This brought to the table the surname of a family that for decades played a decisive role in the history of drug trafficking in Mexico. The rise of Juan Carlos Valencia, alias 'El 03', within the CJNG is not only explained by his closeness to 'El Mencho', who was his stepfather, but by the surname he carried from birth. Behind the leadership change within the criminal group lies another story, that of Armando Valencia Cornelio, his biological father, founder of the Cartel del Milenio and a key piece to understanding the origin of the criminal network that years later evolved into the CJNG. Who was Armando Valencia Cornelio in Mexican drug trafficking? Armando Valencia Cornelio, also known as 'El Maradona' or 'Juanito', was one of the most prominent names in Mexican drug trafficking in the period prior to the creation of the CJNG. 'El Maradona' is identified as one of the founders and leaders of the Cartel del Milenio, an organization that operated drug trafficking routes mainly in Jalisco, Michoacán, and other areas of the western part of the country. As leader of the Cartel del Milenio, Armando Valencia coordinated drug trafficking routes and articulated a network of regional commanders within the organization. The fall of Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, 'El Mencho', opened a new era within the Cartel de Jalisco Nueva Generación (CJNG), where the name of Juan Carlos Valencia González emerged as the new leader of the criminal group. According to several reports, he suffered from cancer. What relationship united Armando Valencia with 'El Mencho'? Before the formation of the CJNG, Oseguera Cervantes was part of the criminal environment operating under the command of Armando Valencia Cornelio in the western part of the country. In that stage, 'El Mencho' was identified as part of the operational and security structure of the Cartel del Milenio, before his subsequent rise within the organizations that emerged after the fragmentation of that group. After the capture of 'El Maradona' and other leaders of that organization, internal fractures emerged that later allowed the rise of Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes and the subsequent formation of the CJNG. The relationship between both was also linked by the family environment. Rosalinda González Valencia, mother of Juan Carlos Valencia González, married Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, which connected the former leader of the Cartel del Milenio to the later leader of the CJNG. That network was also related to the growth of Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, 'El Mencho', within drug trafficking in the western part of the country. After his arrest in 2003, Armando Valencia Cornelio remained imprisoned in Mexico and was later sent to the US, where he was released in 2020. After his capture in August 2003 during an Army operation in Jalisco, the organization weakened and then fragmented. A 2015 report from the US Department of the Treasury indicates that the CJNG emerged from the remnants of that criminal organization after the capture of Armando Valencia Cornelio and his successors. His surname became linked to a criminal structure that later articulated with 'Los Cuinis', a group identified as the financial arm of the CJNG, and with Rosalinda González Valencia, a central piece of that family environment.
