U.S. MOVES AGAINST CARTEL SHIPPING COCAINE IN PRODUCE

Federal agents targeted a violent Mexican drug trafficking cartel
yesterday, executing about 100 arrest warrants in a crackdown on the flow
of millions of dollars of Colombian cocaine into south Texas from Mexico.

The drugs, concealed in produce trucks carrying limes, carrots and jalapeno
peppers, were distributed in New York, Chicago, Memphis and elsewhere,
according to Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) officials.

The State Department is offering a $2 million reward for information
leading to the capture of the cartel's leader, Oclosiel Cardenas-Guillen,
who was indicted on criminal charges unsealed in Brownsville, Tex.,
yesterday for conspiracy to distribute narcotics and assault on a federal
officer.

DEA officials said Cardenas-Guillen is known as "the friend killer" because
he allegedly has murdered associates who botched drug operations. He
allegedly has threatened U.S. drug agents and been connected with an
assault on an undercover sheriff's agent.

"Today's arrests represent a major blow to a violent international drug
trafficking operation," said FBI Director Louis J. Freeh. "Moreover, these
charges send a strong message to those that would try to intimidate law
enforcement officers carrying out their duties."

U.S. officials have confiscated 5,266 kilograms of cocaine, 9,708 pounds of
marijuana and $10.9 million in cash leading up to "Operation Impunity II."
Now the effort is aimed at further curbing the cartel's distribution of
cocaine and marijuana in the United States and apprehending
Cardenas-Guillen, who is at large in Mexico.

Cardenas-Guillen has been implicated in the 1999 assault on a Texas
Sheriff's Department investigator working undercover for the U.S. Customs
Service in Brownsville, officials said.

In another case last year, Cardenas-Guillen and gunmen armed with AK-47
assault rifles surrounded agents from the DEA and the FBI on assignment in
Mexico and ordered them out of their vehicle, U.S. officials said.

When the agents refused, the Mexican drug gang tried to pull them through
the windows, pointed rifles at their heads and threatened to kill them,
officials said. The agents were ultimately released and allowed to return
to Brownsville.

Cardenas-Guillen also has been indicted by the Mexican government on
charges of drug trafficking, attempted murder and money laundering. DEA
Administrator Donnie Marshall said the arrests, the $2 million reward and
the criminal charges are evidence that "no one can threaten or harm a
federal agent with impunity."

Another person in Mexico being sought is Maria Antonetta Rodriguez-Mata, a
former government official who works for Cardenas-Guillen.