Mexico confirms capture of drug cartel kingpin

MEXICO CITY – A former police officer who allegedly admitted to ordering 1,500 killings during a campaign of terror as a drug gang chieftain along the U.S. border has been captured in northern Mexico, federal officials said Sunday.

Jose Antonio Acosta Hernandez also is a suspect in last year’s slaying of a U.S. consulate employee near a border crossing in Ciudad Juarez.

Mexican President Felipe Calderon said through his Twitter account that Acosta’s capture is “the biggest blow” to organized crime in Ciudad Juarez since he sent about 5,000 federal police to the city in April 2010 to try to curb violence in one of the world’s most dangerous cities.

Acosta, 33, was caught Friday in the northern city of Chihuahua along with his bodyguard, said Ramon Pequeno, head of the federal police anti-drug unit. Without offering details on the capture, he said the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration helped by providing information. Acosta’s arrest was not confirmed until Sunday, just before officials displayed him to journalists in Mexico City.

Pequeno said at the news conference that Acosta, nicknamed “El Diego,” told federal police he ordered 1,500 killings. Investigators believe he was the mastermind of an attack last year that killed a U.S. consulate employee, her husband and the husband of another consulate worker in Ciudad Juarez, he said.

Pequeno said he expects an extradition request from the U.S. government.

Mexican authorities have identified Acosta as head of La Linea, a gang of hit men and corrupt police officers who act as enforcers for the Juarez Cartel.