In this courtroom sketch, Genaro García Luna, right, puts his hand on his heart as he stands with his defense team while the jury files out of the courtroom, Tuesday, Feb. 21, 2023, in federal court in New York. The former Mexican presidential cabinet member was convicted Tuesday of taking massive bribes to protect the violent drug cartels he was tasked with combating. A U.S. Marshal stands in the background. (AP Photo/Elizabeth Williams)
Genaro García Luna, once the highest-ranking law enforcer in Mexico, was convicted in a federal courtroom in Brooklyn for taking millions in bribes to help the Sinaloa Cartel’s drug enterprise as protesters stood outside the court holding signs calling for justice, authorities said Tuesday.
García Luna, the former Secretary of Public Security in Mexico from 2006 to 2012, was convicted on charges including conspiracy, international drug possession and distribution, and making false statements, the U.S. Department of Justice said in a news release.
“García Luna, who once stood at the pinnacle of law enforcement in Mexico, will now live the rest of his days having been revealed as a traitor to his country and to the honest members of law enforcement who risked their lives to dismantle drug cartels,” United States Attorney Breon Peace in a statement. “It is unconscionable that the defendant betrayed his duty as Secretary of Public Security by greedily accepting millions of dollars in bribe money that was stained by the blood of Cartel wars and drug-related battles in the streets of the United States and Mexico in exchange for protecting those murderers and traffickers he was solemnly sworn to investigate.”
García Luna used his official positions to help the Sinaloa drug cartel in exchange for millions of dollars in bribes, authorities alleged.
The defendant tipped members of the Cartel to law enforcement investigations of the syndicate and helped facilitate cocaine and other drug shipments into the United States, officials said.
Former high-ranking members of the Cartel testified at his trial about his activities.
The Mexican Federal Police Force under his command acted as bodyguards and escorts for the Cartel. Some in police uniforms and badges even helped unload cocaine shipments from planes at Mexico City’s airport to deliver to the Cartel, the DOJ said.
From 2002 and 2007, García Luna allegedly helped at least six cocaine shipments totaling more than 50,000 kilos of cocaine, the Drug Enforcement Administration said.
The bribes increased over the years as the Sinaloa Cartel grew in size and power.
Former Cartel members testified that bribe money was handed off at a safe house in Mexico City where cash was stashed in a false wall.
Other drop-off locations included a Guadalajara car wash and a French restaurant in Mexico City across the street from the U.S. Embassy. At least twice the Cartel made two personal deliveries of briefcases containing millions of dollars, authorities said.
García Luna’s federal police, U.S. authorities said, “leaked sensitive information that enabled the Cartel to evade detection by law enforcement or use the information in attacks on rival traffickers.”
He moved to the United States in 2012 and lied about his criminal past on his 2018 application to become a U.S. citizen.
Federal agents in Dallas arrested García Luna on Dec. 9, 2019.
Two other men, Luis Cardenas Palomino and Ramon Pequeno García, former high-ranking Mexican law enforcement officials who worked under García Luna, are being sought in the case.
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