Marcelo Pinheiro, aka Marcelo Piloto, a drug dealer and alleged weapons supplier for Rio de Janeiro's criminal gang the Red Command (CV), is presented to the media after being arrested in Itapua region, in Asuncion, Paraguay December 14, 2017. REUTERS/Jorge Adorno 
 
 RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) - Brazil’s most wanted arms trafficker, an alleged weapons supplier for Rio de Janeiro’s biggest criminal gang the Red Command (CV), was captured in southern Paraguay on Wednesday, Rio authorities said, as they battle growing crime in the city. 
 
 Marcelo Pinheiro Veiga, known as Marcelo Piloto, was arrested in the town of Encarnación after hiding out for years in Paraguay, which neighbors Brazil. From there he sent arms, drugs and ammunition to favelas dominated by Rio’s largest gang, Rio state authorities said in a statement on Wednesday. 
 
 A police source who declined to be named confirmed that the gang was the CV. 
 
 The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration participated in the arrest of Veiga, who is wanted for murder, trafficking, and criminal association, the statement said. 
 
 Rio’s authorities are seeking to combat rising crime in the seaside tourist destination. Earlier this month, they arrested Rogerio “Rogerio 157” Avelino, a drug trafficker whose turf war with his former gang chief fueled spiraling violence in Rio’s Rocinha favela. 
 
 Crime has spiked this year, as police have struggled to maintain security gains made in the run-up to the 2016 Olympics. A deep economic crisis has spurred big cutbacks in spending on police and other services. 

 An Argentine lawyer known for representing two Brazilians accused of leading drug-trafficking gangs has been shot dead in Paraguay, close to the border with Brazil, police said Tuesday. 
 
 The victim, identified as lawyer Laura Casuso, was pronounced dead of injuries related to gunshot wounds early Tuesday morning at a hospital in Pedro Juan Caballero, close to the Brazilian border city of Ponta Porá and some 550 kilometres northeast of Asunción. 
 
 According to initial reports, Caruso was shot by a hit man after leaving a house, in what appears to be a targeted assassination. 
 
 The attack was filmed by CCTV cameras and reported by local media. The attacker fled the scene in a van with several unidentified men. 
 
 Casuso had lived in Paraguay for many years and had represented notable clients including suspected drug-trafficker Jarvis Chimenes Pavao (who was recently extradited back to Brazil), and Marcelo Pinheiro, the suspected leader of the powerful Comando Vermelho gang known as "Piloto," whose extradition request is in process. 
 
 The police declared themselves on alert for the action of criminals from Comando Vermelho, based in Rio de Janeiro, and another gang known as the Primeiro Comando Capital (PCC), which operates out of São Paulo. 
 
 Members of that gang are believed to have moved to Paraguay of late, in the wake of fierce operations waged by the Brazilian authorities against them. 
 
 - TIMES/AFP/PERFIL 

 In this 2008 photo provided by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York, Jesus Zambada is shown. Once a top lieutenant in drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman's cartel, Zambada is... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this 2008 photo provided by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York, Jesus Zambada is shown. Once a top lieutenant in drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman's cartel, Zambada is now a cooperating witness describing the Sinolao cartel's history of greed, cunning and violence as... (Associated Press) 
 
 NEW YORK (AP) — Mexico's former top security chief and another law enforcement official who once worked under the country's new president-elect took millions of dollars in bribes from the notorious Sinaloa drug cartel in the mid-2000s, a witness testified Tuesday at the U.S. trial of kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman. 
 
 Former cartel member Jesus Zambada made the allegations Tuesday while testifying about what he described as widespread corruption among authorities who were paid to keep their hands off the lucrative and violent drug operation. 
 
 During cross-examination, Zambada claimed he personally made at least $6 million in hidden payments to the former federal security chief, Genaro Garcia Luna, on behalf of his older brother, cartel boss Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada. The cash was delivered during two meetings at a restaurant in Mexico between the start of 2005 and the end of 2007, he said. 
 
 Cartel leaders had agreed that they would pool up to $50 million to buy the protection of Garcia Luna, Jesus Zambada added when being asked about previous statements first made after he was flipped by U.S. authorities. 
 
 The witness also said a separate bribe of "a few million dollars" was made in 2005 to Gabriel Regino, who worked in the administration of current President-elect Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador when he was mayor of Mexico City. 
 
 In a letter published in Mexican media, Garcia Luna responded, "I repeat that it is false, defamatory and perjury to say that I have ever received any material goods from any person, police officer or criminal group." 
 
 Regino, now a private lawyer and law professor, wrote on Twitter, "I categorically deny these accusations." 
 
 Jurors in federal court in Brooklyn also heard testimony on Tuesday from U.S. agents about how they intercepted cocaine-stashed jalapeno cans and more than $1 million in drug proceeds hidden in the paneling of a Ford Bronco used by Guzman's brother. The trial is off the rest of the week and is to resume Monday. 
 
 Guzman, perhaps best known for escaping from Mexican prisons, has pleaded not guilty to drug-trafficking charges. If convicted, he faces life in prison. 
 
 His lawyers, saying he was either in prison or in hiding when prosecutors allege he oversaw a cartel that sent tons of cocaine into the U.S., have sought to portray Ismael Zambada as the actual boss. The elder Zambada remains on the loose in Mexico, they claim, because of bribes that "go up to the very top," including hundreds of millions of dollars paid to the current and former presidents of Mexico. 
 
 U.S. District Judge Brian Cogan admonished the defense for making that claim, saying there was no evidence. He also turned back efforts by the defense to question Zambada about it. 
 
 Garcia Luna was once seen as a powerful ally in the American effort to thwart Mexican cartels from flooding the U.S. market with cocaine and other illegal drugs. But he had also previously come under suspicion of taking bribes. 

 Marcelo Pinheiro’s murder of Lidia Meza, 18, in an apparent attempt to avoid extradition, highlights a culture of impunity 
 
 Outrage in Paraguay after Brazil cartel boss kills woman in his prison cell 
 
 Paraguayans have been left shocked and outraged after a jailed cartel boss murdered a young woman inside his high-security cell, in an apparent attempt to avoid extradition to neighbouring Brazil. 
 
 The case has underscored the scale of criminal impunity in the landlocked South American country – and fuelled fears of more violence to come. 
 
 'It is a war': Brazil prison authorities warn of more violence after deadly riot Read more 
 
 Marcelo “Piloto” Pinheiro was seized in a joint operation by Brazilian, Paraguayan and US anti-drug authorities in December. A leading figure in Rio de Janeiro’s sprawling criminal group Comando Vermelho (Red Command), he had been on the run from Brazilian authorities and operating from Paraguay since 2012. 
 
 He faces 26 years in prison for armed robbery, and charges of homicide, arms smuggling and drug-trafficking. 
 
 After his capture, Pinheiro sought to implicate a web of politicians, judges and police and admitted that he hoped to stay in a Paraguayan jail – which are notorious for offering luxury “VIP cells” in exchange for bribes – rather than face tough justice in Brazil. “Paraguay is the country of impunity and corruption,” he told reporters. 
 
 Yet as his extradition drew closer, police foiled multiple armed efforts to free him from a riot police barracks in Asunción, Paraguay’s capital. 
 
 Facebook Twitter Pinterest Marcelo Pinheiro, AKA ‘Piloto’, is transferred to Catanduvas maximum-security federal penitentiary in Paraná state, Brazil, on Monday. Photograph: Christian Rizzi/AFP/Getty Images 
 
 On Saturday afternoon, soon after a visit by his lawyer, Pinheiro received Lidia Meza, 18, alone in his cell. 
 
 According to Paraguayan authorities, Pinheiro then knocked Meza out before stabbing her 16 times with a dessert knife. She was brought to a nearby hospital but was pronounced dead on arrival. 
 
 It is unclear why Meza was in his cell. Suggestions she was a sex worker have been denied by her parents. Local media reported it was her second visit. 
 
 Pinheiro’s lawyer immediately called for his client to face murder charges in Paraguay. 
 
 But Paraguay’s president, Mario Abdo Benítez, instead ordered Pinheiro’s extradition to Brazil, where he is now being held in solitary confinement in a maximum-security federal prison. 
 
 In an emotional video shared on social media, a mourner at Meza’s funeral wept as she followed the ambulance Meza’s family borrowed to use as a hearse. 
 
 'Heist of the century': Brazilian gang hits security vault and police HQ in Paraguay Read more 
 
 “They’re killing us like dogs,” she said. “A handful of Brazilians come and do whatever they want in our country, kill a tiny girl from the countryside, seize the border and run everything from a jail cell. Everything is for sale for a few dirty pesos.” 
 
 Since late 2016 Comando Vermelho has been locked in a bloody battle with a rival cartel, Primero Comando da Capital (First Capital Command), for control of cocaine and marijuana-smuggling routes from Paraguay. 
 
 Analysts fear that the as-yet unclear security policies of Brazil’s rightwing president-elect, Jair Bolsonaro, could push some crime groups across the border. 
 
 The result could be even worse corruption and violence, said Andrew Nickson, a Paraguay expert at the University of Birmingham. “The Paraguayan state hardly has the power to withstand what they are doing even now,” Nickson said.
– What's one more murder when it might secure you a spot in a cushier prison? That was allegedly the thinking of a Brazilian cartel boss jailed in Paraguay, who authorities say killed a woman in his high-security cell in the hope that fresh charges would prevent him being extradited home, where guards aren't so easily bribed. Unfortunately for Marcelo Pinheiro—a leader of the Comando Vermelho (Red Command) criminal group, wanted in Brazil since 2012 on murder, armed robbery, drug-trafficking, and other charges—only the first part of the alleged scheme went to plan. Authorities say Pinheiro, also known as Marcelo Piloto, received an 18-year-old woman into his cell Saturday before knocking her unconscious and fatally stabbing her 16 times with a dessert knife, per the Guardian. Pinheiro's lawyer, who visited shortly before Lidia Meza came calling for unknown reasons, immediately called for murder charges to be laid in Paraguay. But Paraguayan President Mario Abdo Benitez wasn't having it. He ordered Pinheiro's extradition to Brazil, where the cartel boss is now held in solitary confinement in a maximum-security prison, per the Guardian. At the time of his arrest in Paraguay last December, Reuters referred to Pinheiro as "Brazil's most wanted arms trafficker," noting he'd allegedly funneled arms, ammunition, and drugs to Brazilian communities via Paraguay. Saturday's murder comes a little over a week after the targeted assassination of Pinheiro's former lawyer in a Paraguayan city near the Brazilian border, per the Buenos Aires Times. (El Chapo's trial is underway in New York.)