SAN DIEGO (CNS) – A Mexico City attorney who prosecutors say had a leading role in an organization that laundered at least $52.7 million for the Sinaloa Cartel through San Diego-based shell companies has pleaded guilty to federal charges, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said Friday.
Prosecutors say cash generated across the country through the cartel’s drug trafficking activities passed through shell companies in San Diego, then into Mexican bank accounts controlled by Hector Alejandro Paez Garcia, 43.
Paez was described by the U.S. Attorney’s Office as “serving a managerial role” in the money laundering organization, which was the target of a long-running FBI investigation that resulted in 11 arrests, and a DEA operation that netted two dozen more.
Prosecutors say that after dozens of the organization’s bank accounts were seized by federal authorities, Paez oversaw efforts to transfer drug proceeds into cryptocurrency as a means of avoiding law enforcement attention.
Paez pleaded guilty in San Diego federal court earlier this month. Charges have also been filed against several other alleged co-conspirators accused of assisting in laundering drug proceeds or acting as bulk cash couriers.
Federal authorities are still searching for one more alleged leader of the money laundering organization, Alberto David Benguait Jimenez. Benguait was sanctioned earlier this year by the U.S. Treasury Department, which said he’s laundered millions on behalf of the cartel and an alleged fentanyl trafficker.
Anyone with information concerning Benguait was asked to contact the FBI at 858-320-1800.
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