Mexico Ex-Security Chief Arrested by U.S. on Drugs-Linked Bribery Charge

On at least two occasions, the cartel personally delivered bribe payments to Mr. Garcia Luna in briefcases containing between $3 million and $5 million dollars, said U.S. Attorney

Richard Donoghue.

In exchange, the cartel got safe passage for its drugs, sensitive law-enforcement information about investigations into the group and information about rival gangs, U.S. prosecutors said. The cartel was run by Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzmán, who is now serving a life sentence in a U.S. prison.

Mr. García Luna’s security consultancy firm didn’t respond to requests for comment. In the past, he has denied allegations of corruption.

The scandal is Mexico’s biggest drug-related corruption scandal since the 1997 arrest of the country’s antidrug czar,

Gen. Jesus Gutierrez Rebollo,

who was found guilty of taking bribes from a cartel and sentenced to 40 years in jail. He died in 2013 in prison.

Mr. Garcia Luna was the public face of Mexico’s antidrug efforts for nearly a decade, first as head of the country’s version of the Federal Bureau of Investigation from 2001 to 2005 under former President

Vicente Fox

and later as Public Security Minister, a cabinet post, under then President Felipe Calderón from 2006 to 2012.

Mr. Garcia Luna was put in charge of overall antidrug strategy and also with building up a new federal police force that would be honest and capable of penetrating and taking down powerful drug mafias, including the Sinaloa Cartel.

The arrest is a boost to Mexican President

Andrés Manuel López Obrador,

who has long argued that his predecessor’s administrations were hopelessly corrupt.

It is also a stain on the legacy of Mr. Calderón, who announced an all-out war on cartels and deployed the army to capture and kill cartel leaders. The strategy failed to contain violence, which rose as drug gangs fractured into smaller groups that fought over succession and territory. Tens of thousands died during Mr. Calderon’s term.

“It’s a terrible blow for Calderón, even if his strategy was already discredited,” said

Eduardo Guerrero,

a security analyst and former intelligence official. “This shows again to what extent Mexico has been incapable for decades of building a trusted, solid security and intelligence apparatus.”

Mr. Calderón, who isn’t accused of wrongdoing, said on Twitter he would await further details but “am always in favor of justice and the law.”

During Mr. Calderón’s term, his administration arrested or killed nearly 50 drug lords, government data shows. But most of the highest-profile arrest were from rival organizations such as the ultra-violent Los Zetas drug gang and the Beltran-Leyva cartel, analysts say. Officials said at the time they were focusing on the most bloodthirsty gangs.

“It seems clear now that (Garcia Luna) let the Sinaloa Cartel be and went after other groups. There were rumors at the time about this,” said

Alejandro Schtulmann,

head of political risk consulting firm Empra in Mexico City.

During Mr. Guzmán’s recent trial in New York, one witness described payments to Mr. García Luna. It was unclear whether this week’s arrest was linked to testimony from that trial.

But that wasn’t the only bombshell revelation from Mr. Guzmán’s trial. Alex Cifuentes, a Colombian associate of Mr. Guzman, testified that the drug lord paid $100 million to former president

Enrique Pena Nieto,

who left office last year. A spokesman for the former president said those allegations were “false, defamatory and absurd” and pointed out that Mr. Guzmán had been captured and extradited during his presidency.

Mr. García Luna got his start in Mexico’s domestic spy agency in the 1990s and was sent for training with the FBI and police agencies in Spain and elsewhere. He rose quickly after leading a covert squad that captured a notorious Mexican kidnapper known for lopping off the ears of his kidnap victims.

In 2006, Mr. Calderón created a new cabinet position for public security and named him to the post.

But a rash of scandals made Mr. García Luna a controversial pick. He admitted to staging a kidnap rescue for the benefit of the cameras. His top antidrug commander was arrested and charged with helping a cartel. Another officer on his anti-kidnap squad was arrested for allegedly organizing phony police checkpoints to abduct victims.

At the time, Mr. García Luna said he was honest and that the arrests of his aides proved that corruption would no longer be tolerated. He told The Wall Street Journal for a 2009 article on his efforts to build an honest police force: “We’re going to do this, you’ll see. Remember me.”

A former U.S. official who served in Mexico after Mr. Garcia Luna had left office said that through the years there were allegations of corruption by Mr. Garcia Luna, many made by high-ranking Mexican criminals who have since been extradited to the U.S. One such allegation was made by Edgar Valdez Villarreal, a U.S.-born cartel leader known as “La Barbie,” who was captured in 2010, extradited to the U.S. and convicted last year.

“Over time, enough high level traffickers have come out who have been involved in paying Genaro,” the former U.S. official said. “It was multiple drug trafficking organizations that were paying Genaro.”

Mr. García Luna moved to Miami after Mr. Calderon left office in 2012. He had been living in a luxury waterside mansion.

In another interview with the Wall Street Journal at a hotel in Miami, Mr. García Luna said he rented the mansion, and again denied he had ever had any corrupt dealings with any criminal organization. Mr. García Luna brought a scrapbook to the interview showing page after page of commendations from the Drug Enforcement Administration and other U.S. government agencies.

Mr. García Luna said at the time that because of his law enforcement work in Mexico he had been warned by the U.S several times that his life was in danger. If he had been corrupt, he said, he would have never been admitted to the U.S.

Write to José de Córdoba at [email protected] and Juan Montes at [email protected]