LEADER DEAD; CARTEL LIVES

Gang Survives By Emulating Kingpin'S Style

Amado Carrillo Fuentes, a Mexican drug kingpin whose domain stretched for
200 miles along the Texas border, died in 1997, but drug enforcement
officials believe his legacy lives on.

Before his death, Fuentes, who operated primarily from Ciudad Juarez across
the Rio Grande from El Paso, tried to avoid the scrutiny of authorities by
killing his enemies and burying their bodies, drug officials said.

The Juarez cartel adopted Fuentes' management style after his death, drug
enforcement agents said. Authorities Tuesday were scouring several ranches
outside Ciudad Juarez based on an informant's tip that drug traffickers
buried at least 100 bodies on remote ranches in the area.

"The way drug cartels operate is that if they want to escape notice, they
dump bodies of their victims on private property," said Phil Jordan, a
former drug enforcement agent who worked in El Paso and Dallas. "Amado
Carrillo Fuentes tried to keep the violence out of the public eye. He
didn't leave bodies out godfather-style."

Fuentes, known as the Lord of the Skies for his use of Cessna airplanes to
carry drug loads, controlled a territory or "plaza" that stretched at least
200 miles through Chihuahua, Mexico, and into Presidio, Texas.

Law enforcement officials believe that his brother, Vicente, assumed
control of the Juarez cartel. Vicente Fuentes, who is still at large, was
indicted in September 1998 on drug-trafficking charges in the United States.

Juan Jose Esparragosa-Moreno, known as "El Azul," or the Blue-Eyed One,
also rose to power within the cartel, U.S. officials said.

When a kingpin dies or is arrested, drug enforcement officials have
problems tracking who has assumed control over a cartel, agents say.

"It's a chaotic time," said Frank Seib, the acting special agent in charge
of the Drug Enforcement Administration's office in Dallas. "It can be hard
to stay on top of intelligence."

In the year after Amado Carrillo Fuentes' death, at least 176 homicides
were linked to warring Mexican drug cartels.

Mexican drug traffickers began organizing into more efficient cartels in
the 1980s after agreeing to carry drug shipments for Colombian drug
cartels, Jordan said. With more at stake, leaders of the cartels turned to
violence to assert control over territory or drug routes.

"Cartel leaders learn by trial and error," Seib said. "They know that when
you walk into a restaurant and kill 15 people that it will attract attention."

Texans were horrified in 1985 by the torture and slaying of Alberto Radelat
of Fort Worth and John Walker, another American, after they walked into a
restaurant where the Guadalajara narcotics cartel was meeting.

In 1989, Mexican authorities uncovered 12 bodies in Matamoros, including
the body of Mark Kilroy, a University of Texas student. Authorities later
linked the killings to a cult of drug traffickers who believed that ritual
sacrifices would protect them from discovery.

The latest cycle of drug violence was triggered in the mid-1990s by a
struggle between rival drug traffickers, said Jorge Fernandez, a columnist
in Mexico City.

"The disappearances and killings escalated in 1993 and 1994 and it has
continued until now," Fernandez said.