Madrid, Mar 3 (IANS/EFE): Spanish police have arrested a Mexican woman accused in her country of commissioning the May 2011 murder of a top retired military officer.

The woman, identified only by the initials L.S., was living in Madrid with her family for several months, Spanish authorities said.

Maj. Gen. Jorge Juarez Loera, who had been part of the Mexican armed forces' operations against organized crime, was killed May 21, 2011, less than three weeks after he retired as the nation's No. 3 military officer.

Three gunmen intercepted the retired general on a road in the Mexico City suburb of Naucalpan, engineered a traffic accident to force him out of his vehicle and then shot him at point-blank range.

Mexican police apprehended two of the gunmen in June 2011 and subsequent investigations led to a man who had been paid 150,000 pesos ($11,500) - allegedly by L.S. - to arrange the assassination of Juarez Loera.

Authorities in Mexico suspected that L.S. had fled to Spain and they enlisted their Spanish counterparts in the search, which ended with the arrest of the fugitive outside her Madrid residence.