Genaro Garcia Luna is accused of taking huge bribes to allow the notorious Sinaloa cartel to smuggle cocaine when he was public security minister during Felipe Calderon’s 2006-2012 presidency.
The 54-year-old is the highest-ranking Mexican official to be charged in New York federal prosecutors’ extensive pursuit of alleged drug traffickers from Central and South America and their ministerial accomplices.
Ex-Mexican drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who headed Sinaloa, is currently serving a life sentence in the United States after being convicted by a jury in Brooklyn in 2019.
Notorious Colombian drug lord Dairo Antonio Usuga, known as “Otoniel,” is awaiting trial in the same district, while former Honduran president Juan Orlando Hernandez has denied drug trafficking charges filed by prosecutors in Manhattan.
Garcia Luna was detained in Texas in December 2019. He has pleaded not guilty to five counts that carry possible sentences of between 10 years and life in prison.
US prosecutors accuse Garcia Luna of accepting millions of dollars in bribes to look the other way as Guzman’s cartel shipped tons of drugs into the United States between 2001 and 2012.
The US government alleges that Garcia Luna became a member of Sinaloa around January 2001 when he was working in police intelligence.
Prosecutors say that in exchange for millions of dollars, he agreed not to interfere with drug shipments, tipped off traffickers about law enforcement operations, targeted rival cartel members for arrest and placed other corrupt officials in positions of power.
More at https://www.ibtimes.com/architect-mexicos-war-drugs-trial-us-trafficking-3656998
Sean Hocking
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