The operation leading to Garcia’s arrest included Agents from Mexico City, Mexico state and the federal Attorney General's Offices.
According to the State of Mexico’s Attorney General Alfredo Castillo, Garcia, 36, also known as “El Compayito,” admitted to having personally participated in more than 300 murders and ordering 300 more.
Garcia is a deserter from the Mexican marines, and a former bodyguard for the infamous cartel figure Edgar Valdez, aka “La Barbie,” until his arrest in 2010, according to the Associated Press (AP).
After Valdez’s arrest, Garcia formed his own gang “The Hand with Eyes,” which AP reports is responsible for much of the drug related violence in Mexico City.
Garcia also worked for a short time as a police officer in Baja California Sur state before he entered the drug trade. In 2002 he joined the Beltran Leyva cartel and worked closely with the leader Arturo Beltran who was killed in 2009, AFP reports.
Fox News reports that Garcia was behind the massacre of 24 people in the forest outside of Mexico City in 2009, and that his gang controls a large portion of the drug distribution surrounding the city.
Garcia’s gang is known for their use of extreme violence and decapitations in their fights with rival groups for control of the drug trade in the state of Mexico.
Garcia’s arrest occurred less than two weeks after the arrest of the La Linea cartel’s leader Antonio Acosta Hernandez, also known as 'El Diego,' who admitted to ordering more than 1,500 killings during his reign as leader.
More than 40,000 people have been killed by drug related violence since President Felipe Calderon began cracking down on cartels. According to AFP, the crackdown on major cartels and their disbanding has lead to the rise of numerous smaller drug gangs like “The Hand with Eyes,” which tend towards extreme violence in order to gain influence.
