Ex-aide: Zetas boss couldn't sleep until he killed

SAN ANTONIO - Miguel Treviño Morales, the feared Zetas drug cartel leader who was arrested Monday, couldn't sleep at night unless he killed, said a former hit man for the gang.

Treviño Morales loved to hunt, be it deer or people, said Rosalio Reta, a so-called teenage "sicario," or hit man, who gained notoriety for his participation in a string of U.S. murders allegedly ordered by the cartel leader.

In a 2011 jailhouse interview, Reta agreed to talk about his former boss, who recruited him when he was 13, as long as his name wasn't published until after Treviño Morales' death or arrest.

Early Monday morning, a Mexican navy helicopter tracked the 40-year-old leader, known by his radio call sign "El 40," on a rural road near the Texas line, Mexican officials said, leading to the arrest of a man whose bloodthirstiness was known on both sides of the border.

"He can't sleep, he's got to kill something," said Reta, 23, during the interview at the Gib Lewis Unit in East Texas where he's serving 70 years for two murders in Laredo. "He has to like what he sees in order to kill. He'd rather kill a horse or a cow than a bull-(expletive) deer."

In Mexico's brutal drug war, where mutilations and torture are commonplace, it's difficult to claim that one gang's brutality rises above the rest. But officials said Treviño Morales, who is wanted on five murder charges in Laredo and has been tied in court documents to another six between 2005 and 2010, is one of the worst.

Intelligent, ruthless

Interviews with Reta and law enforcement officials, as well as courtroom testimony given by Treviño Morales' former associates, describe both an intelligent and ruthless criminal who led a gang that smuggled drugs, engaged in a range of criminal activities and laundered tens of millions of dollars in the U.S.

Treviño Morales climbed the ranks from a small-time criminal in Nuevo Laredo to the head of his country's largest cartel, with tentacles across the Americas.

In the U.S., "El 40" is accused of racketeering, drug smuggling, money laundering and murder.

Waiting in the wings: 'El 42' sits next in line to Zetas throne

On Monday, Eduardo Sanchez, spokesman on security issues for the Mexican government, told reporters that Treviño Morales is wanted in that country on charges of taking part in organized crime, homicide, torture, money laundering, arms smuggling and the kidnapping and slaughter of nearly 300 Central American immigrants in the northern Mexico town of San Fernando.

The Zetas were formed in the late 1990s by former members of the Mexican special forces special air group, known by the Spanish acronym GAFE. Originally hired by Gulf Cartel leader Osiel Cardenas Guillen as his personal muscle, they were eventually sent to Nuevo Laredo in the early 2000s to secure that city from the encroaching Sinaloa Cartel. A local gang, the Los Tejas, had joined forces with the Sinalaloans, but one disgruntled member, a young Treviño Morales, allied himself with the military-trained mercenaries fighting for the Gulf.

When Wenceslao Tovar first met Treviño Morales in 2005, he testified last year during a federal trial in Laredo, "El 40," or "Cuarenta" in Spanish, was already developing a reputation for brutality.

Tovar and a friend had just committed their first U.S. killing for the Zetas, and they were being promoted to work for the rising star Treviño Morales.

"We were taken to like a farm or a ranch or something like that," Tovar, now 28, testified. "Well, when we got there, I saw Cuarenta there. And he was executing three people. He was cutting their head off. And that's when I met Cuarenta."

Best at everything

Treviño Morales is a criminal mastermind who insists on being the best at everything, Reta said, a superb marksman who never touches drugs and a leader who engenders fierce loyalty among some and extreme hatred from others. He's also completely merciless, Reta said, as he would ask his victims how they wanted to be killed.

"He actually sat down and talked to people like that," Reta said. As he came to enjoy the role of hit man, Reta said he grew close to his boss. They argued, Reta said, because Treviño Morales wanted him as part of his entourage, answering phones, and the teenager wanted a life of excitement - and violence.

In the mid-2000s, Adolfo Treviño, a brother who wasn't involved in the drug trade, was slain in Nuevo Laredo, sending "El 40" on a killing spree, law enforcement officials said. Laredo police detectives have testified in court and written in sworn affidavits that Treviño Morales was behind as many as 12 killings in that city between 2005 and 2010.

Financial empire

Recent court cases have shown that he also built a financial empire north of the border.

In the first half of 2012, U.S. officials seized assets worth millions of dollars that they claim belonged to money launderers tied to the cartel boss, including residences in San Antonio, McAllen, Kyle, Laredo and South Padre Island.

Federal agents raided ranches and stables in New Mexico and Oklahoma, seizing hundreds of quarter horses, real estate, farm equipment and several aircraft that they said were part of a $60-million money laundering scheme. Treviño Morales' older brother, Jose Treviño, was arrested during the raids.

In May, a jury in Austin convicted Jose Treviño of taking part in his brother's money laundering conspiracy. Weeks later, police in Nuevo Laredo arrested Eduardo Treviño Treviño, a nephew accused of overseeing drug proceed shipments from Chicago, Philadelphia and Dallas that were sent to the border, who was wanted in the U.S. on money laundering and kidnapping charges.

Omar Treviño, the younger sibling of "El 40" and his presumed successor, once bragged that his brother had killed 2,000 people, hundreds of them U.S. citizens, according to court documents.