Mexico now after ex-border governor

Tomás Yarrington Ruvalcaba Tomás Yarrington Ruvalcaba Photo: File Photo Photo: File Photo Image 1 of / 9 Caption Close Mexico now after ex-border governor 1 / 9 Back to Gallery

Mexican prosecutors said Wednesday they are seeking to arrest a former border state governor who U.S. officials allege laundered millions of dollars in South Texas.

Mexican Attorney General Marisela Morales said a judge in that country issued an arrest warrant for Tomás Yarrington Ruvalcaba, the disgraced former governor of the state of Tamaulipas.

Yarrington's attorney said the charges are politically motivated.

Morales said Yarrington is wanted for “crimes against health,” a euphemism for organized-crime charges often brought against drug traffickers.

U.S. authorities have said Yarrington, also a former border mayor and congressman who sought a presidential nomination in 2005, laundered millions of dollars in drug-cartel bribes in Texas. He's a fugitive, Morales said.

“At this moment, we have no information as to where he might be,” she said.

Yarrington's attorney in Houston, Joel Androphy, said Wednesday evening it's ironic that Yarrington's being called a fugitive because he was forced to leave the U.S.

“The government told him to leave the country around the time that they were supposedly investigating him. That doesn't make any sense to me,” Androphy said. “If you're under criminal investigation, if you're about to be indicted, the government doesn't say, ‘You can take off now.'”

Androphy said he wasn't aware of any charges against Yarrington in the United States.

The charges against Yarrington, who was governor of Tamaulipas from 1999 to 2004, stem from a joint investigation between the U.S. and Mexico, Morales said.

The two countries have been working together since early this year, investigating whether former officials from Tamaulipas, which borders Texas from Laredo to Brownsville, laundered millions of dollars in San Antonio and other parts of the state.

U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents in February arrested one of Yarrington's alleged front men, Laredo businessman and rancher Antonio Peña Arguelles, at his home in Stone Oak.

In May, a federal grand jury in Brownsville indicted Mexican businessman Fernando Alejandro Cano Martinez on money-laundering charges. Investigators allege Cano helped Yarrington launder bribes and money received through extortion.

Peña Arguelles is in jail awaiting trial in San Antonio. Cano is a fugitive.

Yarrington has denied the allegations on Twitter, in interviews with Mexican media and through an attorney.

Yarrington was a prominent member of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, known by its Spanish acronym PRI, which ruled Mexico for 70 years until it was unseated in 2000.

The allegations against him came ahead of Mexico's July 1 presidential election, threatening the electoral chances of PRI candidate Enrique Peña Nieto. After first claiming the allegations were politically motivated, the PRI moved to expel Yarrington in May. Peña Nieto went on to win the election.

In court documents, U.S. prosecutors allege Yarrington used front men to create dozens of businesses and purchase hundreds of acres in San Antonio and South Texas.

He owned a condo here and in South Padre, prosecutors allege. They're seeking forfeiture of the South Padre condo and 46 acres on San Antonio's North Side.

Androphy denied that Yarrington owned the property, and said the Mexican government had picked a high-profile target in an effort to show it's being tough on crime.

“It just reeks of politics in Mexico,” he said. “It just reeks of someone trying to redirect attention from the real criminal activity in Mexico and try to go after a former politician.”

Mexican media have reported that investigators there secured testimony against Yarrington from several of his associates, including a businessman named Napoleon Rodriguez, who U.S. officials say was Yarrington's front man and owned the South Padre condo.

“All there are, are a bunch of individuals seeking to curry favor with the various governments,” Androphy said.

jbuch@express-news.net

Houston Chronicle Staff Writer Dudley Althaus contributed to this report from Mexico City.