APTEPOZTLAN, Mexico: Latin Grammy winner Ramon Ayala was rounded up during a raid on a drug cartel’s Christmas party in a wealthy gated community, a lavish night that showed the audacity of traffickers in gathering despite being hounded by police.
A spokesman for the federal Attorney General’s Office said Monday the Texas-based Ayala was released after being questioned Saturday following a military operation that is part of the government’s campaign to crack down on drug gangs. Authorities found no grounds for charging him with a crime, the spokesman said.
Mexican norteno bands often sing about drug trafficking and violence and many have been rumored to perform at drug traffickers’ weddings and other parties, but few have been caught.
Ayala and his norteno band, Los Bravos del Norte, were performing in a gated community of mansions outside the mountain town of Tepoztlan when sailors raided the house and a shootout ensued before dawn Friday, said the official, who was not authorized to be quoted by name.
Three gunmen were killed and 11 others suspected of working for the Beltran Leyva drug cartel were detained, and $280,000 in cash and 16 automatic rifles were seized, the navy said.
Stray bullets shattered the windows of a nearby home where Maura Cristina Lopez works as a maid. She said she was shocked at the violence in the bucolic neighborhood, where troops in trucks patroled Monday.
“It’s always been quiet,” she said. “This scares me.”
