On 30 January 2012, the Attorney General of Mexico issued a communiqué ordering the past three governors of Tamaulipas—Manuel Cavazos Lerma, Eugenio Hernández Flores, and Tomás Yarrington—to remain in the country because they were being investigated for possible correlation with the Mexican drug cartels.[2][3] The DEA has already accused Yarrington of laundering money for Los Zetas and the Gulf Cartel from 1999 to 2004, his time as governor.[4]
The cousin of the ex-governor, Gilberto Lerma Plata, was arrested in the McAllen–Hidalgo–Reynosa International Bridge on 12 April 2012 by federal agents for alleged drug conspiracy.[5] Lerma Plata was Mexican police commander in Tamaulipas who was reported in 2002 as a Gulf Cartel member who used his police ties to share information on authorities' movements to help the cartel.[5]