Prosecution hammers ex-top cop of Mexico
NEW YORK — Shielded by anonymity and extra security, jurors got their first look Monday at a rare U.S. trial of a former Cabinet-level Mexican official charged with taking bribes to aid drug traffickers he was supposed to be neutralizing.
After blowing a kiss to his wife and daughter in the courtroom gallery, Genaro García Luna, who once was Mexico’s top security official, watched with little outward reaction as opening statements began. His case folds in Mexico’s politics, its vast and violent drug trade, uncomfortable connections between the two, and delicate U.S.-Mexico relations about fighting drugs and corruption.
García Luna is accused of accepting millions of dollars to let the notorious Sinaloa cartel operate with impunity as it sent tons of cocaine to the U.S.
“The person who’s supposed to be in charge of fighting the Sinaloa cartel was actually its most valued asset ... and with his help, the cartel made millions,” Assistant U.S. Atty. Philip Pilmar told jurors. He called García Luna “a man who betrayed both his country and ours.”
He said that while García Luna portrayed himself to both countries as a drug enforcement hero, he saw to it that the cartel got information on investigations, smooth passage for its cocaine through police checkpoints, and police escorts — and sometimes even badges — for cartel members. Officers hand-delivered drug shipments from airports and acted as mercenaries to kill people for cartels, Pilmar said.
García Luna’s lead lawyer, César de Castro, told jurors that the government’s case rested on “rumors, speculation and the words of some of the biggest criminals in the world.”
“No money, no photos, no video, no texts, no emails, no recordings, no documents — no credible, believable evidence that Genaro García Luna helped the cartel,” the lawyer said in his opening statement. He described the case as “a very public and angry display” by a U.S. government that is forsaking a onetime drug-fighting partner whose diligent work made him enemies: corrupt police officers, politicians who opposed the anti-drug war, and cartels. Traffickers are taking the stand to lessen their own punishments and exact revenge, the attorney argued.
“Don’t let the cartels play you,” he told jurors.
They soon heard a different story from former police officer-turned-cartel insider Sergio Villarreal Barragan, known as “El Grande.”
He testified about joint Sinaloa-police raids on the rival Gulf cartel’s operations in the city of Monterrey; police officers letting him set up routes to move 1,700 to 2,600 pounds of cocaine multiple times a week through the state of Chiapas; and police tipping the cartel to forthcoming searches so the traffickers could clear out beforehand.
Villarreal Barragan said that after Sinaloa cartel drugs were seized in Sonora state, he got the contraband released by reminding the local police commander that the cartel had gotten him placed in his job.
During these alleged episodes in the early 2000s, García Luna headed the federal police force — and got payoffs from the Sinaloa group, Villarreal Barragan said. He described García Luna picking up duffel bags full of cash at a Mexico City safe house and collecting $14 million placed in boxes at a warehouse full of cocaine that police had seized from the Gulf gang and turned over to its Sinaloa rivals.
Cartel leaders viewed García Luna as “the best investment they had,” said Villarreal Barragan, who pleaded guilty to drug trafficking. García Luna’s lawyers haven’t yet had their turn to question him.
García Luna is being tried in the same Brooklyn federal courthouse where drug kingpin Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman was convicted.