31 WOMEN ON LIST OF DRUG SMUGGLERS SOUGHT BY DEA AND FBI IN U.S.

EL PASO -- Thirty-one female drug smugglers are among the fugitives
being sought by the DEA and FBI in U.S. border states.

They are among 385 people in border regions wanted by the U.S. Drug
Enforcement Administration. Federal agents described five of the women
as "armed and dangerous."

U.S. lists do not include an alleged kingpin that Mexican authorities
identified as Enedina Arrellano Felix of the Tijuana drug cartel,
Another woman -- Sandra Avila Beltran, "Queen of the Pacific cartel"
- -- is in custody in Mexico.

Arrellano, along with a son, is suspected of taking over the Tijuana
cartel. Like Arrellano, Avila had relatives in the drug trade. She is
awaiting extradition to the United States on drug charges.

According to prosecution witnesses' testifying in the running El Paso
trial of Fernando Ontiveros-Arambula, at least four women were
involved in drug-trafficking.

Sylvia "Burra" Carbajal, one of the witnesses, testified that she and
her sister, Yvonne Carbajal, smuggled marijuana in the El Paso-Juarez
region. She said she also ferried money forOntiveros-Arambula, and
that both she and her sister were romantically involved with the defendant.

"I grew up around drugs all my life," said Sylvia Carbajal, who was
indicted on drug charges in a separate proceeding.

Authorities have not said whether Yvonne Carbajal will be charged,
too.

Last week, witnesses made references to a woman some knew as "La
Guera," or "blondie." Other witnesses identified her as Elizabeth
"Liz" Lares-Valenzuela, who survived a shooting in Juarez in 2008.

Lares-Valenzuela was indicted last year on U.S. drug charges. A DEA
agent testified Monday that she became a fugitive after initially
cooperating with the agency.

During the trial, a former Juarez police captain, testified that a
woman known to drug-traffickers only as "La Tia" (the aunt), was the
conduit for all communications between Joaquin "Chapo" Guzman Loera
and his operatives in Chihuahua state.

A woman in Juarez named Juana said she got involved in
drug-trafficking to help her husband, who was in law enforcement and
was also a drug dealer. She is not involved in the federal trial in El
Paso, so the El Paso Times is not publishing her last name.

Juana got caught once and served a two-year prison sentence. She said
she and her husband avoided problems during the drug wars by not
crossing the cartels.

"If you don't steal from them, then they leave you alone," she said.
"Many of the people who were killed in Juarez owed money or stole
drugs or money from the cartels."

Sandalio "Sandy" Gonzalez, a retired DEA official formerly assigned to
El Paso, said women drug-traffickers are no different from men in many
respects.

"There have been high-profile women traffickers, Colombian and
Mexican, who have not received as much publicity as their male
counterparts. They can be just as bad as the men," Gonzalez said.

Before he retired, Gonzalez supervised investigations of the Juarez
drug cartel, and investigated Colombian cartels while stationed in
Florida.

He said Griselda Blanco, of Colombia, was a notorious drug smuggler in
Miami. She was called the "Godmother of Cocaine," and had a reputation
for ruthlessness.

DEA officials said her organization was tied to 200 killings in
Florida during the 1970s and '80s. She led a ring that operated from
Medellin, Colombia; Miami; and Los Angeles. Convicted and sentenced to
prison, she was deported to Colombia in 2004.

Ignacia "Nacha" Jasso was considered the first undisputed drug lord in
Chihuahua state to control the traffic of marijuana, cocaine and
heroin in the early 1900s.

She worked from her home at 218 Degollado in downtown Juarez, and was
involved in the drug trade from the late 1920s to the mid-1950s.

Mexican historians say she rose to power after ordering the deaths of
11 Chinese immigrants in Juarez who sought to control the heroin trade.

Oscar Martinez, author of several books on the border, said Jasso did
not figure prominently in earlier Juarez history books because of the
nature of the drug trade at the time.

"La Nacha was a major player in the drug trade back then, but even for
a legendary figure like her, drug-trafficking was not as major a
factor in the life of Juarez as it is now," said Martinez, a Juarez
native and history professor at the University of Arizona in Tucson.
"Everyone knew it was there, and there was the occasional gang fight
over drugs, but drug-trafficking did not rise above a nuisance."

Jasso allegedly enjoyed protection from police and other officials.
Some believe she died a natural death in her 70s, although the exact
date is unknown.