Drug Cartel Hires Texas Teens as Hitmen

Houston Chronicle ^ | 4/15/2007 | Sharon Steinman

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LAREDO — If the teenage hitman had stayed locked up in his concrete cell after the first murder, maybe Moises Garcia would still sing goofy Spanish songs to his son.

Maybe Noe Lopez, a 27-year-old father of four, wouldn't be buried under a sapling in the city cemetery.

Maybe.

If a judge hadn't reduced Gabriel Cardona's bail after the second murder charge, perhaps Mariano Resendez would be close to finishing his junior year of high school.

If the justice of the peace hadn't decreased Cardona's bail on another murder charge and a charge of engaging in organized crime from a total of $3 million to $200,000, maybe Jesus Maria Resendez would still take his nephew Mariano fishing.

Maybe.

But the judge, the justice of the peace and to a degree the Webb County District Attorney's Office didn't keep Cardona, a Martin High School dropout, locked up in Webb County Jail.

Instead, court records show, Cardona, who already was in jail on murder and kidnapping charges, made bail twice, allowing him to get out and go on two killing sprees on the orders of a leader of the Gulf drug-smuggling cartel in Nuevo Laredo.

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One of these guys has already pleaded guilty to a couple of hits.

I remember reading once that drug gangs in the N.E were using even younger kids as assassins because they were juveliles and couldn't be jailed for life. Don't know if that was true.