Alleged leader of Mexican kidnapping ring released after nearly 20 years in prison

MEXICO CITY (AP) — The alleged leader of an infamous Mexican kidnapping ring walked out of a maximum security prison after nearly 20 years Friday, hours after a judge said there wasn’t sufficient evidence to support the charges holding him.

Interior Secretary Rosa Icela Rodríguez on Friday rattled off a list of appeals, injunctions and complaints filed over the years of Israel Vallarta’s imprisonment in a case that never arrived at a verdict.

Vallarta had been charged with organized crime and kidnapping, but a judge tossed those out Thursday.

The Attorney General’s Office did not immediately respond as to whether it would appeal.

Vallarta was arrested in 2005, along with his girlfriend French citizen Florence Cassez.

Cassez was eventually convicted and sentenced to 60 years on charges of aiding a kidnapping ring, in a case that soured relations between Paris and Mexico City.

She acknowledged living with Vallarta at a ranch where kidnap victims were being held, but professed her innocence, saying she was unaware of their presence. One victim identified her as a kidnapper, but by voice only rather than by sight.

A day after Cassez was arrested, police had forced her to take part in a staged raid on the ranch purportedly to rescue hostages and arrest suspects. It was covered by the media and broadcast on television.

In January 2013 the Supreme Court overturned Cassez’s conviction due to procedural and rights violations. She was released and became a cause celebre in France.