Border violence pushes north

"They walk across the bridge," said Laredo Det. Robert Garcia, who investigated a murder that involved Reta. "They see all the nightclubs with no age limit. They see the guys their age spending money, throwing money around, paying for everything. They like the lure, the women, the fancy cars. They start moving weapons and guns and pretty soon they start asking for money for hits."

Garcia said Reta told him how he helped break a cartel leader out of a Mexican prison. From there he moved up to become a hit man and returned to Texas behind the wheel of a $70,000 Mercedes Benz, Garcia said.

Then last year a Laredo man, Noe Flores, was killed in front of his home, shot by mistake because the cartel thought Flores was his half-brother.

In a written statement to police, Reta admitted to driving the car with two accomplices. One of them, identified by Reta as Gabriel Cardona, jumped out and "shot two rounds at first," he wrote.

"That was when he fell to the floor and then shot em 13 more rounds and that was when Jesus Gonzales [the other alleged accomplice] started shooting from the rear windows.

"Then we left the sene of the crime and we left the car like 3 blocks away. The work was done for the Gulf Cartel of Mexico."

At trial last month, a witness said Reta and the accomplices were paid a total of $15,000 for the hit. But the case ended abruptly when Reta pleaded guilty in return for a 40-year sentence; he had faced 99 years.

Webb County Judge Joe Lopez told the youth: "It's a young life. Come to terms with your God and your faith, or whatever it may be."

Cardona also pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 80 years. Gonzales was arrested but made bail, and he disappeared back into Mexico.

Reta awaits trial in a second case, involving the ambush slaying in December 2005 of Moises Garcia, shot in his car in a Laredo restaurant parking lot as his pregnant wife and family watched helplessly.

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richard.serrano@latimes.com

Times staff writer Richard Marosi in San Diego contributed to this report.