Guadalupe Lizárraga Miércoles, 01 de Octubre del 2025
The Salgado name’s connection to Grupo LAGSA’s Chardonnay 2025 golf tournament triggered red flags and led to public disavowals.
By Guadalupe Lizárraga
SAN DIEGO — In Baja California, luxury events have increasingly served as tools for image-building. Hosts provide prestige, events offer a cause, and the organizing companies handle execution. Within that structure, operators gain social legitimacy through subcontracted roles. The web of relationships helps normalize reputational risk.
In response to an investigative report detailing the business ties of Marco Antonio Moreno Gómez Santelices —a political go-between linked to two groups the U.S. government has designated as terrorist organizations— businessman Carlos Alberto Lagos Yagües issued a public statement distancing himself from one of Santelices’s associates: Fernando Salgado Chávez.
Salgado has been identified within the Fimbres Network as a key figure in the mass creation of shell companies in San Diego and Miami, used to acquire luxury properties and conceal the identities of their true owners. He has also been accused of operating a network of businesspeople and public officials—particularly in the Tijuana municipal government—to control customs and the movement of goods across the border.
In an exclusive interview with Los Ángeles Press, Carlos Lagos Yagües discussed his business career in Baja California since 2006. “LAGSA is not, and has never been, a front for Salgado,” he told this journalist, responding to claims suggesting otherwise.
Regarding the golf tournament held on Saturday, September 27 —which drew over 150 attendees— Lagos explained that the catering contract had initially been awarded to chef David Salgado Chávez, brother of Fernando Salgado. On social media, David was linked to Marco Santelices in the event’s promotion. However, following a risk assessment triggered by Los Ángeles Press’s investigation, Lagos said he instructed his team to cancel the service four days before the event and replace it with a different company — despite having already paid 50% of the fee requested by Salgado to cater the event at Bajamar.
During a tour of his companies, Lagos Yagües explained that his main business entity is Grupo LAGSA, from which several real estate ventures have branched off, including Baja Blue Investments (founded in 2006) and Chardonnay Bajamar —which, although not yet formally registered, is positioned as an exclusive brand within the Pacific-facing real estate sector.
These are in addition to other residential development firms such as San Marino (2002), Mar de Calafia (2004), and Sierra Blanca de Baja California, a rural production cooperative established in 1996.
Based on requests filed through the National Transparency Platform and official records from the Public Registry of Commerce, Los Ángeles Press confirmed that in none of the founding documents, nor in the minutes of shareholder updates or corporate changes of these long-standing companies in Baja California, is there any record linking Fernando Rafael Salgado Chávez or David Adrián Salgado Chávez. A decade ago, both individuals were based in Guadalajara and Zapopan, Jalisco.
The link to David Salgado emerged through the person hired by LAGSA to organize the Chardonnay golf tournament. The event planner, who also spoke with Los Ángeles Press, requested anonymity for safety reasons. She confirmed having known David Salgado and his wife since around 2015 or 2016, “at one of his restaurants when I was living in Guadalajara.”
Their relationship continued in Baja California, where she has regularly hired his catering services for various events. She noted that Salgado’s restaurant business has grown significantly in recent years, and that he has the infrastructure to set up remote kitchens, even in undeveloped rural areas.
"It’s easy for me to work with a vendor who can handle the entire infrastructure," said the businesswoman, who also lives in San Diego and registered an LLC in California on January 18, 2024, based in Chula Vista, to operate her event planning company. She stated she receives no commissions or payments from Salgado for bringing him contracts and that her sole interest is in making sure her events run smoothly.
"I had no idea, and no way of knowing, who David Salgado Chávez’s brother is — I just hired the chef for his food," she reiterated. Nevertheless, she insisted on keeping her name and company confidential, acknowledging the risks involved when dealing with “very powerful people.”
The Salgado Brothers’ Business Ties
Chef David Salgado operates a catering company registered at 1521 Amador St., Chula Vista, CA 91913. However, the company that hired him on behalf of Grupo LAGSA indicated that his operational base was in Ensenada, near the location where the golf tournament took place.
In the same city, David appears as a partner alongside his brother Fernando in Dafesa Constructora, S. de R.L. de C.V., a construction company incorporated by notarial deed on June 2, 2009, and registered with the Public Registry of Commerce on September 25 of that same year. The articles of incorporation can be viewed in the following PDF.
Business Structures and Political Influence
In Dafesa Constructora, Fernando Salgado Chávez is listed as a partner along with his wife, Iveth Arámbula García. David Salgado, meanwhile, is registered as legal representative alongside their father, Fernando Salgado Díaz, with powers for litigation, collections, administration, and limited control over company assets. According to public business registry records reviewed for this report, the company’s stated purpose is the development and construction of houses, buildings, hotels, and residential subdivisions.
A public official, who also requested anonymity due to fear of retaliation, confirmed one of Carlos Lagos’s concerns: administrative roadblocks and interference by the Salgado group in public procedures and government processes. The official identified Marco Santelices as Salgado’s “right-hand man” in business operations, and pointed to the involvement of Tijuana mayor Ismael Burgueño from within city hall.
Additional confidential sources alleged that Fernando Salgado exercises operational influence over processes tied to the San Diego border crossing. According to these sources, one example is the network of checkpoints installed by Mayor Burgueño and the Tijuana Department of Economic Development (SEDETI), which, rather than serving public interest, reportedly function as political and logistical support structures for former state prosecutor Ricardo Carpio.
Within this scheme, Carpio’s wife, Ana Karen Sánchez, is said to share ownership of a registered LLC with Salgado. Pedro Montejo, current head of SEDETI, was also named as a participant in these efforts, along with other local business figures (a list of whom is still under verification). The alleged goal of these actors is to forge ties with high-profile entrepreneurs in Tijuana in order to “shield their operations” and secure public legitimacy.
The Salgado Chávez network in Baja California is no longer a matter of speculation: it is a complex puzzle of corporate structures, political maneuvering, and legitimacy-building strategies that demands public scrutiny—so that, in Baja California and beyond, there are no blind spots left for alliances that shape power.