Sinaloa governor’s alibi for the ‘El Mayo’ scandal: A private flight, a family trip and a controversial businessman

“The government was on vacation; I made the decision to leave for three or four days.” This is how the governor of Sinaloa, Rubén Rocha Moya, explained his departure from the state on July 25. On the same day, U.S. authorities confirmed the capture of Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada and Joaquín Guzmán López, members of the Sinaloa Cartel’s senior leadership, after they landed unexpectedly at a small airport on the outskirts of the border city of El Paso, Texas, at around 4 p.m. Some eight hours later, the local press in Sinaloa reported the death of Héctor Cuén, an influential local politician and known adversary of the governor. After two weeks of tension and irreconcilable versions of what happened, the controversy reached a peak last Saturday when El Mayo’s lawyer made public a letter in which the drug lord stated that he was ambushed, kidnapped and taken against his will to the United States after being summoned to a meeting with Rocha, Cuén, and “El Chapo” Guzmán’s sons that same July 25. In the eye of the hurricane, the head of the Sinaloa state government asserted that he was not present at any private meeting with El Mayo, but on a family trip to Los Angeles. In a new attempt to dispel suspicions, the governor offered more details of his version this week. “What am I going to the United States for? I’m going to see my relatives,” he said at a press conference.

What happened on July 25? That is the question causing intrigue and dividing opinion in Sinaloa and the whole of Mexico. El Mayo claims in his letter that he was summoned by Joaquín Guzmán López — his godson — to an event hall in Huertos del Pedregal, a ranch on the outskirts of Culiacán, the state capital, at 11 a.m. The reason for the meeting was “to help resolve the differences of the political leaders of our state,” according to El Mayo’s version of events. At the center of the conflict between Rocha and Cuén was the Autonomous University of Sinaloa (UAS), the most important university in the state.

Zambada’s statement, which has not been corroborated, has been deeply uncomfortable for the authorities because it explicitly links his capture to Cuén’s murder, while also offering a crude portrait of the collusion between organized crime and local politics and filling in the gaps in the official version of his arrest. El Mayo speaks of Cuén as a “longtime friend,” claims that a commander in the state Judicial Police was among his bodyguards, and paints himself as a consigliere, a guarantor of the most relevant issues in Sinaloa’s public life. “I know that the official version given by the Sinaloa state authorities is that Héctor Cuén was shot the night of July 25 at a gas station by two men who wanted to steal his pick-up truck,” he wrote. “That’s not what happened. They killed him at the same time and in the same place where they kidnapped me.” The drug lord closes his letter with a call for harmony after his arrest: “Nothing can be solved with violence. We have already gone down that road and we all lose.”

“If they said I was going to be there, they lied, and if he believed them, he fell into the trap,” said Rocha hours after the letter was published, during an event to mark the visit to the state of the president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, and the president-elect, Claudia Sheinbaum. The governor was well aware of the seriousness of El Mayo’s accusations. “He told me before the event that he was going to make his version known, he just asked me for my point of view on how I saw this situation, that he was aware — he also said this, and it is true — that it was not just about involving him, but involving the head of the government, you know who,” said López Obrador Monday. That same morning, some 30 elected and acting governors of Morena (PRI), the ruling party, came out in defense of Rocha’s “probity and vocation of service.”

Rocha Moya’s version is diametrically different to that of El Mayo. The governor says that he cleared his agenda to visit a nephew who works in Los Angeles, among other relatives living in the United States, including one of his sisters. “So that there is no speculation in that sense, I was not aware, nor did I go because I was aware, of that meeting, nor was I invited, nor did they have any reason to invite me,” said the governor in his weekly press conference last Monday. “I don’t attend those kinds of meetings.”

This week a flight log that corroborates Rocha’s version was also leaked to the media. According to the document, advanced by journalist Marcos Vizcarra, Rocha left Culiacán at 9:00 a.m. and landed in California at 11:15 a.m., which breaks with the timeline provided by Zambada. He arrived in the United States in a private plane belonging to Servicio Ejecutivos Aéreos Viz, a company owned by former PRI congressman Jesús Vizcarra and his brothers. Jesús Vizcarra was previously mayor of Culiacán and his family is behind companies such as Salud Digna, which offers low-cost health services, and SuKarne, one of the country’s main cattle-raising emporiums. The politician has been investigated by authorities for drug trafficking and money laundering, and linked for decades to El Mayo and the Sinaloa Cartel, allegations he has repeatedly denied.

Rocha did not refer to the aircraft he boarded along with six members of his family. He did say that his absence from the state and the succession of events that followed his departure was a “coincidence” and that the events took him by surprise. “I never thought, not even here, that such a notable phenomenon could occur in Sinaloa, Mexico, and the world,” he said of the arrest of the two capos. “Later, I found out about Cuén and there I was exclusively attending to that, I asked someone to prepare a Twitter message, published it and then recorded a message, a little video,” he said. “I got up, took off my pajamas, put on the pants I was already wearing, the shirt that I think was wrinkled and that’s how I recorded it.” The video in which he expresses his condolences was posted on his networks at around 2 a.m. The governor said in the message that “he was away” but did not specify where.

The PRI politician said that he took a plane back to Mexico early in the morning to attend to both issues. Regarding the presence of a police commander in El Mayo’s escort, Rocha said he was not aware of the situation. “The Attorney General’s Office does not depend on me, it is a matter for the judicial police,” he said. “I can hardly be aware of what the state police themselves do, the preventive police and the others do, in this case no one could have told me,” he added.

The media war does not only revolve around whether or not Rocha was involved in the meeting with Zambada and Cuén. It is also being waged on another front: the murder of the politician himself. The Sinaloa Attorney General’s Office called a press conference on Monday in which it released a video of the attack on Cuén, a key piece in the authorities’ main line of investigation: that the murder occurred during an attempted robbery of his pickup truck. The images, captured by the security camera of a gas station in Culiacán around 10 p.m., also contradict El Mayo’s version, in which the Sinaloa Cartel kingpin states that his “friend” was killed at 11 p.m. The ministerial authorities decreed the time of death at 11:13 p.m., according to the obituaries. The impact of the bullets, according to the investigation, took place “two or three hours earlier” said prosecutor Sara Quiñonez, although she clarified that sometimes these estimates are not precise. This information also does not coincide with the time of the recording.

The video also does not reveal who was in the vehicle or its license plate number. The images show two armed men on a motorcycle approach the van, open the passenger door and leave after interacting with the victim for only a few minutes. Moments later, both vehicles drive off in opposite directions. The images indicate a direct attack, but are unclear as to an attempted robbery. A gas station employee remains unmoved during the attack; he does not react to it and does not get down on the ground, despite being only a few meters away. The shots cannot be distinguished. The recording has deepened doubts about what happened. Rocha said he would not comment on the investigation and insisted that it was up to the Attorney General’s Office to clarify the events. The ministerial authorities, who agreed to let the Attorney General’s Office take over the case, have said that no hypothesis is being ruled out, including the one claimed by El Mayo.

The governor reiterated that he had nothing to do with what took place, but said he was willing to give a formal statement if required by Mexican or U.S. authorities. “There are two versions, at least,” López Obrador summarized Tuesday when referring to the video and Zambada’s statements. “We have to wait.” Meanwhile, the scandal continues to simmer after the state Attorney General’s Office announced the indictment of Héctor Cuén Díaz, son of the murdered politician, for illegal negotiations at the UAS. In a sea of conflicting stories, there are only questions in Sinaloa.

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