Adrián Alonso Guerrero Covarrubias, alias “El 08,” a regional leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) and godson of the late Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes (“El Mencho”), managed to evade a Mexican Army operation in the municipality of Ocotlán, Jalisco. He escaped after his security detail stayed behind to engage a military unit—allowing him to flee in an armored Ford SUV, which bore Florida license plates and had been reported stolen.
According to federal sources, the vehicle in which the criminal leader was traveling was later found abandoned in the neighboring municipality of Atotonilco el Alto. During the confrontation that took place last Thursday in Ocotlán, two gunmen working for Guerrero Covarrubias were killed, and a third gunman—a Honduran national—was arrested. A military service member and a female civilian who happened to be in the area were also wounded.
Adrián Alonso Guerrero Covarrubias heads an armed wing known as “Los Guerreros” within the CJNG structure, maintaining operational control over northwestern Michoacán, as well as parts of southern Jalisco and Zacatecas.
Although he was arrested by federal authorities in 2019, a complicit judge ordered his release. Furthermore, he appears on the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s sanctions list for his involvement in the illegal trafficking of weapons from U.S. territory into Mexico.
