Mexico needs a financial police to fight drug trafficking: Roberti

Mexico should create a financial police to attack the financial structure of criminal organizations and their money laundering operations, said Franco Roberti, Italy's anti-mafia and anti-terrorism prosecutor.

In an interview with EL UNIVERSAL during his visit to meet officials from the Attorney General's Office (PGR), Roberti said that Mexico's government should: 1) undertake more technical investigations conducted through wiretaps; 2) use undercover agents to know the dynamics of the criminal organizations and 3) seize their assets and use them for public programs.

He stressed the importance of conducting investigations with the help of “repented” members of criminal organizations and added that Mexico should create a program to protect them and their families once their statements are confirmed through wiretaps.

Roberti explained that his visit is the beginning of a legal cooperation process between Italy and Mexico to fight organized crime.

He also said that Italy is investigating contacts between the Ndrangheta, a mafia-type criminal organization of Calabria, and representatives of a Mexican drug cartel and added that Mexican cartels are very dangerous and aggressive and are not in a recessive mode.