Oregon gun supplier linked to downing of military helicopter in Mexico by cartel boss 'El Mencho'
Beth Warren
Louisville Courier Journal
PORTLAND, Ore. – A joint Mexico-U.S. investigation linked a weapon used to blast a Mexican military helicopter out of the sky to a supplier from Oregon, federal firearms officials confirmed to The Courier Journal, part of the USA TODAY Network.
Eight Mexican soldiers with SEDENA, Mexico's national defense, and one Mexican police officer died in the 2015 crash on a mission to arrest top U.S. target El Mencho, the world's most powerful cartel boss. But the link between the incident and Portland, Oregon, had not been made public until now.
Erik Flores Elortegui, a Mexican native and U.S. citizen who lived in Portland, now tops the Most Wanted list of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and is blamed for supplying cartel members with a belt-fed .50-caliber semiautomatic rifle, said Jason Chudy, spokesman for the ATF's Seattle Field Division, which includes Oregon.
The short summary under his photo on the ATF's website mentions an indictment charging the 40-year-old fugitive with illegally buying weapons and smuggling them out of the U.S., but it doesn't describe the ensuing death toll.
More:
https://www.registerguard.com/story/news/nation/2022/10/27/oregon-man-tied-downing-helicopter-el-mencho-cartel/10614394002/