[1] The Colima Cartel is believed to have obtained large quantities of the precursor ephedrine through contacts in Thailand and India,[2] and then distributed it to different methamphetamine labs in Mexico and the United States.
By 1992 the Colima Cartel, through operations as a business, was able to establish amphetamine contacts in Switzerland, India, Germany and the Czech Republic.
[1][5] On June 1, 1998, Luis and Jesús Amezcua were arrested in Guadalajara, Jalisco, by agents from the Mexican former counter-narcotics agency, the Fiscalía Especial para Atención a los Delitos contra la Salud (FEADS).
The Colima Cartel at the time of the arrests of Luis and Jesús was believed to be "the most prominent methamphetamine trafficking organization operating ... as well as the leading supplier of chemicals to other methamphetamine trafficking organizations"[5] Within nine days of their arrest, the New York Times reported two of the three charges Luis and Jesús Amezcua Contreras were facing were dropped.
In October 2008, authorities of the U.S. Department of Treasury, on the basis of financial information and arrests of drug traffickers, identified that the Amezcua Contreras Organization has a two leaders who are still at large: Patricia Amezcua Contreras, (sister of Adan, Jesus and Luis) who was responsible for the overall operations, and Telesforo Baltazar Tirado Escamilla, who with his company Collins Group directed traffic of pseudoephedrine.