Texas DPS busts El Paso cartel cell tied to firearms seizure, border migrant smuggling

A traffic stop for speeding on Country Club Road began a Texas Department of Public Safety investigation resulting in the seizure of an arsenal and four arrests tied to an alleged drug cartel-linked human smuggling cell in El Paso.

The men allegedly served as heavily-armed security and scouts for a migrant smuggling ring in El Paso and Sunland Park, New Mexico, with ties to the Nuevo Cartel de Juárez (New Juárez Cartel) and La Linea cartel, Texas DPS officials said recently.

Texas DPS said that investigators seized 10 firearms, body armor and thousands of rounds of ammunition and collected cellphone and social media photos and videos of armed and body-armored gunmen "paying tribute to La Linea Cartel."

One of the videos was filmed in the parking lot of a Circle K gas station in El Paso's Upper Valley, according to Texas DPS and federal criminal complaint documents filed by U.S. Homeland Security Investigations.

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On Oct. 12, an unregistered short-barrel AR-15 rifle and a high-capacity ammo drum were found when a state trooper pulled over a speeding white Range Rover driven by Adam Isaiah Ramirez, an alleged member of La Linea, according to a criminal complaint affidavit.

Texas DPS suspected Ramirez, 27, was involved in migrant smuggling and had driven the Range Rover as a scout vehicle in a previous encounter resulting in the arrest of 12 undocumented migrants, documents stated.

Ramirez was allowed to go free after the traffic stop, but an investigation was just starting by special agents of the Texas DPS Criminal Investigations Division assigned to Operation Lone Star as well as U.S. Immigration and Custom Enforcement's Homeland Security Investigations, New Mexico State Police and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

Ramirez, along with Edmundo Rodriguez Padilla, 24, Gustavo Alexis Enriquez Acosta, 23, and Lorena Anyla Enriquez Acosta, 28, were later arrested on various state and federal drug, weapons and conspiracy charges, DPS officials said.

Gustavo is the brother of Lorena Enriquez Acosta, who is the girlfriend of Ramirez. The three reside at a home on Valley Plum Avenue in the Upper Valley, stated a complaint affidavit by a Texas DPS special agent.

Ramirez was described as being from Sunland Park during a teleconference court bond hearing.

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Ramirez is identified as a confirmed member of La Linea listed in the Texas gang intelligence database, according to the affidavit. La Linea (The Line) is the name of what was traditionally known as the Juárez drug cartel.

Gustavo Enriquez Acosta, who was a former state police officer in Mexico, and Rodriguez Padilla are undocumented immigrants from Mexico, DPS officials and court documents stated.

Though Texas laws allow almost anyone to openly carry a gun, Ramirez, as a confirmed gang member, is prohibited by state law from being in possession of a firearm as are persons illegally in the United States under federal law.

Bailout at Downtown El Paso bus station

Days after the traffic stop, Texas DPS investigators obtained a warrant to arrest Ramirez on the prohibited weapons charge for the rifle found at the Oct. 12 traffic stop. DPS also got a search warrant for his home on Valley Plum Avenue.

On Oct. 20, DPS agents saw Ramirez driving a white GMC Sierra Denali 2500 pickup while learning from Border Patrol that about 10 migrants were in a "known high smuggling area waiting to be picked up," the complaint stated.

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State troopers later saw the GMC on a road entering El Paso from New Mexico and attempted to pull it over for a traffic stop, but it continued for about five blocks until a bailout at the Greyhound bus station in Downtown.

Two men wearing black, and suspected of being undocumented, ran out the rear doors and fled. The driver, Ramirez, and the front passenger, Gustavo Enriquez Acosta, were detained and were allegedly in possession of firearms during the traffic stop.

The same AR-15 rifle from the Oct. 12 arrest was on the floorboard by the driver and another rifle was in the rear center floorboard, documents stated.

Guns, cocaine seized at Upper Valley home

That same day, Lorena Enriquez Acosta and her two children were in the home on Valley Plum Avenue when DPS investigators carried out the search warrant.

Investigators found two handguns in a safe along with ammunition, body armor and two small plastic bags containing a total of four grams of cocaine, which were located out in the open on a table in the garage and a bedroom closet.

Lorena Enriquez Acosta was only booked on a drug possession charge. She was released from the El Paso County Jail Annex on a $250 cash bond on Nov. 8, according to the jail log.

Reputed cartel video filmed in El Paso's Upper Valley

Evidence, photos and videos found on Gustavo Enriquez Acosta's cellphone allegedly linked and identified several members of the smuggling group, including a video allegedly revealing Rodriguez Padilla as one of the men who fled from the traffic stop at the Greyhound bus station.

Investigators found cellphone photos of alleged ring members "escorting and protecting both vehicle loads and stash houses while being heavily armed with rifles, body armor and tactical equipment," stated the HSI criminal complaint.

Rodriguez Padilla, who is an undocumented migrant from Mexico, "can be observed in several images to be dressed in body armor, tactical equipment to include full combat load of high round capacity magazines, with an automatic rifle slung across his body."

The complaint stated that Rodriguez Padilla is in dark-colored body armor, tactical equipment and holding a rifle in one video taken in the parking lot of the Circle K store at the intersection of Doniphan Drive and Sunland Park Drive. Rodriguez Padilla was arrested and booked into jail on Oct. 27.

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Ramirez, Gustavo Enriquez Acosta and Rodriguez Padilla face federal charges of conspiracy to transport and harbor undocumented migrants, according to federal court documents.

Rodriguez Padilla also faces a federal charge of interstate possession of a firearm and ammunition by an undocumented person. Records show Ramirez and Enriquez Acosta bonded out of jail on the state case. Rodriguez Padilla remains in custody.

This article originally appeared on El Paso Times: Texas DPS: El Paso smuggling cell tied to cartel video, firearms bust