(New York) Former Mexican minister Genaro Garcia Luna, a former champion of the fight against drugs in his country, was found guilty by a jury in a New York court on Tuesday of trafficking cocaine between Mexico and the United States. United and faces life imprisonment.
The 12 jurors of the Brooklyn federal court found that this former Minister of Public Security of Mexican President Felipe Calderon (2006-2012) was guilty of five counts, including that of having received millions of dollars to protect the Sinaloa Cartel and involved in trafficking at least 53 tons of cocaine from Mexico to the United States from 2001 to 2012.
After several days of deliberation and a month-long trial, Mr. Garcia Luna, who did not say a word during the trial, was found guilty on all counts, the Brooklyn federal prosecutor’s office confirmed in a tweet.
His wife and their two children were present at the statement of the verdict in the face of which the former minister remained visibly imperturbable.
His sentence, which can range from 10 years in prison to life imprisonment, will be known in several weeks.
Since January 17, the prosecution had brought to the stand 26 prosecution witnesses, among whom nine are accused of drug trafficking, extradited to the United States for trial and to collaborate with justice in order to obtain sentences. lightened.
Prosecutors had instructed the jury to “get to know” these repentant “criminals” and to “use common sense in stating [Garcia Luna] guilty”: a 54-year-old “two-faced” Mexican anti-drug minister who collaborated with Washington on one side; and “partner in crime” of the Sinaloa cartel on the other.
He is the most senior Mexican official to have been tried by federal justice in New York, in the war against the drug cartels of Central and South America which take advantage of the complicity of local ministers to flood the market of the United States.
It was this Brooklyn court that sentenced former Sinaloa cartel leader Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman to life in prison in 2019.
Genaro Garcia Luna was arrested on December 9, 2019 in Dallas, Texas. Imprisoned since, he is accused of having received millions of dollars in bribes to turn a blind eye to cartel trafficking.
For his lawyer Cesar de Castro, on the contrary, there is “no proof that he received money” and “the absence of proof is not proof”.
Since October 2020, Mr. Garcia Luna has pleaded not guilty. He faces a minimum sentence of 10 years in prison, up to life.
The name of Mr. Garcia Luna, a former figure in the fight against drugs in Mexico, is also known, especially in France, because he was involved in the Florence Cassez case in the 2000s.