Genaro Garcia Luna, former Secretary of Public Security of Mexico during the government of former President Felipe Calderón (2006-2012), declared this Friday not guilty of the charges that are imputed to him.
During his brief appearance in a Brooklyn courthouse, Garcia Luna nodded “no” as prosecutors laid the charges against him.
A judge ordered him to be detained after Assistant United States Attorney Erin Reid alleged that he would pose an “unacceptable risk of flight” if released. García Luna’s attorney, César de Castro, said he would ask the court at a later date for his client to be released on bail.
Contrary to what was believed, it was not Brian Cogan, who took the case of the Mexican drug trafficker Joaquín Guzmán Loera, the magistrate who read the charges to the former member of the cabinet of former President Felipe Calderón (2006-2012), accused of conspiracy to traffic in cocaine and making false statements.
García Luna has pleaded not guilty to the charges against Peggy Kuo, the new court-appointed judge, former president of the Federal Council of Attorneys of the American Inn of Court and vice president of Manhattan Legal Services.
Another change in the case of the former Mexican secretary was that in his appearance this Friday, he was not represented by his lawyers, but by a legal representative assigned by the New York court itself, César de Castro.
The reason that the Brooklyn Court, which tried Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán in mid-2019 and found him guilty, and later sentenced him to life imprisonment, appointed de Castro as the Mexican’s legal representative, is that the defense of this had not yet complied with the required registration procedures for legal representation.
The attorney assigned to García Luna is reportedly a litigator with experience in criminal defense, commercial and appellate litigation, and corporate investigations.
The former secretary was arrested on December 9 in the Texas town of Grapevine on accusations of corruption and being linked to one of the Mexican drug trafficking organizations, the Sinaloa Cartel, which was led by the aforementioned Guzmán Loera.
Following his arrest, the former Mexican official was held in a Texas jail. On December 17, he was denied the right to bail and his transfer to New York was ordered to face the charges against him.
During Guzmán’s 2018 trial in New York, the jury heard former cartel member Jesús Zambada testify that he personally delivered at least $ 6 million to García Luna in clandestine payments, on behalf of his older brother, the cartel boss, Ismael ‘El Mayo’ Zambada.
During that time, prosecutors claimed, García Luna protected the Sinaloa Cartel in exchange for bribes. The organization, under the leadership of ‘Chapo’ Guzmán, of ‘El Mayo’ Zambada and others, sent drug shipments of several tons to New York and other cities in the United States, including the federal district that covers the Brooklyn area and Queens, according to court documents.
García Luna lived in Miami before he was arrested. Between 2001 and 2005 he headed the Federal Investigation Agency of Mexico and from 2006 to 2012 he served as the federal secretary of public security before relocating to the United States, authorities reported.
With AP information
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