Valdez was allegedly a one-time top lieutenant of Mexico's most wanted man, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman.

He later joined the breakaway Beltran Leyva cartel, but the leader of that group, Arturo Beltran Leyva, was killed in a shootout with Mexican officials in late 2009. Beltran's brother Carlos was arrested, leaving Valdez in a fight to fill a power vacuum in one of Mexico's most powerful drug cartels.