Family of Jenni Rivera’s Hairstylist Demands Answers

Jenni Rivera, Life and Death of a Mexican American Superstar

Mexico's music world mourned Jenni Rivera, the U.S.-born singer presumed killed in a plane crash whose soulful voice and openness about her personal troubles had made her a Mexican-American superstar. 

The loved ones of Jenni Rivera’s hairstylist, who perished in the tragic jet crash with the singer last month, is seeking accountability for the accident.

Rivera's makeup artist, Jacob Yebale, was among the seven people killed when the aircraft crashed Dec. 9 in northern Mexico.

Yebale's family filed a request this week in an Illinois court to compel the plane manufacturer Bombardier Aerospace and its Learjet division to turn over information on the aircraft's history.

The petition for discovery was filed Wednesday in Cook County Circuit Court in Illinois because Bombardier does a substantial amount of business in the state.

As Fox News Latino previously reported, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency is investigating the company and the man who runs the business that owns the luxury jet.

DEA spokeswoman Lisa Webb Johnson confirmed that the planes owned by Las Vegas-based Starwood Management were seized in Texas and Arizona, but she declined to discuss details of the case.

The agency also has subpoenaed all the company's records, including any correspondence it has had with a former Tijuana mayor who U.S. law enforcement officials have long suspected has ties to organized crime.

Christian Esquino, 50, who runs the business and has a long and checkered legal past, told The Associated Press a few weeks ago that the DEA has been investigating him for more than 20 years but has yet to prove a single drug-related charge. Esquino said his sister-in-law owns the company but he has the "expertise."

His legal woes date back decades. He pleaded guilty to a fraud charge that stemmed from a major drug investigation in Florida in the early 1990s and most recently was sentenced to two years in federal prison in a California aviation fraud case.

Esquino, a Mexican citizen, was deported upon his release. He and various other companies he has either been involved with or owns have also been sued for failing to pay millions of dollars in loans, according to court records.

The 43-year-old California-born Rivera died at the peak of her career when the plane she was traveling in nose-dived into the ground while flying from the northern Mexican city of Monterrey to the central city of Toluca early Sunday morning. She was perhaps the most successful female singer in grupero, a male-dominated Mexico regional style, and had branched out into acting and reality television.

Based on reporting by The Associated Press

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