 As of 1998, the top editors of the newspaper, along with Blancornelas' three sons, were under guard by the authorities at all times.Marco Arturo Quiñones Sánchez, whom Mexican authorities alleged to be a hit man for the Tijuana Cartel, was later charged with being one of the gunmen in the attack on Blancornelas, but was found not guilty by a judge in 2013.In the last years of his life, Blancornelas lived as a virtual prisoner, always accompanied by an escort of fifteen armed guards.