How was cartel boss Arturo Beltrán Leyva killed?

For decades Arturo Beltrán Leyva led one of the most powerful cartels in Mexico.

He was killed on December 11, 2009.

Find out what is known about his death and how his body was found.

How was cartel boss Arturo Beltrán Leyva killed? Arturo Beltrán Leyva was one of the most feared organized crime leaders in the world. However, on December 11, 2009, elements of the Mexican armed forces broke into one of the homes of the Beltrán-Leyva cartel and killed Arturo.

For three years, the federal government of Mexico pledged to bring down organized crime. However, this ended up unleashing a war between the Mexican cartels led by El Chapo Guzmán and the Beltrán-Leyva brothers, who assumed that the former handed them over to the authorities in exchange for protection.

Who was Arturo Beltrán Leyva?

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Marcos Arturo Beltrán Leyva was born on February 5, 1958 in Badiraguato, Sinaloa. From a very young age, Arturo, along with his brothers Alfredo, Héctor, Esaúl and Carlos, was involved in criminal life due to his relationship with his cousin, Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ Guzman.

In his youth, Beltrán Leyva worked as an escort for Amado Carrillo Fuentes, also known as «El Señor de los Cielos». There he learned how organized crime and the sale of illegal substances worked. In 1997, the Beltrán Leyva brothers began working directly with the Sinaloa cartel, and that was the beginning of the end of a history of violence, abuse and excesses.

His role in organized crime

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By the 2000s, Arturo Beltrán Leyva had already earned a place as one of the most feared leaders of Mexican organized crime. At that time, many knew him as The Boss of Bosses thanks to the control that the Beltrán-Leyva cartel had over practically all of Mexico and the recruitment of young people to engage in the sale of arms and drugs.

Beltrán’s power was so great that he used all his available resources to embed his members in Mexican politics so he could have exclusive access to information regarding the investigation involving him. However, this did not seem to have the desired effect since, in 2008, Alfredo Beltrán was arrested by the Mexican army, sparking a war with the Sinaloa cartel and El Chapo Guzmán.

The search that led to Arturo Beltrán Leyva’s death

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On December 11, 2009, elements of the Mexican armed forces managed to break into a party at a home in Tepoztlán, Morelos, where Arturo Beltrán was. That day, the leader of the cartel was able to escape to a residential building, where he would remain until he was finally found by the Mexican army.

Four days later, on December 16, Mexican Navy sailors discovered Beltrán Leyva’s whereabouts and, after a 90-minute battle between cartel hitmen and Mexican authorities, Beltrán-Leyva was killed in the main bedroom of the apartment where he was hiding. This weakened the cartel and caused it to split into several cells that still operate in different parts of Mexico.

How did Arturo Beltrán Leyva die?

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What is known about how Arturo Beltran Leyva was killed? According to infobae, Arturo Beltrán Leyva’s body was collected by the Morelos Forensic Medical Service. He was shot several times. In one of the most controversial actions attributed to the Mexican authorities, Beltrán was exhibited bloody and without underwear, with bills and other objects covering his body.

For many, this was taken as a message from the Mexican authorities, but they distanced themselves from these images, saying that it was standard procedure to publicly show the objects that the deceased carried with them at their time of death.