Authorities arrest infant trafficking cartel leader 'La Diabla'

International joint operations have arrested an infant trafficking ring leader who, according to a press release from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, "lured pregnant women to remote locations, performed illegal cesarean procedures, harvested the organs from the mothers’ bodies, and sold the newborns to couples in the U.S. for up to 250,000 pesos [$13,000 USD]"

Key Takeaways:

• An infant trafficking ringleader from Mexico has been arrested; her arrest is the latest among female traffickers working for violent cartels.

• The crimes were brutal, as pregnant women were lured to their deaths, their children cut out of their wombs and sold, while their own organs were harvested.

• Sadly, human trafficking and organ trafficking are large criminal enterprises.

The Details: 

The U.S. Office of the Director of National Intelligence (NCTC Intel) announced that it arrested trafficking ring leader Martha Alicia Mendez Aguilar, known as “La Diabla” (Spanish for “the devil”) during a joint operation between U.S. and Mexican law enforcement officials in Juarez, Mexico. 

According to NCTC Intel, Aguilar is affiliated with the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), a transnational criminal organization, designated by the Trump administration as a foreign terrorist organization. The Center Square reports that CJNG operates in all 50 states across the U.S. and internationally.

CJNG, like several other violent cartels based in Central and South America, often collaborates with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and other international terrorist networks like Hezbollah and Hamas, while profiting from drug trafficking, human smuggling and trafficking, money laundering, and other illicit markets.

“This is one example of what terrorist cartels will do to diversify their revenue streams and finance operations,” stated NCTC Director Joe Kent in a press release, which gave additional details:

The arrest was supported by U.S. Marshals Service (USMS) El Paso, the U.S. Department of State’s Diplomatic Security Service (DSS), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) El Paso, and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and executed by Mexican law enforcement partners and Fiscalia Especializada en la Mujer (the Special Prosecutor’s Office for Women).

Counterterrorism operations on both sides of the U.S.-Mexican border are coordinated by the Homeland Security Task Force (HSTF), which was established by the Attorney General and the Secretary of Homeland Security based on direction in Executive Order 14159 signed by President Trump.

The Trafficking of Children

The Center Square reports that Aguilar's arrest is the latest among female traffickers working for violent cartel organizations, many of whom are involved in the trafficking of children.

The targeting of vulnerable pregnant women and mothers is not new. In 2015, Vice News reported allegations of child trafficking, citing dozens of cases of illegal adoptions of newborns who were trafficked from Mexico and sold in the U.S. for up to $20,000 each.

In 2021, the Guardian reported allegations of at least 70 infants sold for upwards of $40,000 each to American buyers through a human trafficking ring who lured pregnant women from the Marshall Islands to the United States.   

The Red Market

The United States and Canada are among the top participants of organ transplant tourists (those who travel abroad for cheaper access to organs for transplant surgery), a market which often involves preying on vulnerable populations for the procurement of harvested organs. 

Although exact amounts are unclear, it is estimated that the illegal trading of harvested human organs, otherwise known as the “Red Market,” produces an annual revenue up to $1.7 billion.

Live Action News has reported on allegations of forced sterilization, abortion, and the recent expansion of organ harvesting by the CCP. Reports of cartel organizations' growing involvement in the Red Market escalated during the recent migrant crisis. According to the United Nation’s Inter-Agency Coordination Group against Trafficking in Persons (ICAT), males are estimated to account for 82% of victims whose organs are harvested by trafficking networks. 

In 2023, National Geographic investigative journalist Mariana van Zeller sought to investigate claims of the black market for organs along the U.S./Mexico border. In the documentary, “Black Market Organs,” California-based infectious disease doctor specializing in organ transplants, Peter Chin-Hong, estimated the baseline of the market in the U.S. to be at least 10%, but believed the actual number to be much higher. 

During interviews, cartel leaders described conducting compatibility matches; this was also cited by surviving victims of CCP concentration camps before the Texas legislature in 2023. After traveling to Columbia and Mexico to investigate, van Zeller stated, “If I had doubts that the red trade existed in Columbia, I have none that it’s thriving here in Mexico.”

Traffickers claim the majority of purchasers for organs are from the U.S., Canada, and Italy, and that they are willing to pay up to $200,000 per organ. 

The Bottom Line: 

For years, Live Action and Live Action News have discussed allegations of organ harvesting by Planned Parenthood and by some in academia (like the University of Pittsburgh).

The United States is also a top ‘global reproductive destination’ for surrogacy and IVF. In the U.S., both women and babies are often treated as commodities by big abortion and surrogacy agencies all for the sake of profits. 

Exploitation and deaths at the hands of Big Abortion and Big Fertility are part of the culture of death, as are the savagery seen in transnational criminal organizations. But in the U.S., only atrocities done at the hands of transnational criminal organizations is strategically opposed by the government, despite the brutal treatment and deaths of the victims involved.