The Attorney General’s Office of the State of Sinaloa confirmed that Dámaso Castro Zaavedra, the state’s Deputy Attorney General, submitted a request today for unpaid leave from the position he had held since October 2021. He stated that he would make himself available to address any institutional requests directed to him through legal channels and in strict adherence to the legal framework.
In a brief statement, the Attorney General’s Office (FGE) announced that the request submitted by the now-officer-on-leave is grounded in Articles 1 and 8 of the Political Constitution of the United Mexican States; Article 123, Section B, Fraction XIII; as well as Articles 141, 142, and 148 of the Political Constitution of the State of Sinaloa, in addition to the provisions outlined in the Organic Law of the State Attorney General’s Office.
Claudia Sánchez Kondo, the State Attorney General, had reported just yesterday that Deputy Attorney General Dámaso Castro Zaavedra remained active in his duties, although the possibility of removing him from office was already being weighed to avoid hindering the investigations opened by the Federal Attorney General’s Office (FGR).
In addition to former Governor Rubén Rocha Moya and the Mayor of Culiacán, Juan de Dios Gámez Mendívil, other officials have also requested leave from their posts.
In the case of the Deputy Attorney General, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York accuses him of “receiving monthly bribes from ‘Los Chapitos’ in exchange for offering protection to members of that criminal group—specifically to help them avoid arrest—and for providing information regarding operations targeting clandestine laboratories.”
Dámaso Castro Zaavedra was one of 26 candidates who, in 2024, sought to assume leadership of the State Attorney General’s Office, replacing Sara Bruna Quiñónez Estrada. She had become implicated in alleged mishandling of the case file regarding the murder of the former Rector of the Autonomous University of Sinaloa, Héctor Melesio Cuén Ojeda—a case that was subsequently taken over by the Federal Attorney General’s Office (FGR). Following the crime perpetrated against Cuén Ojeda in July 2024, the Deputy Attorney General asserted that there had been no omissions in the lines of investigation pursued by the FGE and that they had followed the witness’s account included in the case file.
Furthermore, he was one of the candidates vying to head the FGE following the resignation of Sara Bruna Quiñónez Estrada in August 2024—a resignation that came after the FGR announced inconsistencies in the case file regarding the death of the former president of the Sinaloense Party—a position ultimately filled by Claudia Zulema Sánchez Kondo.
He joined the then-General Attorney’s Office of the State in 1998, where he served as an auxiliary agent of the Public Prosecutor’s Office (common jurisdiction), head of the Specialized Criminal Unit for Property Crimes, and director of the Oral Litigation Unit for the central-north, southern, and central regions.
