Beltran Leyva gunmen in El Salto, Durango in 2012
The Beltran Leyva Cartel which a Mexican drug cartel and organized crime syndicate that was active from 2008 to 2014. The cartel was led by the brothers Marcos Arturo, Carlos Beltran Leyva, Alfredo, and Hector. The cartel split from the larger Sinaloa Cartel, and it sold cocaine, heroin, and marijuana (producing the second two). The Sinaloa Cartel, La Familia Michoacana, Gulf Cartel, and MS-13 went to war with the cartel, which allied with Los Mazatlecos, Los Zetas, the Juarez Cartel, the Independent Cartel of Acapulco, the Knights Templar Cartel, and the Tijuana Cartel. The Sinaloa Cartel infiltrated the Mexican law enforcement system and played an important role in bringing down the Beltran-Leyva Cartel, and all of its major leaders were dead or in jail by 2011. Alfredo gave control of the cartel to Fausto Isidro Meza Flores in 2012, and he engaged in a bloody war with the Sinaloa Cartel under El Chapo. The group soon fragmented into Los Mazatlecos, Los Negros, the Independent Cartel of Acapulco, La Barredora, Los Rojos, and Los Pelones.
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