Allegations regarding Kiki Camarena
In October 2013, two former DEA agents and a pilot who allegedly flew for the CIA claimed to the Mexican journal
Proceso and to the US network
Fox News that the CIA had been "complicit" in the murder of DEA agent
Enrique "Kiki" Camarena in 1985 and that Rodríguez had played a role.
[16][17] The alleged motive for the crime was that Camarena had supposedly discovered that the US government had collaborated with the
Guadalajara Cartel in the importation and the transfer of drugs from Colombia to the United States via Mexico to use the proceeds to sponsor the Contras in Nicaragua in its war against the Sandinista government. Phil Jordan, a former director of the El Paso Intelligence Center (EPIC); Héctor Berrellez, a former agent of the United States anti-drug administration who directed Operation Leyenda to clarify the murder; and Tosh Plumlee, allegedly a former pilot for the CIA, claim to have the evidence that the US government itself ordered the execution of Camarena.
[18]
In July 2020, the documentary
The Last Narc shows the testimonies of people like Héctor Berrellez, Phil Jordan, Mike Holm (a member of the DEA for 24 years), Manny Medrano (former assistant US Attorney and lead prosecutor in Camarena case) as well as Camarena's widow and three former police officers and former bodyguards of
Ernesto Fonseca. The documentary explores the claims of the details of the torture and the interrogation, including some of the questions that Rodríguez allegedly asked Camarena in relation to the association that the CIA had allegedly reached with the Guadalajara cartel to bring cocaine into the US, the final goal being to finance the Nicaraguan Contras.
[19][20]
In 2013,
Jack Lawn, a former head of the DEA, and retired Special Agent Jack Taylor, who investigated the murder, said the CIA had no involvement in Camarena's death. Without mentioning any agents by name, Jack Lawn also stated that "this is [a] fable not worthy of individuals who would serve in DEA."
[21] A CIA spokesperson told
Fox News that "it's ridiculous to suggest that the CIA had anything to do with the murder of a U.S. federal agent or the escape of his killer."
[17]