Mexico City was where the [[Federal Bureau of Investigation]] office requested in 1979 that [[Norwin Meneses]] be placed on the Bureau's "tightest watch list" for drug trafficking. The request, years before Meneses's Contra-connected operations were publicly exposed, demonstrated that federal law enforcement had long been aware of his activities.[^1] ### Early Awareness The FBI's Mexico City office's request to monitor Meneses showed that the U.S. government knew about his drug trafficking well before he began selling [[cocaine]] in [[Los Angeles]] to fund the [[Contras]]. Despite this awareness, Meneses was never prosecuted and continued to operate freely in [[San Francisco]] and Los Angeles throughout the 1980s. The failure to act on the intelligence about Meneses, combined with his known role as a Contra political leader, raised questions about whether his connections to the U.S.-backed war protected him from law enforcement action.[^2] ### Footnotes [^1]: Gary Webb, *Dark Alliance*, Ch. 2. [^2]: Gary Webb, *Dark Alliance*, Ch. 2.