Mexican hit man trial on PhotoPeach
It was early in the morning of Sunday April 20th, 2009 when a convoy of four vehicles arrived to the Mexican restaurant Morelia, in the Dallas neighborhood of Oak Cliff. The restaurant was closed but the owner, Santos Lozano Jr. traveling with the convoy, was going to open it for his hungry group of friends. Suddenly, a pick-up truck with two individuals aboard approached them and, with assault rifles in hand, started shooting at the convoy. The group then returned fire and soon after Dallas police and paramedics where on the scene of the firefight.
At the scene laid dead a man identified as Antonio Aviles Sanchez. He was under investigation in Dallas for his connection with local members of the La Familia Michoacana cartel. Some other members of his convoy were also hurt. Police followed a trail of blood and were able to track down Jose Arrez Rangel, one of the assailants, who had been shot on the foot. Rangel was arrested but his partner got away. According to witnesses the attackers were dressed in black, had masks over their heads and were heavily armed.
When I heard about the shooting there was no doubt in my mind, this was the result of a battle between members of Mexican drug cartels. The circumstances of the incident were too similar to the shootings that occur every day in Mexico between members of rival gangs. Moreover, the shooting took place outside a Mexican restaurant named after the capital city of the state of Michoacán, home of the La Familia Michoacana cartel. Could this be just a coincidence? Was this shooting in fact evidence that the violence tied to the Mexican drug war had infiltrated into Texas?
Juan Carlos Sanchez, a Dallas criminal defense Lawyer familiar with the case, has no reservations about this incident. He believes it is an example of how the violence associated with Mexican drug cartels has penetrated the United States. “This was not a shooting between two persons that knew each other, and that had a fight that resulted in a dead. This incident, we believe, was planned out by an organization that sent out a hit man from Mexico to carry out the crime in Dallas”, the lawyer said.
Investigators determined that Rangel, an alleged member of the Zetas cartel, entered the country illegally three days prior to the shooting with the intent of terminating Antonio Aviles Sanchez. Rangel was accused of murder. During his trial last week Rangel insisted that he had had nothing to do with the shooting. He said that he came to the US looking for work, and that he had just happened to be walking in the neighborhood when he was struck by a stray bullet. However, prosecutors for the state of Texas insisted; Rangel came here to kill.
On May 6th, 2011 Jose Arrez Rangel was sentenced to life in prison, a very harsh punishment said Lawyer Juan Carlos Sanchez. “Usually the average punishment for murder is 25 years behind bars. But I believe that the jury chose the maximum punishment considering that Rangel came all the way from Mexico to carry out the killing”, Sanchez added.
Currently police are investigating a few more incidents in the Dallas area that they believe have ties to the Mexican drug cartels.
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