The former leader of the Los Zetas cartel in Oaxaca has been sentenced to 91 years in prison for the 2011 kidnapping and murder of the wife of a soldier.
Marco Carmona Hernández, also known by the moniker “El Cabrito,” ordered the assasination of Yahaira Guadalupe Bahena López, who was married to a member of the army’s special forces. Carmona was also sanctioned for wider activities in organized crime.
On April 13, 2011 a commando broke into Bahena’s home in Tlacolula, Oaxaca, 32 kilometers southeast of Oaxaca city, after confusing her for a member of a rival cartel. She was kidnapped and decapitated.
The case came to national prominence after Bahena’s mother, Margarita López, decided to investigate the crime herself. The investigation led her to Perote prison in Veracruz where Carmona was an inmate.
Carmona admitted to López that he’d ordered the murder in the belief that Bahena and her husband were members of the La Familia Michoacana cartel.
Another Zetas member, Encarnación Martínez Colorado, was sentenced to 20 years in prison in late December for the murder.
Martínez was also interviewed at Perote prison at the time of the investigation, and admitted that he and another cartel member sexually abused and decapitated Bahena, despite already knowing that she wasn’t part of the rival cartel.
With reports from Milenio