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 Drug Kingpin SentencedPosted on Feb 26, 2010
The head of the Gulf Cartel, the leading drug cartel in northern Mexico and southern Texas, has been sentenced to 25 years in prison after cooperating with the U.S. federal government and pleading guilty to five counts that included attempted murder and money laundering. —JCL The New York Times: One of the most brutal and feared drug kingpins in Mexican history was sentenced this week to 25 years in prison during a highly secretive hearing here that was closed to the public to protect the lives of everyone involved, according to a court transcript unsealed Thursday. Osiel Cárdenas Guillén, the head of the Gulf Cartel, which controls much of the cocaine traffic across the border in South Texas, has agreed to cooperate with the federal government, according to the transcript. Mr. Cárdenas pleaded guilty to five counts in a lengthy indictment, including drug dealing, money laundering and the attempted murder and assault of federal agents. He also forfeited $50 million in assets. The sentencing took place in a federal courtroom in Houston behind locked doors and armed guards before Judge Hilda G. Tagle, who granted the government’s request to bar the public. Only two members of Mr. Cárdenas’s family and a handful of federal agents were present. Judges often seal particular documents in drug and terrorism trials to protect informants or continuing investigations, but it is highly unusual to seal a sentencing hearing for security reasons. Advertisement Previous item: Gadhafi's Personal Holy War Next item: Danish Paper Apologizes for Cartoon New and Improved CommentsWe are launching a major overhaul of our comments section. In addition to more robust spam filtering and moderation, new features include the ability to rate other comments, sort how they are displayed and respond directly via e-mail or in a thread. Unfortunately, commenters will lose their existing Truthdig identities. It's a pain, we know, but on the plus side you will now be able to log in with a plethora of options, including Google, Twitter, Facebook and Disqus accounts. Before launching this system we spent months in discussion with our top commenters. We listened to the feedback and we hope you like what we've come up with. Please direct any problems or concerns to us via our contact page. |
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By rollzone, February 26, 2010 at 8:03 pm Link to this comment
hello. sure, i agree with your premise. what a sweet
Report thisdeal! the guy is responsible for uncountable murders,
has made his family billions of dollars, and gets to
plead down to attempted murder and money laundering.
even if he does the whole 25 years in exclusive club
fed, it would take galactic financial ruin to punish
anyone in his family for what he has done. he goes out
a hero in any aspiring drug lord’s book, and someone to
follow the footsteps. just another mockery of the war
on drugs.
By punkdudeus, February 26, 2010 at 11:05 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
I guess that means there’s a new position open? If folks think this will do anything to dent the flow of drugs into the country they’re either stupid or ignorant. it just means somebody else’ll get the crown soon enough and run things for a while.
it’s a game, everybody takes turns
Report this