In July 2019, two Israeli figures from the underworld sat with Vanessa Ballar Fallas at a restaurant in Mexico City. At one point during their meeting, Ballar Fallas took a phone call and moments later two attackers approached the table and shot both men at close range. Ballar Fallas then rose calmly, walked out of the restaurant and disappeared – until now.
According to reports from Mexico, Ballar Fallas was arrested on Thursday for allegedly plotting the murder of the two men. The couple, Alon Azulay and Benjamin Yeshurun Sutchi, were reportedly in Mexico City to collect a $ 14.5 million money laundering debt she had with them. But the dark deal was entwined with Mexico City’s brutal cartels, and the men were aware that they were in danger before the rally.
Messages on cell phones recovered on site – a restaurant in the upscale Plaza Arts Mall – reportedly revealed that the victims only agreed to meet in person when it all happened in a crowded public place. Ballar Fallas reserved the table where Azulay and Sutchi were shot, and was there to meet them before all hell broke loose in the building. A cell phone from the incident showed panicky diners hiding under the tables from the gunfire.
Ballar Fallas, nicknamed “La Güera”, is believed by investigators to have lured Sutchi and Azulay to the restaurant with the promise of giving them millions of dollars in laundered money. In a statement on Friday, the Attorney General of Mexico City reportedly described her as a “ trusted partner ” of the leadership of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, which has been blamed for organizing the murders.
The newspaper The universal reported that the Jalisco New Generation Cartel had attempted to use the two Israelis to launder the millions but came to believe the two would not give their share, so it allegedly arranged the hit job using Ballar Fallas and hired weapons.
At the time of the murders, the gunmen were called Esperanza Gutierrez, a 33-year-old woman, and 23-year-old man Mauricio Hiram. They are both believed to have belonged to the Tláhuac Cartel, which is said to be affiliated with the larger Jalisco New Generation Cartel. Gutierrez was arrested shortly after the July 2019 hit, while Hiram was only tracked down and arrested in September of that year.
The Israeli embassy in Mexico said the two dead men had previous criminal records in both Israel and Mexico, and Mexican police noted that the evidence suggested the shooting was linked to a financial dispute between criminal groups linked to the Israeli mafia.
“The event yesterday leads us to link the facts with a settlement of scores among criminal groups and / or organized crime,” Ulíses Lara López, a spokesman for the city’s prosecutor’s office, said in 2019. a complete identification [of the victims] possible, along with their criminal record. “
In August 2019, Mexico asked Interpol for help finding Ballar Fallas. On Thursday, a year and eight months after allegedly mastering the deadly job, she was finally tracked down in Mexico City.