Cerventes told few years later: https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1998-jan-17-mn-9150-story.html
If you have time, you can read those transcripts. You will see that nobody ever said any single word about Kuykendall's or CIA involvement in murder of Camarena. Moreover, except Berrellez's witnesses, nobody ever said anything about alleged meetings prior kidnap of Camarena (between Mexico's politicians and Guadalajara Cartel). And even those Berrellez's witnesses sometimes denied themselves. Btw, as a bodyguards of drug traffickers, they used to made less than $50/mo. But when Berrellez recruited them, they were all paid $3,000/mo by DEA.
I was able to read maybe 10% of all material, so I don't know everyhing from that. Anyway, good start for you can be "Related Cases" > "Zuno Arce" > "Trail Transcripts". By the way, there are also details about burned field in Zacatecas (1984). You can add them to this article about Camarena since it was mainly his job. SaintSanti ( talk) 00:05, 18 January 2021 (UTC)
In his RfC close, S Marshall stated that we should "include a section on the alleged CIA participation in Camarena's interrogation," but that the section should not "read like Darouet's proposed edit." That proposed edit can be seen here [93]. S Marshall added that text linking the CIA to Camarena's killing "requires in-text attribution to a specific source as well as an inline citation that directly supports the claim," and wrote that this issue should not be given "undue prominence."
Aquillion suggested holding another RfC, but whether we do or don't hold an RfC, we need to decide what text is being considered for addition to this article.
Academic sources with meaningful discussion of possible CIA involvement in Camarena's death include:
Newspaper articles include:
A relatively high-quality blog post has been offered as capable of providing a counternarrative:
Lastly, there's this book by journalist Jesús Esquivel, that's referenced by some of the academics:
If you think there's another source we really must mention, please post it here. Since nobody has done so, I'll draft a text proposal shortly. - Darouet ( talk) 20:57, 5 February 2021 (UTC)
@ Rja13ww33 and Aquillion: here's my effort at a draft:
Allegations of CIA involvement
A number of former DEA agents, CIA agents, Mexican police officers, and historians contend that the CIA was complicit in Camarena's death.[1-7] DEA agent Hector Berréllez writes after he was named director of the DEA's investigation into Camarena's death Operation Leyenda in 1989, Mexican police informants and CIA agent Victor Harrison told him that Camarena had been killed with CIA complicity.[1,2] According to Berrellez, in response to his discovery he was told by senior DEA officials not to investigate possible CIA involvement, was threatened by the CIA, and removed from the investigation.[1,2]
Since the Mexican government released Rafael Caro Quintero from prison in 2013, Harrison and the police informants have been joined by several former DEA agents who similarly argue that the CIA had participated in Camarena's killing.[1-6] Between 2013–2015, the Mexican newspaper Proceso,[3] journalist Jesús Esquivel,[4] journalists Chuck Bowden and Molly Malloy,[5] and historians Russell and Silvia Bartley[6] published investigative reports and books making the same allegation. They write that Camarena, like Mexican journalist Manuel Buendía, discovered that the CIA helped organize drug trafficking from Mexico into the United States in order to fund the anti-communist Contras in Nicaragua as a part of the Cold War. Historian Wil Pansters explains that US victory in the Cold War was more important to the CIA than the DEA's War on Drugs:[7]
"Since the overriding concern of the CIA was the anti-Sandinista project, it trumped the DEA's task of combating drug trafficking, and covertly incorporated (or pressured) parts of the Mexican state into subservience. Buendía had found out about the CIA-contra-drugs-DFS connection, which seriously questioned Mexican sovereignty, while Camarena learned that the CIA had infiltrated the DEA and sabotaged its work so as to interfere with the clandestine contra-DFS-traffickers network. They knew too much and were eliminated on the orders of the U.S. with Mexican complicity. Later official investigations attempted to limit criminal responsibility to the dirty connections between drug traffickers, secret agents and corrupt police, leaving out the (geo)political ramifications."[7]
In 2019 the United States Department of Justice began reinvestigating Camarena's murder,[8] and in 2020 Amazon Studies released a documentary, The Last Narc,[1,9] supporting the allegations. The CIA has said the allegations are untrue.[8] Camarena biographer Elaine Shannon describes the allegations as "another Deep State conspiracy theory," and interviews other former DEA agents including Jack Lawn, who agree with her.[10]
Full details are given for references above, but listed briefly for clarity here, they are [1] 2020 Amazon documentary, [2] 2020 Berrellez book, [3] 2013 Proceso investigative report, [4] 2014 Esquivel book, [5] 2015 Bowden and Malloy investigative report, [6] 2015 Bartley book, [7] 2017 Pansters review, [8] 2018 USA Today article, [9] 2020 Variety article, [10] 2020 Shannon blog post.
This text doesn't mention more minor people involved by name, and instead places an emphasis on the secondary sources: journalists and historians. It also attempts to avoid duplicated references. Let me know what you think. - Darouet ( talk) 17:09, 7 February 2021 (UTC)
I've shortened the text in this second draft. Per the RfC, there was consensus to include this in the article, but S Marshall did insist that the text be changed to accommodate objections. If there's no feedback here — S Marshall requested discussion before inclusion — I'll launch another RfC to see what the community thinks.
Allegations of CIA involvement
A number of former DEA agents, CIA agents, Mexican police officers, and historians contend that the CIA was complicit in Camarena's death.[1-7] Between 2013–2015, the Mexican newspaper Proceso,[3] journalist Jesús Esquivel,[4] journalists Chuck Bowden and Molly Malloy,[5] and historians Russell and Silvia Bartley[6] published investigative reports and books making the same allegation. They write that Camarena, like Mexican journalist Manuel Buendía, discovered that the CIA helped organize drug trafficking from Mexico into the United States in order to fund the anti-communist Contras in Nicaragua as a part of the Cold War. Historian Wil Pansters explains that US victory in the Cold War was more important to the CIA than the DEA's War on Drugs:[7]
"Since the overriding concern of the CIA was the anti-Sandinista project, it trumped the DEA's task of combating drug trafficking, and covertly incorporated (or pressured) parts of the Mexican state into subservience. Buendía had found out about the CIA-contra-drugs-DFS connection, which seriously questioned Mexican sovereignty, while Camarena learned that the CIA had infiltrated the DEA and sabotaged its work so as to interfere with the clandestine contra-DFS-traffickers network. They knew too much and were eliminated on the orders of the U.S. with Mexican complicity. Later official investigations attempted to limit criminal responsibility to the dirty connections between drug traffickers, secret agents and corrupt police, leaving out the (geo)political ramifications."[7]
In 2019 the United States Department of Justice began reinvestigating Camarena's murder,[8] and in 2020 Amazon Studies released a documentary, The Last Narc,[1,9] supporting the allegations. The CIA has said the allegations are untrue.[8] Camarena biographer Elaine Shannon describes the allegations as "another Deep State conspiracy theory," and interviews other former DEA agents including Jack Lawn, who agree with her.[10]
The references (see above) are [1] 2020 Amazon documentary, [2] 2020 Berrellez book, [3] 2013 Proceso investigative report, [4] 2014 Esquivel book, [5] 2015 Bowden and Malloy investigative report, [6] 2015 Bartley book, [7] 2017 Pansters review, [8] 2018 USA Today article, [9] 2020 Variety article, [10] 2020 Shannon blog post. - Darouet ( talk) 00:11, 16 February 2021 (UTC)
Phil Jordan, Hector Berrellez, Jorge Godoy, Ramon Lira and Rene Lopez (for The Last Narc 2020) support the allegations (from 2013) originally made by Phil Jordan, Hector Berrellez, Jorge Godoy, Ramon Lira and Rene Lopez. :-) I give it up, it's waste of my time. SaintSanti ( talk) 23:33, 19 February 2021 (UTC)
It should be noted somewhere that the conspiracy theory has been given wide currency throughout Latin America ie: This piece from El Salvador: https://diario1.com/zona-1/2014/09/crimen-ordenado-aqui-partio-el-mundo-de-carteles-de-drogas/ fbclid=IwAR1om8fHtXkj8phcMuTieT3BoC_GWUtRAfBDWCHD4xRZaGMIoD989h39l1o
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This article is prohibitionist propaganda, POV to the extreme. The man was sent on a fool's errand, killed, and now he's a propaganda poster. It need cleanup, and a more balanced point of view. If it weren't for drug prohibition, the man would not have been killed by some group of Al Capones like he was. ( 24.68.140.36 ( talk) 22:04, 25 October 2008 (UTC))
It is a well-known fact to any LEO involved with Mexican drug activity that corruption exists, from the lowest rurale right up to the top, in Mexico's government. The U.S. government and U.S. Chamber of Commerce have willingly turned a blind eye to this in their greed for profits at the expense of both the American and Mexican citizens. People like Enrique Camarena, Ignacio Ramos and Jose Campean pay the price for that greed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.11.104.98 ( talk) 17:56, 25 November 2008 (UTC)
Where was he born? Why no one mentions the book "Desperados" —Preceding unsigned comment added by Galindes ( talk • contribs) 10:21, 14 April 2009 (UTC)
--> Update information about this entry. According to recent data, the DEA was responsible for the murder of Camarena (
http://www.proceso.com.mx/?p=355283) — Preceding
unsigned comment added by
62.82.178.50 (
talk) 07:48, 15 October 2013 (UTC)
Can we have some argument to delete these conspiracy theory claims? I followed the link and there just aint nothing to prove any of what it claims, and to put a misbegotten and ridiculous conspiracy theory on the same level as fact seems too much relativism even for wikipedia... and, how do I put this? the unstable comments by the people up above lead me to think they're the ones responsible for this hijacking
thanks - Eli
I think it's important to include the conspiracy theory as it has received wide currency throughout Latin America ie: https://diario1.com/zona-1/2014/09/crimen-ordenado-aqui-partio-el-mundo-de-carteles-de-drogas/?fbclid=IwAR1om8fHtXkj8phcMuTieT3BoC_GWUtRAfBDWCHD4xRZaGMIoD989h39l1o — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jpmcphaul ( talk • contribs) 17:15, 25 February 2024 (UTC)
this article states that: "On 1984, acting on information by Camarena, 450 Mexican soldiers backed by helicopters destroyed a 1000-hectere marijuana plantation known as 'Rancho Búfalo', where more than 3,000 farmers worked these fields,[1] the annual production which was later valued at $8 billion"
how ever, another one thats talking about Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, person who was running Rancho Búfalo, states that "An undercover agent from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, Enrique Camarena managed to infiltrate deep into the drug trafficking organization and had become close to Félix Gallardo. On 1984, acting on information by Camarena, 450 Mexican soldiers backed by helicopters destroyed a 1000-hectere marijuana plantation known as 'Rancho Búfalo', where more than 10,000 farmers worked these fields, the annual production which was later valued at $8 billion."
So witch is it 3,000 or 10,000 theres a huge difference —Preceding unsigned comment added by Uku1234 ( talk • contribs) 19:31, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
Cheers, BatteryIncluded ( talk)
The golf tournament held in honor of Mr. Camarena is held in Miami, not Fresno. There is a tournament in Fresno affiliated with the Camarena Health Center, however that has nothing to do with this individual. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 23.29.4.205 ( talk) 22:44, 16 March 2013 (UTC)
references indicate his nickname was kiki, not kike, regardless of whether this is a feminine name in spanish. any evidence that his nickname was not kiki should be presented first. And, to anyone completely ignorant of this word, kike is a slur against jews, so there better be a good reason (ie better references than the DEA) for replacing this nickname. Mercurywoodrose ( talk) 02:34, 29 October 2010 (UTC)
Enrique Camarena was not a Jew, so I am sure you realize that his nickname was used in a completely different context. Kike is the nickname used for the name Enrique and is a very common nickname in Latin America. Some references to Enrique's nickname being Kike:
Next are some references specific to DEA agent Enrique Camarena Salazar being nicknamed Kike:
Cheers, -- BatteryIncluded ( talk) 01:27, 26 November 2010 (UTC)
A memorial statue of Enrique Camarena sits in the lobby of the public library in Vallejo, California. Why Vallejo?
Georgejdorner ( talk) 22:00, 15 June 2011 (UTC)
WhisperToMe ( talk) 23:45, 2 September 2011 (UTC)
John McPhee "The Gravel Page." The New Yorker 71:46 (29 January 1996), 44ff. McPhee (in one of 3 stories about forensic geology) describes the FBI forensic geologist's work that proved that Camarena's body was not unearthed at the place that the Mexican Federal Police announced when they produced the body. The geologist's ability to locate the actual original burial site (a dozens and dozens of miles away) by analyzing soil clinging to the body for it's mineral content and unique characteristics is fascinating and compelling, and the Police had not counted on this. The evidence, presented by the FBI geologist in court, lead directly to the convictions. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RhyoliteTopaz ( talk • contribs) 05:02, 12 June 2012 (UTC)
Is there any consensus on renaming the article to his given name? It should be enough to mention it (his alleged nickname) in the lede, especially given concerns above concerning the arguably (not that Id be inclined to do so - incidentally the 'spanish version' is a slur in English, to the best of my knowledge) borderline slur in addition to use of diminutive for a murder victim apparently because the gentleman had a spanish sounding name, etc. I'm just not convinced wikipedia is a venue for adding insult to injury, arguably unless someones going to argue this was his cover story for witness protection. We all have our motivations but I'm not seeing any reasonable person needs to see this devolve to the point of childishness. I'd also think Giulio Regeni warrants a mention, if not Wayno Simmons. As well as the other agent(s) relatively recently. What do you think. I'd also think Micheles glorification of violence is relevant at some point, even if it only illustrates the mentality which causes these sorts of problems at the highest levels. I've had all sorts of runins with these guys myself but even I'm unconvinced we have to keep kicking them even after they're dead. Incidentally, what was the deal they refused to name the training center after him but put his name on a golf competition instead? Seriously. Personally I think this guy was set up or scapegoated, if not the witness protection mentioned above. Plus with this 'the CIA did it' I'd think we'd be looking at someone like Wayne Simmons. If he's who I think he is, he's nothing nice when it comes to things like torture. 55378008a ( talk) 18:24, 31 December 2016 (UTC)
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Although Camarena served in the Marines during the Vietnam War era, no reliable sources found as of yet state that he actually served in Vietnam during the war. Accordingly, Category:American military personnel of the Vietnam War was removed from the article. Semper Fi! FieldMarine ( talk) 11:54, 10 December 2018 (UTC)
I've found a host of high-quality academic sources that discuss the role of the CIA in Camarena's killing in detail. The section that we have on this topic should not be a single article from El País, even if that is Spain's flagship newspaper. Here, I'm posting a paragraph from a review of a number of books on the topic. The review is titled "Spies, Assassins, and Statesmen in Mexico’s Cold War", is published in Revista Europea de Estudios Latinoamericanos y del Caribe (Amsterdam Iss. 103, Jan/Jun 2017, pp.143-155) and is written by professor Wil Pansters, head of the Department of Social Sciences of University College Utrecht.
In May 1984, the influential journalist and columnist Manuel Buendía was brutally shot in the back in the centre of Mexico City... In a painstaking investigative process, the authors along with other journalists in Mexico and the U.S. became convinced that the Buendía and Camarena killings were linked, and much of the book is about the Bartleys trying to put the different pieces together. The most important element is that the interests behind both killings go beyond criminal interests and reach into the political domains on both sides of the border. In the mid-1980s, Mexico's one party regime confronted serious challenges, while the Reagan administration was deeply involved in a Cold War battle against the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. Buendía and DEA agent Camarena had each separately discovered that the CIA was running a dark network, which involved Mexican and Central American drug traffickers that imported cocaine into the U.S. and facilitated the movement of arms to the contras. Nicaraguan contras were trained at a Mexican ranch owned by one of the country's most notorious capos. CIA pilots flew many of the planes. The DFS functioned as the go-between, and hence involved the Ministry of the Interior. The Mexican army provided the necessary protection, and got a bite of the pie. Since the overriding concern of the CIA was the anti-Sandinista project, it trumped the DEA's task of combating drug trafficking, and covertly incorporated (or pressured) parts of the Mexican state into subservience. Buendía had found out about the CIA-contra-drugsDFS connection, which seriously questioned Mexican sovereignty, while Camarena learned that the CIA had infiltrated the DEA and sabotaged its work so as to interfere with the clandestine contra-DFS-traffickers network. They knew too much and were eliminated on the orders of the U.S. with Mexican complicity. Later official investigations attempted to limit criminal responsibility to the dirty connections between drug traffickers, secret agents and corrupt police, leaving out the (geo)political ramifications.
The review ends up quoting from "Eclipse of the Assassins. The CIA, Imperial Politics, and the Slaying of Mexican Journalist Manuel Buendía," by Russell H. Bartley and Sylvia Erickson Bartley. University of Wisconsin Press, 2015. That book concludes,
The preponderance of evidence... persuades us beyond any reasonable doubt that Manuel Buendía was slain on behalf of the United States because of what he had learned about U.S.-Mexico collusion with narcotics traffickers, international arms dealers, and other governments in support of Reagan administration efforts to overthrow the Sandinista government of Nicaragua. Camarena was... killed for the same reason.
I'll work to expand this section in the coming weeks. - Darouet ( talk) 21:16, 30 January 2019 (UTC)
On the issue of sourcing, I found this 2013 article by Steven Dudley and Michael Lohmuller of InSight Crime that came out shortly after the Fox News and Proceso reports. (Per the renowned Wilson Center: "InSight Crime, a joint initiative of American University in Washington, D.C., and the Foundation InSight Crime in Medellin, Colombia, which monitors, analyzes and investigates organized crime in the Americas" and Dudley is one of its co-founders.) A few snippets:
The story connecting Mexico’s infamous Guadalajara Cartel to the United States’ top spy agency in the 1980s is not fiction, even if the assertion that the agency helped kill a US drug agent probably is.
There is, however, little documentation to back up the claims of CIA involvement [in the death of Camarena] and the statements of the sources [i.e. Jordan, Berrellez, and Plumlee] are not all rock solid.
And while the story is still percolating via Proceso, it has not picked up momentum in the United States for reasons that are clear: it is still thin.
During his trial, neither [Matta Ballesteros] nor his lawyers ever raised the CIA’s possible connections to the cartel or the agency’s possible role in the murder of Camarena. Matta Ballesteros was eventually sentenced to multiple life sentences in a US prison where he remains to this day. So, conspiracy theories aside, the record shows an indirect connection between the CIA and the Guadalajara Cartel via Matta Ballesteros and possibly a more direct connection via the Mexican police. However, the assertion that the CIA presided over the murder of a DEA agent seems — with the documents that are publicly available now at least — more conspiracy theory than reality.
So, there is that for reference. - Location ( talk) 20:59, 5 August 2020 (UTC)
For future reference, I found this link to "Brought to Justice: Operation Leyenda" in the DEA Museum Lecture Series, October 29, 2013; the transcript is here. The panelists include "Former Administrator Jack Lawn, who led DEA during Operation Leyenda, retired Special Agent Jack Taylor, the Inspector in Charge of the Camarena kidnap/murder case in Los Angeles, and journalist Elaine Shannon whose research into the Camarena case resulted in the book Desperados, the basis of the NBC TV miniseries Drug Wars: the Camarena Story." On pages 39 to 41, the panel addresses a question submitted by a retired DEA agent:
There has been much recently said in the press that the CIA bears some responsibility for the murder of Special Agent Camarena. That it was linked in some way to the Iran Contra scandal. These claims come from former DEA Special Agents who claim they had a leadership role in the murder investigation. Please comment on these claims.
Without mentioning Berrellez or Jordan by name, Jack Lawn replies:
As a youth I read Aesop's Fables. This - this is another fable not worthy of individuals who would serve in DEA. Anyone who uh, knows who we are knows this investigation, and should know that when it came to our finding out what happened in this case, it was the CIA who told us about the tapes. It was indeed the CIA who came at one point and said, we are so proud of what you did in the case of Kiki Camarena. And, we hope that our organization would do like things if something happened to us. Our, cooperation - our coordination with CIA, in this case has always been above board. In drug cases as I recall uh, so uh, I - I feel it unfortunate that two of our former agents who had come to that conclusion, where, as I understand it, has no basis in fact.
Jack Taylor then states:
There was - there was - during my tenure investigating this case there was absolutely zero evidence of any involvement with the CIA uh, complicit with Camarena's death.
Elaine Shannon responds to Taylor's comment:
But, if I may follow up, the CIA did have a relationship with the DFS. Uh, this relationship uh, may not have included advance knowledge that somebody was going to kidnap and kill a DEA agent. What do you think, Jack?
Taylor replies:
I don't believe the CIA had advance knowledge, because their personnel is also in jeopardy in countries throughout the world. But, Elaine is absolutely right. When I - I talked about the interstate transportation of stolen motor vehicles with the DFS. Uh, the DFS, at least in that investigation, was working in Mexico with the CIA. They are counterparts in a number of investigations. Uh, but again, because uh, CIA also doesn't work with angels in the gathering of information, their working with the DFS is not surprising. Their mission there is to gather intelligence. And, if they can gather intelligence from corrupt people like DFS, they'll certainly do that. But, again, I would be shocked to learn at some point in the future, that CIA had advance knowledge of the taking of Camarena, and did not pass that information on. They were most cooperative during the investigation. They're good partners with us internationally. And, I think it's - it's shameful that anyone would draw them into this - this investigation at this point.
If the claims or Berrellez or Jordan are inserted into the article, then some part of their superiors' views of those claims should be provided, too. - Location ( talk) 15:40, 11 August 2020 (UTC)
I have started looking at Russell Bartley's book "Eclipse of the Assassins," mentioned in the section above. It will take quite a while to go through it, but it is already worth noting that Bartley lists Tosh Plumlee as a source. Plumlee was also a source for the 2013 Fox news story on CIA involvement in the Camarena kidnapping and murder, and was very likely a source for J. Jesus Esquivel's Spanish language book on the Camarena case (La CIA, Camarena y Caro Quintero: La historia secreta). Unfortunately, Plumlee is not a reliable source. He is best known for his claim to have worked with Mafioso Johnny Roselli as part of a CIA attempt to stop the assassination of JFK (see here). I don't yet know how central he is to Bartley's book, but I would not be in a rush to cite "Eclipse" in the article. Rgr09 ( talk) 15:02, 13 February 2019 (UTC)
@ Darouet: @ Rgr09: Speaking of stuff, we could make a Wikipedia article on the book itself. As per Wikipedia:Notability (books) a book may have an article if there are at least two or more independent secondary sources, which includes book reviews. Use the book reviews as sources and link to them, and it will be easy for the public and fellow Wikipedians to consult the book's reputation. WhisperToMe ( talk) 01:57, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
Jaydoggmarco, Darouet, Ringerfan23, and Classified20, please reach a consensus on the talk page (or a noticeboard) about the desired contents of the article, especially related to the section on the CIA's involvement. Feel free to ping me or any other admin before the 3 days' protection is up if there's a consensus and the article can be unprotected. Enterprisey ( talk!) 00:21, 15 May 2020 (UTC)
@ Jaydoggmarco: Would you be willing to participate in a "dispute resolution" process, Wikipedia:Dispute resolution? An experienced editor would mediate between our concerns to help us arrive at an agreement. @ Enterprisey: Last time this was an issue I went to WP:BLPN, where Nomoskedasticity was the only editor to comment and suggested I just add the content. Having gotten a favorable response there but with Jaydoggmarco adamant that Camarena sources are fringe, I guess I'll try WP:RSN now. - Darouet ( talk) 13:02, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
Comment from an otherwise uninvolved editor: I agree with Jaydoggmarco and Rgr09 on this. Any source that relies on Tosh Plumlee (claims to have been in Dealey Plaza during JFK assassination) or Richard Brenneke (known fabricator for claims about October Surprise conspiracy theory) should be treated with extreme skepticism. - Location ( talk) 08:35, 23 July 2020 (UTC)
References
Here's another peer-reviewed source we might consider: [17]. Relevant passage:
Fourth, the transformations discussed above acquired additional significance in 1985 when corrupt drug trafficking law enforcement relations led to the kidnapping and murder of DEA agent Enrique ´Kiki´ Camarena and his Mexican pilot Alfredo Zavala. The incident ushered in a new and prolonged phase of US pressure on Mexican authorities. The Camarena affair constituted a turning point in the recent history of state-crime governance in Mexico, as it brought to light the complicity between drug traffickers and the Dirección Federal de Seguridad (DFS), which enjoyed the support of or worked on behalf of the CIA.
Nomoskedasticity (
talk) 13:21, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
Year of high school graduation should be 1966 according to the source. Chrose1 ( talk) 08:56, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
There seems to be a split in views on the sources appropriate for the article. I suggest discussing some of the content that is getting inserted and removed so rapidly in the article. I hope we can come to a consensus on at least some of that material and get back to a more stable article. Please leave the disputed content up somewhere so that we can discuss it, I don't care where. Here is my list of things I would like to discuss about it. Since this is mostly Darouet's material, I hope D. could respond.
This is not right. The USA Today article (Updated 4:27 a.m. TST Feb. 29, 2020) says "former Mexican police officers Ramon Lira, Rene Lopez and George Godoy, who had worked as security guards for cartel kingpins spoke with USA TODAY and recounted that they told investigators a DEA official and a CIA operative were present at meetings where Camarena’s abduction was discussed." So this needs fixing if it is to stay. I hope there is consensus on that. Note that these were not police officers investigating Camarena's murder, they were police hired by the traffickers as gunmen.
First, who are the former cia agents (plural)? This is not answered anywhere in the article. Please explain and give a source so I can check it. Second, who are the Mexican journalists (plural)? They are not cited anywhere in the article. Please explain and give a source so I can check it. Third, who are the historians? are you referring to the Bartleys? Or do you include others? Do you include Panster in this group? If so, please cite where Panster explicitly says that he believes that Camarena was killed with the complicity of the CIA because etc. Fourth, who are the witnesses that say they believe Camarena was killed with the complicity of the CIA because etc. What were they witnesses to? Is this an opinion, or did they see or hear someone do or say something. Look forward to a careful, thorough discussion Rgr09 ( talk) 02:43, 6 August 2020 (UTC).
In a painstaking investigative process, the authors along with other journalists in Mexico and the U.S. became convinced that the Buendía and Camarena killings were linked, and much of the book is about the Bartleys trying to put the different pieces together. The most important element is that the interests behind both killings go beyond criminal interests and reach into the political domains on both sides of the border. In the mid-1980s, Mexico’s one party regime confronted serious challenges, while the Reagan administration was deeply involved in a Cold War battle against the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. Buendía and DEA agent Camarena had each separately discovered that the CIA was running a dark network, which involved Mexican and Central American drug traffickers that imported cocaine into the U.S. and facilitated the movement of arms to the contras. Nicaraguan contras were trained at a Mexican ranch owned by one of the country’s most notorious capos. CIA pilots flew many of the planes. The DFS functioned as the go-between, and hence involved the Ministry of the Interior. The Mexican army provided the necessary protection, and got a bite of the pie. Since the overriding concern of the CIA was the anti-Sandinista project, it trumped the DEA’s task of combating drug trafficking, and covertly incorporated (or pressured) parts of the Mexican state into subservience. Buendía had found out about the CIA-contra-drugsDFS connection, which seriously questioned Mexican sovereignty, while Camarena learned that the CIA had infiltrated the DEA and sabotaged its work so as to interfere with the clandestine contra-DFS-traffickers network. They knew too much and were eliminated on the orders of the U.S. with Mexican complicity.
The second half of the book uncovers the authors' proposed motive for the Buendía assassination: his knowledge of Mexico's connection to the Iran-Contra affair. According to the authors, Buendía learned that the Mexican government was aiding the CIA in its proxy war against Nicaragua's leftist government. Specifically, the CIA used a Veracruz airfield to transport weapons to the Nicaraguan Contras, and at the same time the agency trained Contras on the ranch of Guadalajara Cartel kingpin Rafael Caro Quintero. Bartley and Bartley find confirmation for these claims in US court case files, which include statements by ex-CIA and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents asserting that such operations involved the knowing collaboration of Mexican politicians, the DFS, drug traffickers, and the CIA, among others. Using these testimonies, which come from the trial for the 1985 murder of undercover DEA agent Enrique Camarena, the authors hypothesize that the United States played a role in the Buendía and Camarena murders to prevent the so-called “Veracruz link” from surfacing (p. 195). The evidence for US involvement is compelling but, as Bartley and Bartley acknowledge, circumstantial (p. 394).
"In a painstaking investigative process, the authors [Bartley and Bartley] along with other journalists in Mexico and the U.S. became convinced that the Buendía and Camarena killings were linked."Therefore ascribing this merely to Proceso is wrong. 4 Witnesses) The USA Today article [43] names three witnesses, but does not state that the named witnesses are all the witnesses described by the sentence,
"U.S. Justice Department agents and prosecutors obtained statements from witnesses implicating a Central Intelligence Agency operative and a DEA official in the plot to torture and murder Camarena, according to the witnesses, Camarena’s widow and others familiar with the case who were interviewed by USA TODAY."The LA Weekly [44] writes that
"Twenty-three informants from Operation Leyenda were murdered while Berrellez was supervisor or shortly thereafter. Nevertheless, he managed to bring over to the United States as many as 200 informants and place them in witness protection, quarantined from one another — indeed, unaware of who was in this country — as a precaution to prevent them from comparing notes. Ten of the informants were eyewitnesses to the kidnapping and murder of Kiki Camarena."5 Felix Rodriguez) I didn't say witnesses observed CIA agent Rodriguez involved in planning the abduction and torture (really, interrogation): that's what was reported by the Bartleys and journalists. 6 Historians) Yes, historians refers to the Bartleys, Pansters and Freije.
"the claim that Harrison was a CIA asset is basically unsourced in Bartley,"so that any conclusions that involve Harrison may also be suspect. However, Harrison describes himself as an employee of the CIA [45], and Pansters repeats this claim in his own voice [46]. c Rodriguez/CIA You write that Rodriguez was not seen torturing Rodriguez, merely interrogating him while he was tortured. You also write that Rodriguez might not have represented the CIA, and so any claim that the CIA was involved in Camarena's death because Rodriguez was is flawed. In response I must say that from the naive perspective of a biologist who has never been involved in torture, the moral distinction between interrogation and torture while torture is ongoing escapes me. I'll also note that in every one of the sources we're discussing, the authors very prominently state that the evidence indicates CIA involvement in Camarena's death, whether they discuss Rodriguez or not. That is, statements being made here rely upon exact phrases taken from reliable sources, not and not upon reading into Rodriguez's specific role. Lastly, you write that a lead sentence implicating the CIA d Cartel finances) implies that Camarena was not killed because of his impact on the finances of the cartels. In response, I'd just say that I don't think the text implies any such thing. And I think any educated historian / journalist / reader would understand that the CIA and cartels could theoretically both collaborate to kill a DEA agent for their own reasons. - Darouet ( talk) 16:33, 9 August 2020 (UTC)
I'm going to jump in here. Various versions of the lede have stated that "CIA agents" have claimed that Camarena was killed with the complicity of the CIA. There are various issues with this. First of all, the meaning of "CIA agent" is vague and I would think professional historians and journalists would be a bit more careful using the term. Robert "Tosh" Plumlee has claimed in various places that he was an employee of the CIA (i.e. a CIA officer) and as far as I can tell, Lawrence Victor Harrison did not make that same claim. Darouet cited the LA Weekly's interview of Hector Berrellez in writing "Harrison describes himself as an employee of the CIA". This is what the LA Weekly article states:
Harrison may have described himself as an employee of the CIA at some point in time, but the LA Weekly article only indicates that Berrellez said Harrison made that claim. In 1990, Harrison was reported to be a DEA informant who claimed he trained Guatemalan guerrillas at Rafael Caro Quintero's ranch. This AP report is in line with other news accounts of the time reporting on his testimony:
You would think that if Harrison claimed to be a "CIA agent", that would make it in to the story. (By the way, the AP report also states: "'The whole story is nonsense,' [CIA] spokesman Mark Mansfield said. 'We have not trained Guatemalan guerrillas on that ranch or anywhere else.'") So, on the point of whether Harrison was a "CIA agent" are we to believe Bartley and Bartley who are relying on Berrellez's claim (Pansters is clearly citing Bartley and Bartley), or are we to believe Harrison himself? And on the point of whether Tosh Plumlee was a "CIA agent" are we to believe Bartley and Bartley who are relying on Plumlee's claims, or are we to believe the SPLC who wrote:
I am curious to see suggestions on how to resolve these statements in sources that are quite divergent. - Location ( talk) 18:57, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
"disillusioned former CIA spy, Lawrence Victor Harrison"), a point repeated by Pansters in his 2017 review [48]
"a former CIA agent, Lawrence Victor Harrison", and Harrison tells journalists he was in the CIA too ( 2015 story)
"Harrison told his story. He said he was a CIA agent who was trained in Virginia."It's also repeated by Chuck Bowden in his 2015 piece [49]:
"It is a simple arrangement: He is a CIA operative embedded in DFS and assigned by DFS to assist and guard major drug people in Guadalajara."
Q: You indicated that it was learned by certain colleagues that Mr. Buendía had obtained information on certain members of the PRI who were assisting the CIA with arms smuggling and knew of the CIA link to narcotics traffickers. That is what is reported here.
A: Yes, Sir.
Q: Is that an accurate statement of what you told the agents?
A: Yes, that is an accurate statement of what I described to the agent.
Q: Could you tell us where you learned that information?
A: Also as part of the investigation that I told you I had made. I was relating to the agent the facts that I had uncovered, or the suppositions or the rumors that I uncovered, in support of this hypothesis only.
Q: Did you speak to any members of the American intelligence community in connection with your investigation?
A: I don’t know if I did or not.
Q: So you may have?
A: Anything is possible, Sir.
Q: Have you ever had any formal relationship with any American intelligence agency in Mexico?
A: Formal relationship? No, I haven’t.
Q: How about an informal relationship?
A: I don’t think so.
Q: Do you know where the CIA office was in Guadalajara, for example?
A: I have no idea. I don’t know if there was an office there.
"I was instructed to sit up there [on the witness stand] and act like a clown! They laid a mine field for me and I didn’t want to step on any mines. They told me to lie!"
Of more serious concern to executive branch spin strategists was a front-page, four column, 2,600-word illustrated feature article that appeared in the Washington Post the day Judge Rafeedie turned the trial over to the jury for deliberation. Written by Post foreign service reporter William Branigin and datelined Mexico City, the article focused on friction between the DEA and CIA around the Camarena case and, in effect, lent credence to Harrison’s testimony about CIA collusion with Mexican narcotics traffickers. “The trial in Los Angeles of four men accused of involvement in the 1985 murder of a U.S. narcotics agent,” read Branigin’s lead paragraph, “has brought to the surface years of resentment by Drug Enforcement Administration officials of the Central Intelligence Agency’s long collaboration with a former Mexican secret police unit [DFS] that was heavily involved in drug trafficking.”
I have caught up with comments from Darouet and Location on the talk page. My response follows, sorry for the delay. Anything else from me will take at least a week, sorry about that too. I will abide by any consensus reached in my absence, no problemo.
At this point I have to agree with Darouet. It's clear we aren't going to reach a consensus so we should launch an RfC to get outside opinions. Classified20 ( talk) 06:19, 28 August 2020 (UTC)
@ Rgr09: in response to your comments above, you state that all of the information connecting the Camarena case to the CIA and the contras comes from three people, "BJP." However, there are in fact three former DEA agents who have testified to this connection, two former CIA agents, multiple witnesses to Camarena's death who state that they worked for the cartels. Then we have five academics who are experts on Latin American drugs and politics who based on this testimony and their own expertise and research takes these claims seriously, and conclude they're almost certainly correct. Then in addition to this we have a host of newspaper reporters from outlets in the US and Mexico who report on this, some of whom describe years of work on the topic, and also take the allegations very seriously. And last but not least, the Justice Department has reopened their case on the matter. I'm not sure how we're supposed to weight academia and journalism versus your speculations here. - Darouet ( talk) 22:22, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
Harrison, Lawrence Victor—cover name assumed by George Marshall Davis (q.v.) when he was given a new identity by the CIA in the mid-1960s; served as a CIA “illegal” (deep-cover agent) in Mexico; has personal knowledge of the Manuel Buendía assassination, as well as agency collusion with Mexican drug traffickers and government officials in support of the Nicaraguan contras.
A crucial step in getting to this conclusion was the authors’ engagement with a former CIA agent, Lawrence Victor Harrison, who for a long time had worked under deep cover in the Mexican netherworld of the DFS, drug trafficking and political repression. He later became disenchanted with the agency and in conversations with the authors eventually spilled the beans about the relationships between organized crime, security agencies, law enforcement, and political interests in Washington, Mexico, and beyond. In his mind Buendía was murdered on the orders of the architect of the Iran-contra network, Oliver North (p. 331)!
The authors unearth new evidence of US intelligence assistance in Mexico’s dirty war. According to their interviews with disaffected ex-CIA agent Lawrence Victor Harrison, CIA operatives helped identify leftist “dissidents” and reported directly to Mexican intelligence officers such as Miguel Nazar Haro, notorious for ordering tortures and disappearances (p. 314).
Lawrence Harrison comes up to the U.S. in September 1989. In his initial debriefing, he explains that he holds a rank in DFS. He had handled all the communications for the drug leaders in Guadalajara — Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo, Rafael Caro Quintero, Miguel Félix Gallardo, and El Cochiloco. He says he attended classes at the University of California at Berkeley but was not officially enrolled and he also attended some classes in the law school there. Then, in 1968, he is recruited by the CIA, trained, and sent to Mexico... It is a simple arrangement: He is a CIA operative embedded in DFS and assigned by DFS to assist and guard major drug people in Guadalajara.
Once in the safety of Berrellez's office in L.A., Harrison told his story. He said he was a CIA agent who was trained in Virginia and assigned to pose as an English instructor at the Autonomous University of Guadalajara.
I wish people would stop adding AND deleting material under discussion. It is driving me nuts. Rgr09 ( talk) 06:41, 7 August 2020 (UTC)
Responding to Hipal's request, here is a list of references for the article with a dissatisfied note at the beginning. Unless stated, I have read the material cited.
The article is putatively about Enrique Camarena. It is radically truncated, with a few details of Camarena's life, a couple of sentences about his work, a confused account of his kidnap/murder, and omits most of the murder investigation in Mexico and America. It also omits most of the lengthy judicial process in both Mexico and the U.S. I regret that so much time has been spent on the talk page over what I think are marginal claims which have been poorly documented and presented, while central events and issues in Camarena's life and murder case are ignored.
Much of what I think is key content for the article can be supplied from two books I recently added to the article's reference section: Elaine Shannon's Desperados and James Kuykendall's O Plato O Plomo. I will not discuss them here. Other sources for key content include newspaper articles from the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and Washington Post. I would not dispute the inclusion of articles from these sources as long as they are relevant, properly sourced and accurately cited.
The dispute in the article is whether to include claims made by various people since 2013. Here are sources for some of these claims.
There are two reviews of Eclipse in academic journals:
There are also journalistic sources for some of the claims. These include:
I think these are the main references in the discussion on the talk page.
For those who have not yet seen Darouet's disputed addition to the article, I think the most recent version of it was here Rgr09 ( talk) 07:18, 27 August 2020 (UTC)
In 1985, a murky alliance of Mexican drug lords and government officials tortured and killed a DEA agent named Enrique Camarena. In a three-part series, Blood on the Corn, legendary journalist Charles Bowden finally digs into the terrible mystery behind a hero’s murder — his final story.
"extremely seriously", and also point out that arguments opposing inclusion are based almost wholly on WP:OR. Because your close so wholly disregards both the policy-based arguments and the overwhelming majority of editors here, I'm going to challenge your close at WP:AN, per policy. I'm informing you here first, as you've requested. - Darouet ( talk) 16:32, 22 December 2020 (UTC)
Should we include a section on possible CIA participation in Camarena's interrogation, and his case more broadly, using this text at least, [62] and based on these sources? - Darouet ( talk) 22:40, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
Academic
Newspaper articles
Reopened Justice Department Investigation
- Darouet ( talk) 22:40, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
"At least five academics have described CIA involvement as likely in this case"cannot be taken at face value. In fact, Darouet has just one academic source for this claim (Bartley & Bartley 2015), along with two book reviews that merely summarize it, noting that Bartley & Bartley rely on
"circumstantial"evidence to connect the CIA to Camarena's murder. Darouet argues that since the reviewers (Pansters and Freije) are mostly favorable, and do not expressly set out to disprove any of the content in Bartley & Bartley, that means they are additional sources independently corroborating Bartley & Bartley's findings. However, as Rgr09 has noted ( [70], [71], [72]), that is not entirely clear from the text of the reviews and the vast majority of the content in Bartley & Bartley is about the life of Mexican journalist Manuel Buendía, with much of the contentious material about the CIA and Camarena being relegated to a brief ~30 page epilogue in a book that Darouet himself states ( [73]) is
"around 500 pages long"and difficult to read in its entirety. I was very curious about Darouet's reference to Marshall 1991 as a "fifth" academic source that has
"described CIA involvement as likely in [Camarena's murder],"especially because it never seems to have come up in the preceding discussions (unless I'm missing something), yet now Darouet has conceded ( [74]) that
"Marshall does not write that Camarena was killed with CIA complicity."I do not think that anyone should support Darouet's proposed addition on the pretense that he has marshaled an array of academic historians representing a broad scholarly consensus in the field of contemporary Latin American history when he really just has a single academic source from a few years ago, that is under-reviewed and contains controversial findings that have not been proven or independently confirmed either by other academics or any of the legal trials involving this incident. None of this is to say that Bartley & Bartley 2015 is not a reliable source with attribution (despite its undisputed shortcomings) or not DUE for at least a short paragraph in this article, but if Darouet wants an RfC to effectively "vote" on his preferred version rather than drafting a consensus version in collaboration with Rgr09, then my inclination is to say no—primarily because of Darouet's tendency to overstatement. TheTimesAreAChanging ( talk) 02:29, 10 September 2020 (UTC)
There are so many sources on this topic, and yet none are in the article: this issue needs wider input from across the encyclopedia. I'll admit, I had never even read on Camarena until the last year. But I'm shocked that literally every reliable source from academia, and from recent newspaper reports on this topic, is being systematically removed from the article. Why is that happening? When I asked for comment previously at WP:RSN, the only uninvolved editors who commented [75], Horse Eye Jack and Nomoskedasticity, said that it should be fine to use this material with attribution. That advice has had no impact on this page however. - Darouet ( talk) 22:40, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
Harrison, Lawrence Victor—cover name assumed by George Marshall Davis (q.v.) when he was given a new identity by the CIA in the mid-1960s; served as a CIA “illegal” (deep-cover agent) in Mexico; has personal knowledge of the Manuel Buendía assassination, as well as agency collusion with Mexican drug traffickers and government officials in support of the Nicaraguan contras.
A crucial step in getting to this conclusion was the authors’ engagement with a former CIA agent, Lawrence Victor Harrison, who for a long time had worked under deep cover in the Mexican netherworld of the DFS, drug trafficking and political repression. He later became disenchanted with the agency and in conversations with the authors eventually spilled the beans about the relationships between organized crime, security agencies, law enforcement, and political interests in Washington, Mexico, and beyond. In his mind Buendía was murdered on the orders of the architect of the Iran-contra network, Oliver North (p. 331)!
The authors unearth new evidence of US intelligence assistance in Mexico’s dirty war. According to their interviews with disaffected ex-CIA agent Lawrence Victor Harrison, CIA operatives helped identify leftist “dissidents” and reported directly to Mexican intelligence officers such as Miguel Nazar Haro, notorious for ordering tortures and disappearances (p. 314).
Lawrence Harrison comes up to the U.S. in September 1989. In his initial debriefing, he explains that he holds a rank in DFS. He had handled all the communications for the drug leaders in Guadalajara — Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo, Rafael Caro Quintero, Miguel Félix Gallardo, and El Cochiloco. He says he attended classes at the University of California at Berkeley but was not officially enrolled and he also attended some classes in the law school there. Then, in 1968, he is recruited by the CIA, trained, and sent to Mexico... It is a simple arrangement: He is a CIA operative embedded in DFS and assigned by DFS to assist and guard major drug people in Guadalajara.
Once in the safety of Berrellez's office in L.A., Harrison told his story. He said he was a CIA agent who was trained in Virginia and assigned to pose as an English instructor at the Autonomous University of Guadalajara.
I am shocked that Darouet is shocked that his additions to article have not been generally accepted. I wrote earlier that I did not have time to discuss the article in detail, but that I had doubts about his sources. I was not in his rsn discussion because I had no time. Now I do. Wikipedia is full of this sort of back and forth, I have felt frustrated over it myself, but that is the way WP has evolved.
I first have some comments on the book by Bartley and Bartley. The full title is Eclipse of the assassins : the CIA, imperial politics, and the slaying of Mexican journalist Manuel Buendia. The subject of this book is the murder of Buendia. Its focus is Buendia's life and career, including his early biography, his later career, the political and historical background, Buendia's political views and roles, and, in detail, the investigation of his murder and the prosecution of the men accused of killing him. For Camarena, on the other hand, the book has no personal details, no discussion of his career, no discussion of DEA either in general or in Mexico, no discussion of drug traffickers or trafficking in general or in Mexico, no discussion of the circumstances of Camarena's murder, no discussion of the investigation of Camarena's murder in Mexico or in America, except as it relates to Lawrence Harrison, no discussion of the legal proceedings over the murder in Mexico or America except as it relates to Harrison. Harrison provides B & B with grounds to claim that CIA was involved in Buendia's murder. In fact, Harrison says Buendia was killed at the behest of Oliver North (p. 394). B & B are not interested in Camarena. The sole exception to this lack of matters relevant to Camarenais in the "Epilogue" section of the book, about 30 pages where the Bartleys discuss the 2013 claims of BJP. The main focus of this discussion is on whether the accusations fit in with their views of Lawrence Harrison. In other words, the book is barely relevant to Camarena at all, except for the 2013 BJP claims, which should not, at this stage, have a central or even peripheral position in the article. Rgr09 ( talk) 01:13, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
"not interested in Camarena,"and for a book that is
"barely relevant to Camarena at all."The book situates both the Camarena and Buendia murders in the context of international politics, which is what you'd expect from historians, and hope for in a Wikipedia article.
The preponderance of evidence now available in the public record, confirmed and further nuanced by our own cited sources and most especially by Lawrence Victor Harrison, persuades us beyond a reasonable doubt that Manuel Buendía was slain on behalf of the United States because of what he had learned about U.S.-Mexico collusion with narcotics traffickers, international arms dealers, and other governments in support of Reagan administration efforts to overthrow the Sandinista government of Nicaragua. The evidence we have developed also leads us to conclude that DEA S/A Enrique Camarena Salazar was abducted, interrogated, and killed for the same reason and that the two cases are therefore related. The import of this latter conclusion is that, contrary to the hero status accorded Camarena as an ostensible casualty of the "war on drugs," he was sacrificed by his own government in order to prevent exposure of a covert operation against the legitimate authorities of another country.
I also have some comments on the reception of “Eclipse” Who are the five academics? Russel and Sylvia Bartley, Pansters, Freije, and who else? Darouet writes “at least five academics have described CIA involvement as likely in this case.” Freije mentions Camarena only once in her review. “Using [testimonies] which come from the trial for the 1985 murder of undercover DEA agent Enrique Camarena, the authors hypothesize that the United States played a role in the Buendia and Camarena murders to prevent the so-called “Veracruz link” from surfacing (p. 195). The evidence for US involvement is compelling but, as Bartley and Bartley acknowledge, Circumstantial (p. 394).” The use of hypothesize and circumstantial contradicts Darouet’s claim that Freije described CIA involvement as likely. The description of Camarena as an undercover agent shows that Freije was not familiar with the Camarena case. Rgr09 ( talk) 02:57, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
The preponderance of evidence... persuades us beyond a reasonable doubt that Manuel Buendía was slain on behalf of the United States because of what he had learned about U.S.-Mexico collusion with narcotics traffickers, international arms dealers, and other governments in support of Reagan administration efforts to overthrow the Sandinista government of Nicaragua. The evidence we have developed also leads us to conclude that DEA S/A Enrique Camarena Salazar was abducted, interrogated, and killed for the same reason.
Since the overriding concern of the CIA was the anti-Sandinista project, it trumped the DEA's task of combating drug trafficking, and covertly incorporated (or pressured) parts of the Mexican state into subservience. Buendía had found out about the CIA-contra-drugs-DFS connection, which seriously questioned Mexican sovereignty, while Camarena learned that the CIA had infiltrated the DEA and sabotaged its work so as to interfere with the clandestine contra-DFS-traffickers network. They knew too much and were eliminated on the orders of the U.S. with Mexican complicity. Later official investigations attempted to limit criminal responsibility to the dirty connections between drug traffickers, secret agents and corrupt police, leaving out the (geo)political ramifications.
The Camarena affair constituted a turning point in the recent history of state-crime governance in Mexico, as it brought to light the complicity between drug traffickers and the Dirección Federal de Seguridad (DFS), which enjoyed the support of or worked on behalf of the CIA.
The product of [The Bartleys'] research, Eclipse of the Assassins, suggests that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the DFS, and high-ranking Mexican politicians collaborated to murder Buendía... The second half of the book uncovers the authors’ proposed motive for the Buendía assassination: his knowledge of Mexico’s connection to the Iran-Contra affair. According to the authors, Buendía learned that the Mexican government was aiding the CIA in its proxy war against Nicaragua’s leftist government. Specifically, the CIA used a Veracruz airfield to transport weapons to the Nicaraguan Contras, and at the same time the agency trained Contras on the ranch of Guadalajara Cartel kingpin Rafael Caro Quintero. Bartley and Bartley find confirmation for these claims in US court case files, which include statements by ex-CIA and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) agents asserting that such operations involved the knowing collaboration of Mexican politicians, the DFS, drug traffickers, and the CIA, among others. Using these testimonies, which come from the trial for the 1985 murder of undercover DEA agent Enrique Camarena, the authors hypothesize that the United States played a role in the Buendía and Camarena murders to prevent the so-called “Veracruz link” from surfacing (p. 195). The evidence for US involvement is compelling but, as Bartley and Bartley acknowledge, circumstantial (p. 394).... Eclipse of the Assassins offers important insights into Mexico’s dirty war and the US-Mexican relationship during the late Cold War... Bartley and Bartley have uncovered a chilling transborder history of government collusion to silence criticism and subvert dissidents.
One more comment. First, in defense of my doubts on Plumlee. This is not unique to me; as noted above, doubt is shared by Vincent Bugliosi who writes in Reclaiming History that Plumlee is "a fraud so pathetic that he is an insult to those who make their living by fraudulent means." I have defended my views on Harrison and Bartley's evaluation of him above, read it if you want. Finally, I disagree that I have put anything into the article remotely resembling original research. I have read three books: Shannon, Kuykendall, and Bartley-Bartley. I have read all of the content of these books and looked at the notes and checked some, though not all, quotes. I have looked at some legal documents on the Camarena case, but I have not put these in the article. This may be research, but I believe its the kind of research that WP requires, not proscribes. Rgr09 ( talk) 03:59, 9 September 2020 (UTC)
The use of hypothesize and circumstantial contradicts Darouet’s claim that Freije described CIA involvement as likely. This is absurd and wildly confused sophistry: the words do nothing of the sort, and any competent reader can recognize that. "Hypothesize" means they draw by inductive reasoning the conclusion mentioned, it is a statement of fact about the content of the book and implies no value judgement about the merits of the(ir) reasoning. The word circumstantial means that the evidence requires a logical step of reasoning; again it makes no value judgement about the merits of the reasoning. The Bartleys state that the evidence is of this type. The word in the relevant section of the review which does make a value judgement is "compelling", meaning "Not able to be refuted; inspiring conviction" (OED), or "convincing" (M-W). Cambial Yellowing ❧ 00:40, 15 September 2020 (UTC)
I added the official denials on this to the Felix Rodriguez article....it might be a good idea to use them here as well. Not sure how to address the problem of Plumlee's (obvious) credibility issues. He doesn't have a wiki article and inserting those issues might be awkward (since they are tangential to this particular one). Rja13ww33 ( talk) 22:43, 16 September 2020 (UTC)
I've not looked for better references yet, but the content being edit-warred over looks grossly undue at best. [92]. Maybe if we can find some high-quality, independent sources about it, but that New York Post article is not. -- Hipal/Ronz ( talk) 23:33, 8 September 2020 (UTC)
References
Hi, I see past discussion about murder of Camarena. This is transcript of proceedings from late '80s/90s (Camarena case, court in Los Angeles): http://www.reneverdugo.org/pdf/ Maybe it will help you.
There are official testimonies of men like Harrison, Berrellez, Godoy, Lopez and many, many other people. If you compare their testimonies with their words from The Last Narc (and other interviews), you will see the huge differences. Not only in big cases like 'corrupt Kuykendall', but also in small things like 'how Berrellez found Harrison':
In november 2020, Berrellez told at one interview that he talked with Harrison in Mexico. Harrison agreed with cooperation, but then he disappeared, so Berrellez was looking for him for one year and he finally found him in Mexico's mountains. In reality, as you can see in those transcripts, Harrison talked with Berrellez for the first time in California, when he was already recruited by Mexicans working for DEA.
At these transcripts, you can also find there that one of the witnesses told that he was imprisoned because he didn't lie, how Berrellez wants. Berrellez visited him in jail and told him that if he doesn't tell the court what he wants, he will never see his family again.
There were many doubts about credibility of all Berrellez's witnesses. Except one. There was only one Berrellez's witness, who was seen as trustworthy - Hector Cervantes Santos. And this is what Cerventes told few years later: https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1998-jan-17-mn-9150-story.html
If you have time, you can read those transcripts. You will see that nobody ever said any single word about Kuykendall's or CIA involvement in murder of Camarena. Moreover, except Berrellez's witnesses, nobody ever said anything about alleged meetings prior kidnap of Camarena (between Mexico's politicians and Guadalajara Cartel). And even those Berrellez's witnesses sometimes denied themselves. Btw, as a bodyguards of drug traffickers, they used to made less than $50/mo. But when Berrellez recruited them, they were all paid $3,000/mo by DEA.
I was able to read maybe 10% of all material, so I don't know everyhing from that. Anyway, good start for you can be "Related Cases" > "Zuno Arce" > "Trail Transcripts". By the way, there are also details about burned field in Zacatecas (1984). You can add them to this article about Camarena since it was mainly his job. SaintSanti ( talk) 00:05, 18 January 2021 (UTC)
In his RfC close, S Marshall stated that we should "include a section on the alleged CIA participation in Camarena's interrogation," but that the section should not "read like Darouet's proposed edit." That proposed edit can be seen here [93]. S Marshall added that text linking the CIA to Camarena's killing "requires in-text attribution to a specific source as well as an inline citation that directly supports the claim," and wrote that this issue should not be given "undue prominence."
Aquillion suggested holding another RfC, but whether we do or don't hold an RfC, we need to decide what text is being considered for addition to this article.
Academic sources with meaningful discussion of possible CIA involvement in Camarena's death include:
Newspaper articles include:
A relatively high-quality blog post has been offered as capable of providing a counternarrative:
Lastly, there's this book by journalist Jesús Esquivel, that's referenced by some of the academics:
If you think there's another source we really must mention, please post it here. Since nobody has done so, I'll draft a text proposal shortly. - Darouet ( talk) 20:57, 5 February 2021 (UTC)
@ Rja13ww33 and Aquillion: here's my effort at a draft:
Allegations of CIA involvement
A number of former DEA agents, CIA agents, Mexican police officers, and historians contend that the CIA was complicit in Camarena's death.[1-7] DEA agent Hector Berréllez writes after he was named director of the DEA's investigation into Camarena's death Operation Leyenda in 1989, Mexican police informants and CIA agent Victor Harrison told him that Camarena had been killed with CIA complicity.[1,2] According to Berrellez, in response to his discovery he was told by senior DEA officials not to investigate possible CIA involvement, was threatened by the CIA, and removed from the investigation.[1,2]
Since the Mexican government released Rafael Caro Quintero from prison in 2013, Harrison and the police informants have been joined by several former DEA agents who similarly argue that the CIA had participated in Camarena's killing.[1-6] Between 2013–2015, the Mexican newspaper Proceso,[3] journalist Jesús Esquivel,[4] journalists Chuck Bowden and Molly Malloy,[5] and historians Russell and Silvia Bartley[6] published investigative reports and books making the same allegation. They write that Camarena, like Mexican journalist Manuel Buendía, discovered that the CIA helped organize drug trafficking from Mexico into the United States in order to fund the anti-communist Contras in Nicaragua as a part of the Cold War. Historian Wil Pansters explains that US victory in the Cold War was more important to the CIA than the DEA's War on Drugs:[7]
"Since the overriding concern of the CIA was the anti-Sandinista project, it trumped the DEA's task of combating drug trafficking, and covertly incorporated (or pressured) parts of the Mexican state into subservience. Buendía had found out about the CIA-contra-drugs-DFS connection, which seriously questioned Mexican sovereignty, while Camarena learned that the CIA had infiltrated the DEA and sabotaged its work so as to interfere with the clandestine contra-DFS-traffickers network. They knew too much and were eliminated on the orders of the U.S. with Mexican complicity. Later official investigations attempted to limit criminal responsibility to the dirty connections between drug traffickers, secret agents and corrupt police, leaving out the (geo)political ramifications."[7]
In 2019 the United States Department of Justice began reinvestigating Camarena's murder,[8] and in 2020 Amazon Studies released a documentary, The Last Narc,[1,9] supporting the allegations. The CIA has said the allegations are untrue.[8] Camarena biographer Elaine Shannon describes the allegations as "another Deep State conspiracy theory," and interviews other former DEA agents including Jack Lawn, who agree with her.[10]
Full details are given for references above, but listed briefly for clarity here, they are [1] 2020 Amazon documentary, [2] 2020 Berrellez book, [3] 2013 Proceso investigative report, [4] 2014 Esquivel book, [5] 2015 Bowden and Malloy investigative report, [6] 2015 Bartley book, [7] 2017 Pansters review, [8] 2018 USA Today article, [9] 2020 Variety article, [10] 2020 Shannon blog post.
This text doesn't mention more minor people involved by name, and instead places an emphasis on the secondary sources: journalists and historians. It also attempts to avoid duplicated references. Let me know what you think. - Darouet ( talk) 17:09, 7 February 2021 (UTC)
I've shortened the text in this second draft. Per the RfC, there was consensus to include this in the article, but S Marshall did insist that the text be changed to accommodate objections. If there's no feedback here — S Marshall requested discussion before inclusion — I'll launch another RfC to see what the community thinks.
Allegations of CIA involvement
A number of former DEA agents, CIA agents, Mexican police officers, and historians contend that the CIA was complicit in Camarena's death.[1-7] Between 2013–2015, the Mexican newspaper Proceso,[3] journalist Jesús Esquivel,[4] journalists Chuck Bowden and Molly Malloy,[5] and historians Russell and Silvia Bartley[6] published investigative reports and books making the same allegation. They write that Camarena, like Mexican journalist Manuel Buendía, discovered that the CIA helped organize drug trafficking from Mexico into the United States in order to fund the anti-communist Contras in Nicaragua as a part of the Cold War. Historian Wil Pansters explains that US victory in the Cold War was more important to the CIA than the DEA's War on Drugs:[7]
"Since the overriding concern of the CIA was the anti-Sandinista project, it trumped the DEA's task of combating drug trafficking, and covertly incorporated (or pressured) parts of the Mexican state into subservience. Buendía had found out about the CIA-contra-drugs-DFS connection, which seriously questioned Mexican sovereignty, while Camarena learned that the CIA had infiltrated the DEA and sabotaged its work so as to interfere with the clandestine contra-DFS-traffickers network. They knew too much and were eliminated on the orders of the U.S. with Mexican complicity. Later official investigations attempted to limit criminal responsibility to the dirty connections between drug traffickers, secret agents and corrupt police, leaving out the (geo)political ramifications."[7]
In 2019 the United States Department of Justice began reinvestigating Camarena's murder,[8] and in 2020 Amazon Studies released a documentary, The Last Narc,[1,9] supporting the allegations. The CIA has said the allegations are untrue.[8] Camarena biographer Elaine Shannon describes the allegations as "another Deep State conspiracy theory," and interviews other former DEA agents including Jack Lawn, who agree with her.[10]
The references (see above) are [1] 2020 Amazon documentary, [2] 2020 Berrellez book, [3] 2013 Proceso investigative report, [4] 2014 Esquivel book, [5] 2015 Bowden and Malloy investigative report, [6] 2015 Bartley book, [7] 2017 Pansters review, [8] 2018 USA Today article, [9] 2020 Variety article, [10] 2020 Shannon blog post. - Darouet ( talk) 00:11, 16 February 2021 (UTC)
Phil Jordan, Hector Berrellez, Jorge Godoy, Ramon Lira and Rene Lopez (for The Last Narc 2020) support the allegations (from 2013) originally made by Phil Jordan, Hector Berrellez, Jorge Godoy, Ramon Lira and Rene Lopez. :-) I give it up, it's waste of my time. SaintSanti ( talk) 23:33, 19 February 2021 (UTC)
It should be noted somewhere that the conspiracy theory has been given wide currency throughout Latin America ie: This piece from El Salvador: https://diario1.com/zona-1/2014/09/crimen-ordenado-aqui-partio-el-mundo-de-carteles-de-drogas/ fbclid=IwAR1om8fHtXkj8phcMuTieT3BoC_GWUtRAfBDWCHD4xRZaGMIoD989h39l1o