The sentence against García Luna, postponed until September

The sentence against Genaro García Luna will have to wait until at least next September. This was announced this Monday by Judge Brian Cogan, who has decided to postpone the hearing that was scheduled for the end of June for three months. The lawyers of the former Secretary of Public Security of Felipe Calderón have assured that they have had access to new evidence to appeal the jury’s decision for drug trafficking and organized crime against their client on February 21. “Since the verdict, several people, including former law enforcement officers, have contacted us with new evidence potentially favorable to the defense,” reads a brief presented by the legal representatives of the former Mexican official before the Court for the Eastern District of New York.

Judge Cogan has decided to grant the postponement at the request of the defense and despite the fact that the Prosecutor’s Office opposed it. García Luna’s lawyers have argued that they are stretched thin while they analyze the new evidence and prepare for the upcoming hearings. They have said that the new leads are “substantial” and “numerous” and that preparing a legal strategy in this context is “very difficult”. “After all, the Prosecutor’s Office is not harmed in any way, Mr. García Luna is not free and will remain in custody,” said César de Castro and Florian Miedel, in charge of the defense of the former anti-drug czar.

The new schedule approved by the Brooklyn court provides for the defense to present its arguments on July 7. The Prosecutor’s Office will have to respond on August 4 and two weeks later, García Luna’s lawyers will have to present their counterarguments. The sentencing hearing is scheduled for September 27 at eleven in the morning, in the same room where the trial was held between January and February of this year. The lawyers for the former symbol of the war on drugs had left in the air the possibility that he would become a cooperating witness for the authorities.

The historic trial in New York was not without controversy on the other side of the border, after the US authorities decided to build the case on the testimony of convicted drug traffickers. The lack of physical evidence was the basis of García Luna’s defense, who insisted that the Prosecutor’s Office had no elements to convict him beyond the testimonies of “criminals and kidnappers.” “Where is the evidence?” De Castro insisted in various sections of the judicial process.

“Let’s be very clear, we would love to call schoolteachers to testify in this trial, but schoolteachers do not lead criminal organizations,” Assistant District Attorney Erin Ried said in closing arguments, the last chance both sides had to address each other. to the jury. Saritha Komatireddy, who led the team of prosecutors, justified that the collusion between the Mexican authorities and the drug trafficker “happened in secret and was paid for in cash.” “Corruption reached the highest levels,” Komatireddy said, “there is only one possibility: Genaro García Luna took the bribes.”

Nearly a dozen drug traffickers, including cooperating and protected witnesses, took the stand to bring down the former secretary and seek benefits in the US legal system. The Prosecutor’s Office called 26 people to testify, while the defense only one: Linda Cristina Pereyra, the wife of the former official. Capos as Sergio Villarreal The big oneOscar Nava Valencia The wolf and Jesus The king Zambada affirmed that they personally delivered millions of dollars in bribes to García Luna, both as director of the Federal Investigation Agency (AFI, in the Government of Vicente Fox) and during his tenure in Calderón’s Cabinet.

The decision to postpone the sentence anticipates that the battle will continue in the courts and makes it increasingly possible for García Luna’s lawyers to appeal the sentence. Cogan, the same judge who sentenced Joaquín El Chapo Guzmán to life in prison in mid-2019, will have the last word on the future of the Mexican high command. The former head of the Federal Police faces between 20 years and the rest of his life behind bars.