BOMB DROP: U.S. Indicts Sinaloa Governor On Narco Charges
Accusation could force Sheinbaum government to arrest senior Morena politicians
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Ioan Grillo and Juan Alberto Cedillo
Who were the witnesses for the indictment? (We ask lawyer Lichtman if the Chapitos were involved)
Source says Sentator Inzunza is related to a top narco
Mexico’s foreign relations ministry says there is a lack of evidence
U.S. officials on Wednesday unveiled an indictment in the Southern District of New York against current Sinaloa Governor Rubén Rocha Moya and nine other active and former Mexican officials on narco trafficking charges, throwing a bomb into the heart of Mexican politics and pushing President Claudia Sheinbaum into a tight corner.
The indictment accuses Rocha, Senator Enrique Inzunza, the mayor of Sinaloa capital Culiacán, the deputy attorney general for Sinaloa, along with former high level Sinaloa police and prosecutors, of working with the Chapitos faction of the Sinaloa Cartel as it trafficked fentanyl, cocaine, heroin and crystal meth into the United States and carried out mass murder south of the border. “To protect and grow this drug trafficking empire, the Cartel has partnered with corrupt politicians and law enforcement officials,” the indictment says.
It goes on to accuse the Chapitos (founded by four sons of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán) of violently tampering in the election to get Rocha into power in 2021; it claims the Chapitos paid thousands of dollars monthly to the accused officials; and it says Sinaloa police carried out murder and kidnapping for the cartel.
After President Donald Trump returned to power last year, he has criticized Mexico over narco corruption and many believed that an indictment of a Mexican governor was coming. However, the reality of these charges is an earthquake in Mexico and puts President Claudia Sheinbaum into a very challenging position.
Rocha and Senator Inzunza are members of Sheinbaum’s governing Morena party, founded by her predecessor and mentor Andrés Manuel López Obrador, or AMLO. Amid accusations in Mexico that Rocha was corrupt, AMLO and Sheinbaum had stood by the governor.
Shortly after the charges were unveiled, Rocha wrote on X that the charges were false and without evidence, saying that he would demonstrate his innocence. Moreover, he claimed the United States was not only targeting him but the whole “Fourth Transformation,” as Morena calls its movement to reform Mexico.
“This attack is not only against my person, but the movement of the Fourth Transformation, and its emblematic leaders,” he wrote.
Mexico’s foreign relations department said it received requests for the extradition of Rocha and the other officials at 6 pm on Tuesday. It said they lacked the evidence of guilt needed to arrest the suspects but that it handed them to Mexico’s attorney general’s office to determine how to go forward.
The indictment shows hand written lists alleged to be pay rolls by the cartel of corrupt officials. In the one above, it alleges that Culiacan Regio refers to Deputy AG Dámaso Castro Zaavedra receiving 200,000 pesos, or $11,400, per month from the cartel. However, it does not details which witnesses have provided information (indictments don’t largely reveal their sources). The level of details in the indictment suggest high level figures from inside the cartel gave evidence (more below).
Senator Inzunza also denied the charges calling them, “false and malicious” in a post. Inzunza was born and raised in Badiraguato, the municipality of El Chapo, and two sources from Sinaloa told CrashOut that Inzunza is a blood relation of a major trafficker called…
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