FBI Documents Connect Aryan Brotherhood with Mexican Cartels

News coverage of the assassinations of Kaufman County, TX Assistant District Attorney Mark Hasse, District Attorney Mike McLelland, and McLelland's wife Cynthia has turned to the alleged involvement of a group named the Aryan Brotherhood (AB).

Considering McLelland was part of a task force that investigated the Aryan Brotherhood, and in light of the recent killing of Colorado prison chief Tom Clements, allegedly by a member of a white supremacist prison gang, this theory that the AB may have been involved in the murders clearly has some merit.

Yet in that coverage, the mainstream media has gone to great lengths to label ad-infinitum the Aryan Brotherhood as a “white supremacist” group, implying a racial motivation. The AB, even if involved at all, however, may have been motivated not by a "white supremacist” philosophy, but rather by something more mundane. Evidence suggests that the Aryan Brotherhood has morphed into what is primarily a drug-trafficking gang, and there is a more frightening possibility: that the Aryan Brotherhood is acting as a conduit, doing the dirty work for a Mexican drug cartel's criminal insurgency into the United States.

In November of last year, for example, an Aryan Brotherhood member went on the record stating that he had helped smuggle hundreds of pounds of methamphetamine across the border from Mexico. According to the Mexican newswire Notimex, the AB member "stated that he had some important connections with Mexican drug cartels."

On Tuesday of this week, a federal task force apprehended an Aryan Brotherhood "general" who "had ounces of crystal methamphetamine" on him at the time of his arrest.

Moreover, since many Republicans and Democrats seek a compromise on immigration reform in short order, it is not surprising that politicians are themselves ignoring the possible connection between the murders and the Mexican cartels, with the notable exception of Governor Rick Perry. After all, if Americans were to find out that the Mexican cartels are operating on U.S. soil, it would likely change the immigration debate and could potentially delay a deal indefinitely.

In fact, ample evidence suggests that the AB does not typically operate under racial motivations, and they have a history of working with the Mexican cartels. On the condition on anonymity, several law enforcement personnel from the FBI and other agencies confirmed with Breitbart News that the Aryan Brotherhood's criminal activities are seldom driven by race; their focuses are drug and sex trafficking, as well as murder-for-hire.

The FBI has declassified 156 pages of internal documents that shed light on the inner workings of the Aryan Brotherhood from its inception in the late 1960s through the 1980s. The documents show that the AB is known for engaging in brutal, high-profile killings to impress upon foreign narcotics cartels and other organized crime groups that they are the best organization to handle a domestic US ground game.

The clearest analysis of the AB’s motivations are revealed on page 56:

The purpose of the AB is now power and is not a racial organization as it has been deemed in the past. The AB’s continue to be aligned with members of the Mexican Mafia (EME) and certain motorcycle type inmates. [emphasis added]

This passage refers to the same US-based Mexican Mafia verifiably operating as hitmen and narcotics traffickers for various Mexican Drug cartels. It is the same US-based group that was hired by the Tijuana Cartel to assassinate the head of the Sinaloa Cartel, killing a priest in the process. The FBI documents reveal that the AB has kept an alliance with the US-based Mexican Mafia since 1968. The Mexican Mafia has used the AB as hitmen.

The National Gang Intelligence Center (NGIC), a Congressionally-mandated effort led by the FBI, reports that the AB works directly with Mexican cartels. The FBI’s 2011 NGIC report states:

MDTOs (Mexican Drug Trafficking Organizations) use street and prison gang members in Mexico, Texas, and California to protect smuggling routes, collect debts, transport illicit goods, including drugs and weapons, and execute rival traffickers...

The report specifically names the Aryan Brotherhood as working with the Mexican drug trafficking groups.

The lack of racial motivations for the AB is also indicated by the handbook of another prison-based organized crime group known as the Aryan Circle. The Aryan Circle is a splinter group that, by their own admission, broke away from the AB due to a the AB’s lack of racial motivations.

Other declassified FBI documents reveal the Aryan Circle’s handbook to assert:

The organization [Aryan Circle] was put together by a group of men who were fed up with other organizations within the system who claimed to be for the White race, but were in reality nothing more than radical prison gangs.

Another clear indicator of the lack of racial motivations or operational restrictions regarding the AB was reported in a 2010 article by the Hispanic news source La Opinion. They quoted Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department’s Eric Ruble as stating:

In prison, divisions and racial problems are still strong, but on the street, the structure is different. Now it’s based on a union of power and economics where racial divisions are unnecessary.

The 156 pages of declassified FBI documents also reveal that the AB has an alliance with La Costra Nostra, otherwise known as the Italian mob. There is evidence on Page 41 that the AB has served as the Italian mob's hitmen inside prison walls. Also, according to the documents, the Aryan Brotherhood comprised an elite "hit squad" for assassinations that took place on the outside.

It is also revealed on page 43 of the FBI documents that a Thai national solicited the Aryan Brotherhood to assist him with a heroin running business.

The publicly available documents illustrate that the Aryan Brotherhood has aggressively pursued alliances with larger and more powerful crime organizations throughout its history. They have smuggled, trafficked, and killed on behalf of groups of all shapes, sizes, and ethnicities in order to turn a profit. They are hired guns (or fists, or knives, or prison shanks, depending on the situation).

It would be convenient for the media if the brutality in Texas turns out to be at the hands of a "white supremacist" group acting alone and on racial grounds. What would be less convenient is if a "white supremacist" group turned out to be working in conjunction with Mexican drug cartels in the middle of a politically charged debate on U.S. immigration policy.

Photo: MS-13 is another independent gang which works for Mexico's Sinaloa cartel.
Image credit: BorderLandBeat

Originally posted on Breitbart.com.