The Santa Cruz Cartel () or La Conexión is a Bolivian

drug cartel A drug cartel is a criminal organization composed of independent drug lords who collude with each other in order to improve their profits and dominate the illegal drug trade. Drug cartels form with the purpose of controlling the supply of the i ...

and criminal organization, said to be one of the largest in the country, headquartered in

Santa Cruz de la Sierra Santa Cruz de la Sierra (; ), commonly known as Santa Cruz, is the largest city in Bolivia and the capital of the Santa Cruz Department (Bolivia), Santa Cruz department. Situated on the Pirai River (Bolivia), Pirai River in the eastern Tropical ...

. The cartel was responsible for multiple narco-terrorist incidents in the 1980s, including assassination attempts on

Drug Enforcement Administration The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) is a Federal law enforcement in the United States, United States federal law enforcement agency under the U.S. Department of Justice tasked with combating illicit Illegal drug trade, drug trafficking a ...

agents and bombing attempts on politicians. The Santa Cruz Cartel is strongly allied with drug trafficking organizations in Colombia, Brazil and Mexico, though is involved in various turf wars against smaller drug gangs. Local intelligence states that members of the

Comando Vermelho Comando Vermelho (, ''Red Command'' or ''Red Commando''), also known as CV, is a Brazilian criminal organization engaged primarily in drug trafficking, arms trafficking, protection racketeering, kidnapping-for-ransom, hijacking of armored tru ...

(Red Command) drug gang have fled the favelas of Brazil to Santa Cruz in order to escape the

Federal Police A law enforcement agency (LEA) is any government agency responsible for law enforcement within a specific jurisdiction through the employment and deployment of law enforcement officers and their resources. The most common type of law enforcement ...

References

{{Organized crime groups in the Americas Organizations established in the 1980s 1980s establishments in Bolivia Drug cartels in Bolivia Transnational organized crime Santa Cruz Department (Bolivia) Bolivian organized crime