Mexican cartel leader “El Gato” faces new federal indictment, death penalty for 2013 Southlake murder
By Marissa Armas
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Texas (KTVT) — He was one of the FBI’s ten most wanted fugitives; now federal prosecutors have filed their fifth superseding indictment against Mexican cartel leader José Rodolfo Villareal-Hernández, also known as ‘El Gato.’
Villareal-Hernández is connected to a 2013 Southlake murder and is facing a new charge.
The violent crime at Southlake’s popular Townsquare shook the community over a decade ago. Now, 12 years later, Villareal-Hernández, who is accused of orchestrating that murder, is charged with conspiracy to commit murder-for-hire, interstate stalking, and now, continuing criminal enterprise.
“A rival drug cartel that was responsible for the death of the defendant’s father,” Paul Coggins, former United States attorney, said. “So, there was a long-held plot of revenge at the heart of this indictment, at the heart of this story.”
Authorities said that in May 2013, Villareal-Hernández, who was part of the Beltran Leyva Organization cartel, ordered the hit on Juan Jesús Guerrero Chapa in Southlake. Guerrero Chapa was allegedly a lawyer for a rival cartel.
Authorities said Gurrero Chapa was gunned down while sitting in his vehicle. He had been in the area shopping with his wife.
While others were convicted, Villareal-Hernández remained on the run for years. He was finally arrested in Mexico in 2023 and extradited to the U.S. this past February.
“It just shows the lengths that the federal government will go to, the federal government, the state government, will go to in a case like this, in a murder case, in a murder for hire case,” Coggins said.
Coggins added that if a jury finds Villareal-Hernández guilty on the murder-for-hire charge, he is death penalty eligible.
“Then they move to a special sentencing hearing where the jury considers you know, all these factors that cut against death penalty and in favor of death penalty, and the basic factor, the underlying factor, is did the defendant intend to kill someone, and was it premeditated?” said Coggins.
Villareal-Hernández’s arraignment is set for Oct. 29 in Fort Worth.
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