No sooner had Alejandro Gertz Manero left the Attorney General’s Office than a massive purge began in the areas investigating the country’s most explosive cases. The heads of specialized prosecutor’s offices received official notices of their dismissal.
A coincidence? It happened precisely when they had open investigations into fuel theft and organized crime infiltrated within the government.
- Alfredo Higuera Bernal, head of the Specialized Prosecutor’s Office for Organized Crime (FEMDO) since 2019, was dismissed. This FEMDO is responsible for compiling case files on drug trafficking, fuel theft, arms smuggling, and organized crime. The most sensitive investigations of the six-year presidential term were under his jurisdiction.
Among the active FEMDO cases was the tax-related fuel theft case involving a Navy vice admiral, Manuel Roberto Farías Laguna, nephew of former Secretary of the Navy Rafael Ojeda. They were also investigating fuel smuggling networks linked to figures in the Morena party, such as Adán Augusto López and Mario Delgado, according to intelligence reports cited by the media.
But the scandal runs deeper. Corruption was rampant within FEMDO itself: Mari Carmen Ramírez Rodríguez, the special prosecutor for hydrocarbons, and Commander Raúl Manrique Miranda are accused of leaking confidential information and accepting millions in bribes from fuel theft networks. Even a federal judge, Elizabeth Muzquiz Pineda, appears to be implicated.
The investigations document how FEMDO officials received between 120,000 and 2 million pesos for providing copies of case files, alerting authorities about raids, and protecting illegal shipments. The case of Raúl Rocha, owner of Miss Universe, exposed this entire network of institutional corruption.
According to Dossier Político, multiple investigations into fuel smuggling are “strangely frozen.” The cases involving former governors of Tabasco, officials from the National Palace during AMLO’s administration, and the connections between government fuel theft and the political elite are simply stalled.
The replacements arrived immediately. César Oliveros Aparicio took over the Specialized Prosecutor’s Office for Organized Crime (FEMDO), and Héctor Elizalde Mora headed the Criminal Investigation Agency. Both are close to Omar García Harfuch and Sheinbaum’s team. Oliveros was involved in a 2023 political espionage scandal revealed by The New York Times, when he requested phone records of political opponents without a court order.
All in less than 24 hours. Gertz Manero left, Ernestina Godoy took over, and the prosecutors investigating government fuel theft were dismissed.
The country’s most sensitive investigations are now in the hands of a completely new team, and apparently, one at the service of the 4T movement.
Source: dossierpolitico.com
