This week a historic trial for Mexico concluded: that of the former secretary of public security Genaro García Luna, in charge of the fight against drug trafficking between 2006 and 2012. He was prosecuted in a New York court for cocaine trafficking and dozens of witnesses testified in against him, including former drug traffickers who claim to have paid him bribes in exchange for police protection.
The former secretary of public security in Mexico received millions of dollars from the Sinaloa cartel and was a partner in this drug trafficking organization, the US prosecutor recalled in her closing argument this week at the trial of Genaro García Luna. In total, there were 26 witnesses who testified in the Brooklyn court, evidencing the corruption plot at the highest level of the Mexican state between 2006 and 2012 under the presidency of Felipe Calderón. 9 of these witnesses were former drug traffickers and they claim to have paid millions of dollars to García Luna in exchange for the protection of the Federal Police.
For Carlos Antonio Flores, a specialist in security issues at the Research Center, if these conclude an unprecedented trial.
“This is the first time that a Mexican official of that level, an official who held a presidential cabinet position, is prosecuted by the Americans for drug trafficking and for conspiracy to traffic drugs,” he points out.
More than 20 prosecution witnesses filed through the Court. Some of them are former drug traffickers and claim to have bribed García Luna with millions of dollars in exchange for protection. What do these testimonies say about the power of drug trafficking in Mexico?
“What they show is the articulation and operation of systemic corruption to protect high-interest, high-impact organized crime activities, such as transnational drug trafficking. Of course, we would all have wanted some kind of additional documentary evidence, but what must be pointed out is that a character with the power that Genaro García Luna had in this country, that even if we remember the judicial processes that he imputed to people who He denounced him for corruption at the time this was happening, he was a character who was very well protected by the entire structure that he himself controlled and commanded”, underlines the specialist in security issues at the Investigation Center.
As for what is the impact of this trial in Mexico? “Today, all that structure that is said to have existed not only at the federal level, but also at the state level in different institutions in the country, has not been completely dismantled. One of those named in this trial was Ramón Pequeño, since he is still a fugitive from justice. Mexican justice has not been able to stop him”, emphasizes Carlos Antonio Flores.
During the three weeks that his trial lasted, García Luna remained silent. His wife was the only defense witness and tried to justify the origin of the fortune amassed in Mexico.
After the end of a four-week process -half the time initially scheduled-, the deliberations to decide whether or not the defendant helped the Sinaloa cartel to traffic tons of drugs to the United States will begin this Thursday in the Brooklyn court. The former Mexican official is exposed to a penalty ranging from ten years in prison to life imprisonment.
