Culiacán searches net seven alleged Los Rugrats associates
Publimetro México reports that federal forces arrested seven people, including four relatives of alleged Los Rugrats leader Carlos Alberto Páez Pereda, while executing five search warrants in Culiacán.
Federal forces arrested seven people described by authorities as suspected members or collaborators of Los Rugrats during searches in Culiacán, Sinaloa, including four relatives of alleged leader Carlos Alberto Páez Pereda, known as “Carlitos Rugrats,” according to Publimetro México.
The operation involved five search warrants in Los Becos, Laguna Colorada and Costa Rica. Navy personnel, the federal Security and Citizen Protection Secretariat, the Attorney General’s Office and the National Guard took part.
Publimetro México reported that those arrested included Leslie Dennise Pereda García and Aglaee Ramírez Páez, identified as Páez Pereda’s cousins and described by authorities as suspected logistics operators. Claudia Selene García Ontiveros and Francisco Javier Ramírez Agüero were identified as his aunt and uncle.
The other three detainees were Carlota Murillo Avendaño, María Alejandrina Páez Sainz and Ana Cristina Ramírez Páez. The report did not describe a subsequent court decision concerning the seven arrests.
Authorities reported seizing three long guns, a handgun, magazines, ammunition, two packages of cocaine, additional drug doses, cash and vehicles, including a motorcycle and a Razer-type off-road vehicle. The article did not provide drug weights or a cash total.
U.S. authorities identify Páez Pereda as the alleged leader of Los Rugrats, a group linked to the Los Mayos faction of the Sinaloa Cartel, the outlet reported. It said prosecutors in the Southern District of California brought charges against him on July 7, 2026, involving narcoterrorism, material support for terrorism and trafficking fentanyl, cocaine and methamphetamine into the United States.
The U.S. investigation alleges that he controls drug shipments from Sinaloa toward Tijuana and other border points, and provides money, weapons and logistics support to Los Mayos in its conflict with Los Chapitos. Publimetro also reported that the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned him in September 2025 over alleged drug-trafficking links.
The searches followed the October 13 arrest in Villa Unión, Mazatlán, of José Luis “N,” known as “Wicho,” whom authorities describe as a suspected Los Rugrats financial and logistics operator. He is wanted by U.S. authorities in connection with cocaine-trafficking offenses, according to the report.
Original report: Publimetro México.