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"We have more leads, more witnesses and sources to talk to than we can probably handle right now."
For years, fear stopped informers from dialing the hot line, so that is a big change. But it appears to remain business as usual on the border — good business for drug runners.
"We still see tremendous amounts of cocaine coming across the border," Hook told ABCNEWS' Nightline.
"And, not much has changed at all.
"Volume really hasn't changed," he added. "No change in the [U.S. street] price."
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New Kingpins
In fact, the Tijuana newspaper Zeta reports the Arellano family business is stronger than ever. Publisher Jesus Blancornelas, also author of a new book on the history of the Arellanos, believes that the younger members of
the clan already have stepped in to take their place of their dead or captured older brothers. "I think they'll be smarter," Blancornelas said through a translator. "They have seen their brothers in action and have learned from their mistakes and the unity is stronger."
Blancornelas is still protected by a dozen armed guards he's had since the Arellanos tried to kill him back in 1997. He escaped an assassination attempt that killed his driver. Now, after the arrest and the inevitable trial of Benjamin, there are others who are afraid, he says, perhaps
including Mexican politicians with ties to Arellano Felix.
"Benjamin Arellano respects those who arrested him, but he'll accuse those who he bought to protect him," Blancornelas said. "There will be vengeance by death or by accusation." While some politicians may worry Arellano will talk, others who once worked for the cartel believe it was time
for the brothers to go.
"There are people much more powerful than the Arellanos who feel a sense of relief that they're out of the picture now," said a former cartel employee "Steve," who asked ABCNEWS to conceal his true identity. "They
can deal in more of a peaceful way … and in a more of a calculated way, not the old OK-Corral shoot-out type of thing. In other words, becoming more sophisticated. The Arellanos were becoming the dinosaur of the cartel
era."
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