Cartel-Run Racetrack Across From Laredo, Texas: U.S. Treasury Sanctions CDN’s ‘La Molienda,’ Nuevo Laredo Boss ‘El Takia’ and a Horseman Who Races in California and New Mexico
The U.S. Treasury on Tuesday, Oct. 13, 2026, sanctioned Club La Molienda, a horse racetrack on the outskirts of Nuevo Laredo, across the river from Laredo, Texas, that it says the Cártel del Noreste (CDN) controls. The action also hit Nuevo Laredo plaza boss Pablo César Guajardo Álvarez, “El Takia,” and a horseman who races at tracks in California and New Mexico. In all, Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) named four people and 11 companies, calling it its “most significant effort to date” against the CDN’s finances.
A racetrack Treasury says Z-40 still controls
According to Treasury, La Molienda charges entry fees to racers and spectators, and CDN leaders buy horses, many from the United States, to run there. Treasury says the track is controlled by Miguel Ángel Treviño Morales, “Z-40,” and overseen by other CDN figures while he is jailed in the U.S. He and his brother Omar, “Z-42,” face drug trafficking, racketeering and money laundering charges in Washington, D.C. Before Mexico suspended Casino Centenario in April, people could bet on La Molienda races from inside that casino, Treasury says.
Treasury calls it a Zetas tradition. Between 2008 and 2012, it says, the brothers’ front men spent $16 million on quarter horses in New Mexico, Oklahoma, California and Texas. The U.S. seized 455 horses in June 2012.
The horseman, the contracts and ‘El Takia’
Treasury calls Gamaliel Garza García a CDN associate who races in Mexico and at prestigious tracks in California and New Mexico. It says his firm, Construcciones y Edificaciones Garza Elías (CEGESA), funneled CDN money to favored candidates and won Nuevo Laredo and Tamaulipas contracts it subcontracted to CDN-linked people. His son, Gamaliel Garza Elías, his Cuadra San Dibanh racing stable and seven other companies, including four fuel and gas firms, were also named.
Treasury says Guajardo, a former leader of the CDN’s hitmen, was arrested in 2020 over the Jan. 4, 2017, killing of Ricardo Martínez Chávez and four public servants, and was later released. It also sanctioned Nuevo Laredo trucking firm Tamex Logistics and dispatcher Francisco Javier Inzunza Partida over two U.S.-bound trailers that it says carried 52 kilos of cocaine hidden in brake drums.
What the sanctions do
Any U.S. property of the people and firms named is frozen, and Americans are generally barred from dealing with them. Sanctions are not criminal charges. Treasury says it coordinated with Mexico’s Financial Intelligence Unit (UIF). For border travelers, see our Nuevo Laredo–Laredo safety guide.
Sources
- U.S. Department of the Treasury, “Treasury Targets Cartel del Noreste’s Horse Racing Enterprise and Expansive Criminal Network,” Oct. 13, 2026
- Photos: U.S. Department of the Treasury, from the same press release (public domain)
Reported Oct. 13, 2026, from Treasury’s announcement. Its descriptions are U.S. government allegations, not court findings and do not mean anyone named has been charged or convicted in connection with this action.