Colombia Arrests Two Tren de Aragua Leaders Wanted by the United States

Colombian authorities captured two alleged senior leaders of the Tren de Aragua criminal organization in Manizales, President Abelardo de la Espriella announced.

The operation, named Titan, was carried out by Colombia’s national police through its intelligence and elite anti-kidnapping units, the president said. The detainees were identified as Richard José Espinal Quintero, known as El Coti, and Henderzon Adrián Villarroel Luque, known as El Patón.

De la Espriella described Espinal Quintero as the fourth-ranking Tren de Aragua leader in Colombia. The group’s criminal structure operates between the Caribbean coast and the Coffee Axis, one of the country’s main tourist regions. The president said Espinal Quintero maintained criminal alliances for cocaine and weapons trafficking and had been wanted since 2023 under a red notice from Interpol.

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Today, in Manizales, our national police, through Dipol and Gaula-Elite, captured two important leaders of this transnational terrorist organization in Operation Titan.

Villarroel Luque faces allegations of trafficking weapons and coordinating logistics for cocaine shipments to Central America, the United States and Europe. Both men appear on the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control list of Specially Designated Nationals and Blocked Persons.

The arrests follow the capture last week of Luis Saúl Pérez Nieto, who Colombian authorities accuse of leading Tren de Aragua operations in Peru and serving as a trusted associate of the gang’s founder, known as Niño Guerrero. The founder died in June during an operation in Venezuela.

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This criminal maintained alliances for cocaine and weapons trafficking and had been a fugitive since 2023 with an Interpol red notice.