From the remnants of cartel infighting after the Zeta era, CJNG rose to become Mexico’s most notorious and powerful criminal organization, boasting thousands of heavily armed members equipped on a level comparable to a military force.
Mexico was plunged into widespread unrest over the weekend as members of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) launched multiple coordinated attacks targeting police and military forces in the western part of the country. The violence was widely seen as retaliation following the death of cartel leader Nemesio Rubén Oseguera Cervantes, known as “El Mencho,” who was killed during a large-scale Mexican military operation in Tapalpa, Jalisco state, on February 22.
U.S. media have described El Mencho (born 1966) as Mexico’s most powerful drug lord, while CJNG is regarded as one of the most violent criminal groups in the Americas, spreading terror for the past 15 years.
**Origins from the “Zeta Killers”**
CJNG first emerged publicly in 2011 with a gruesome display: 35 bodies bearing signs of torture — members of a rival cartel — were left in plain sight in Boca del Río, Veracruz state.
CJNG gunmen at a location in Mexico, November 2023. Photo: Insight Crime
According to Insight Crime, a think tank specializing in organized crime in the Americas, CJNG originated from the Milenio cartel, which operated primarily in Michoacán and Jalisco states since the early 1990s. El Mencho joined Milenio after a brief stint as a police officer in Tomatlán, Jalisco. Before that, he had smuggled drugs into the United States, served three years in prison, and was deported in 1997.
El Mencho rose through the ranks, eventually commanding a Milenio faction in Guadalajara, Jalisco’s capital. When Milenio’s top leaders were arrested or eliminated between 2008 and 2009, the group fractured into two warring factions: La Resistencia and the faction led by El Mencho.
La Resistencia allied with Los Zetas — the ex-special forces unit infamous for extreme brutality in Michoacán — forcing El Mencho to flee to Jalisco. There, he allied with the Sinaloa cartel and formed Los Mata Zetas (“Zeta Killers”).
Known for their ruthlessness, Los Zetas met their match in brutality. Los Mata Zetas responded with equal or greater savagery, including reports of explosive devices attached to rivals.
After defeating rivals and consolidating power in western Mexico, Los Mata Zetas broke away from Sinaloa. In 2011, El Mencho rebranded the group as CJNG.
**Octopus-like reach and massive arsenal**
According to the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED), CJNG evolved from a Sinaloa armed wing into a sophisticated global drug production and trafficking enterprise under El Mencho’s leadership.
The group diversified revenue streams through extortion, kidnapping, human smuggling, illegal mining, and fuel theft, including control over avocado and oil operations in Michoacán and Guanajuato. Rosalinda González Valencia, El Mencho’s wife, has been described as the cartel’s “financial director.”
CJNG now operates in at least 27 of Mexico’s 32 states and has international ambitions. Its arrival in new territories is almost always accompanied by a sharp increase in violence, especially in contested areas.
The organization maintains a centralized, hierarchical structure with at least 37 allied criminal groups. Its longest-standing alliance is with Los Cuinis, led by El Mencho’s brother-in-law and often described as CJNG’s “financial arm,” though some sources view it as a separate entity.
Relations with Sinaloa have deteriorated into open rivalry across multiple regions. In August 2016, CJNG kidnapped two sons of then-Sinaloa leader Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera.
The U.S. government estimates CJNG has 15,000–20,000 members and generates billions of dollars annually. The group is known for corrupting police and politicians.
Mexican authorities say CJNG possesses a “massive” arsenal — including machine guns, anti-tank weapons, and body armor — rivaling military-grade equipment.
In 2015, when Mexican troops deployed two helicopters to an Oseguera hideout, CJNG gunmen shot down one, killing three soldiers.
CJNG members posing with rifles and heavy machine guns. Photo: Reuters
Analysts attribute CJNG’s rapid rise to several factors, including security policies under former President Enrique Peña Nieto. The 2016 arrest and 2017 extradition of El Chapo to the U.S. weakened Sinaloa, creating a power vacuum that CJNG quickly exploited.
The U.S. designated El Mencho a most-wanted fugitive in May 2016, offering $10 million for information leading to his arrest and/or conviction in 2018, later raising the reward to $15 million in 2024.
U.S. officials say CJNG operates the largest cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine trafficking network in Mexico and has recently become a major fentanyl supplier to the United States. In February 2025, the U.S. State Department designated CJNG a foreign terrorist organization.
“This is undoubtedly one of the most powerful organizations in Mexico in terms of military capability, recruitment capacity, and weaponry,” David Mora, a conflict researcher at the International Crisis Group (ICG) in Belgium, told AFP.
Drug lord Nemesio Oseguera. Photo: RTE
Observers warn that the Mexican military’s elimination of El Mencho has dealt a severe blow to CJNG. Given the group’s vast territorial footprint, the risk of internal fragmentation is high, potentially triggering fierce power struggles and a surge in violence across multiple regions.
It remains unclear whether El Mencho had established a clear succession plan within CJNG.
Most Mexican cartels operate as family-based structures, according to security analyst David Saucedo. The smoothest transitions typically occur when control stays within the family. However, El Mencho’s eldest son is serving a life sentence in the United States for drug trafficking. His wife was arrested in Mexico in 2021, sentenced to five years, received a pardon last year, and her current whereabouts are unknown.
“For the United States, this is good news because they want Mexican cartels weakened to reduce the flow of illegal drugs,” Saucedo said. “But for Mexico, it’s bad news — a power vacuum means more violence, more deaths, and more crime.”
