Ex-Guatemalan mayor has initial U.S. court hearing on drug charge
The U.S. Department of Justice said Wednesday in a statement that Romeo Ramos Cruz, 57, was extradited from Guatemala on Monday and present for an initial court hearing on Tuesday in federal court in Washington, D.C.
Ramos Cruz, formerly the mayor of Santa Lucia in Guatemala's Escuintla Department in the south-central part of the country only miles to the Pacific Ocean, allegedly abused his authority to coordinate cocaine shipment logistics destined for the illicit U.S. drug market.
He was charged on one count of conspiracy.
Guatemala has a long history of politicians who either pilfer the public coffers or join the cartel that in recent years has shifted its illegal drug operations into Guatemala via Mexico.
DOJ says from 2002 to last year the former chief of the Guatemalan city of nearly 59,000 inhabitants served as a "key" player in a Guatemala-based trafficking cartel that's sole purpose was to transport cocaine to the United States.
According to court records, in one instance he agreed to help disguise a cocaine shipment from Venezuela to Guatemala as cement, and prepared an official letter on government letterhead in order to evade inspection by Guatemalan authorities.
The United States has maintained a more dynamic relationship with Guatemala over the last 25 years following the end to its bloody 35-year-long civil war, but issues of inequality and exploitation of its native population still persist.
"I don't understand why the US supports corrupt politicians that later are against their own policies and want to govern forever changing laws and constitutions," Carlos Torrebiarte, VP of Guatemala's right-leaning Association for the Defense of Private Property, posted last Tuesday on social media.
"It happened with Noriega, Sadam, Ortega, Lula, Petro, in Afghanistan, etc.," he said. He claimed that it's "happening in Guatemala with Arevalo," in reference to the country's center-left President Bernardo Arevalo.
The arrest of and extradition of Ramos Cruz was a coordinated international effort by law enforcement from the FBI, DEA, ICE, INTERPOL and Guatemalan authorities part of the so-called "Operation Take Back America" initiative in the Trump administration's crackdown on migration.
The former Guatemalan politician faces a maximum penalty of life in prison if convicted.
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