Notorious Marseille Drug Lord ’The Cat’ Captured in Morocco After Months-Long Manhunt

End of the run for Félix Bingui alias the Cat. His arrest took place on Friday in Casablanca. He is considered one of the biggest drug traffickers in Marseille and had fled to Morocco several months ago, and was the subject of an Interpol red notice for an arrest warrant issued by the French justice system for drug trafficking and criminal association, reports Le Parisien. This information was confirmed by the French Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, who welcomed a "major blow to narco-banditry".

This arrest follows a trip by French police to Morocco to notify their Moroccan counterparts of Félix Bingui’s presence on Moroccan territory. "This arrest is the result of remarkable cooperation from the Moroccan authorities [...] and the meticulous and relentless work" of the many French police services involved in this investigation, said the Marseille public prosecutor in a press release. After his arrest, the drug trafficker will be extradited to France.

Towards the end of the war between the Yoda clan (a name inspired by a graffiti on a drug dealing point and representing the famous "Star Wars" character) and the DZ Mafia? Following an altercation in a nightclub in Thailand in February 2023, the Cat and Tic, the boss of the DZ Mafia, returned to France, and their two groups engaged in a merciless war around the La Paternelle neighborhood. According to a police note, these are operations that can affect "any person present at the drug dealing points, regardless of their age, origin or role in the network (most of the victims are simple lookouts or small-time dealers), without sparing collateral victims". The two groups would be responsible for more than forty murders that occurred last year in the Phocaean city.