Alfredo Castillo

A federal judge sentenced a Mexican drug trafficker to 22 years in prison for shipping 276 kilos of cocaine to Chicago hidden in railway cars in a case that highlighted the city's role as a hub for distributing tons of cocaine throughout the United States from 1998 to 2008.

Soldiers and police arrested 83 suspected vigilantes on Friday on charges of carrying unauthorised weapons, including one of the founders of the "self-defence" movement in Mexico's western Michoacan state, authorities said.

A federal judge sentenced a Mexican drug trafficker to 22 years in prison for shipping 276 kilos of cocaine to Chicago hidden in railway cars in a case that highlighted the city's role as a hub for distributing tons of cocaine throughout the United States from 1998 to 2008.

Soldiers and police arrested 83 suspected vigilantes on Friday on charges of carrying unauthorised weapons, including one of the founders of the "self-defence" movement in Mexico's western Michoacan state, authorities said.