Latest news with #Guadalajara-based
Yahoo
28-03-2025
- Yahoo
Del Records CEO found guilty after doing business with cartel-linked concert promoter
A federal jury Thursday convicted the chief executive of Del Records, a Bell Gardens-based label that produces Latin music, of conspiring to violate a federal law that prohibits U.S. residents and companies from doing business with known drug traffickers and their associates. After a nine-day trial, Ángel Del Villar, 44, and his talent agency, Del Entertainment, were found guilty of one count of conspiracy to do business with sanctioned people connected to drug trafficking, in violation of the Kingpin Act and 10 counts of violating the Kingpin Act, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office in L.A. The Kingpin Act prohibits anyone in the U.S. from engaging in deals or transactions with people or businesses sanctioned by the Treasury Department. Federal authorities arrested and charged Del Villar in 2022. In April 2018, Del Villar and the talent agency did business with Jesús Pérez Alvear, a.k.a. 'Chucho," a Guadalajara-based music promoter who had been sanctioned by the Treasury Department, according to evidence presented at trial. Treasury officials said at the time that Pérez had laundered drug money for the Cartel de Jalisco Nueva Generacion and a related trafficking group, Los Cuinis. Pérez was accused of commingling the traffickers' profits with legitimate revenue from ticket and refreshment sales. He also promoted singers of narcocorridos, ballads which 'glorify' traffickers and their crimes, Treasury officials said. Pérez had previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to do business with sanctioned people connected to drug trafficking. He promoted concerts for Del Entertainment in Mexico until March 2019. He was murdered in Mexico in December 2024. During the trial — which featured testimony from a popular singer of Mexican regional music named Gerardo Ortiz — Del Villar's attorneys tried to shift the blame onto a former employee of Del Records, Brian Gutiérrez. One of Del Villar's attorneys, Marissa Goldberg, said in her opening statement that the case centered around "misplaced trust" and "manipulation." Goldberg accused Gutierrez of working with the government, "to manufacture a gotcha situation to take down someone that they perceived to be on top." Del Villar's attorneys did not return a request for comment on Thursday. According to the U.S. attorney's office, Del Villar and Del Entertainment willfully did business with Pérez, "by continuing to have a Del Entertainment musical artist perform at concerts in which Pérez and Del Entertainment had a financial interest." 'The defendants here chose to get into business with an individual they knew had ties to the CJNG and had been designated a narcotics trafficker under the Kingpin Act,' said acting U.S. Atty. Joseph McNally. 'Cartels and transnational criminal organizations cause immeasurable harm to our country. We are using every tool to eliminate these organizations and will prosecute those that do business with cartels.' During the trial, Goldberg, Del Villar's attorney, told the jury that her client, an immigrant from Mexico, had "accomplished the American dream." She said he had a passion for Mexican regional music, the music of his childhood, and started his record label two decades ago. The trouble, authorities said, began in 2018. Ortiz, one of Del Records' artists, had been scheduled to perform at a concert organized by Pérez in the state of Aguascalientes, Mexico, when the promoter was sanctioned, FBI Special Agent Lauren Radke wrote in an affidavit filed in court. Del Villar's employees drafted a news release at the time, stating the company had 'no choice' but to 'obey U.S. law and not allow the bookings of any of my shows to individuals the Dept. of Treasury has deemed sanctioned.' The news release was never distributed, but agents used a search warrant to obtain the draft a year later, Radke wrote. That news release came up repeatedly throughout the trial. Radke and other agents met with Ortiz at an airport in Phoenix, where they handed the singer a letter from the Treasury Department and told him he was prohibited from doing business with Pérez. Later that day, Del Records' chief financial officer, Luca Scalisi, left a voice message with an employee of the record label. Scalisi said Del Villar wanted the chief financial officer to go to Mexico to collect a debt that Pérez owed to a Mexican company affiliated with Del Villar, Radke wrote. Scalisi said he was concerned about creating a 'paper trail' leading to Pérez because the concert promoter was 'under surveillance," Radke wrote. Authorities have also charged Scalisi, 58, with violating the Kingpin Act. He has pleaded not guilty and his trial is scheduled for July. Ortiz ultimately did perform at the concert Perez staged in Aguascalientes, Radke wrote. Del Villar's credit card was used to pay for a private jet that transported Ortiz from Van Nuys Airport to the performance in Aguascalientes, according to the U.S. attorney's office. On multiple other occasions in 2018 and 2019, authorities said Pérez and Del Villar continued to do business by arranging for Ortiz to perform at concerts in Mexico. The 'Para Qué Lastimarme' singer admitted in court that he performed at the 2018 Feria de San Marcos in Aguascalientes, Mexico, despite already being made aware of Pérez's status, according to Univision. Ortiz, who was signed under Del Records from 2009 to 2019, has already pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy tied to the case. Del Villar is set to be sentenced on August 15 and faces up to 30 years in prison on each count. Del Entertainment will face a sentence of five years of probation and a fine of $10 million for each count. Times staff writers Matthew Ormseth and Carlos De Loera contributed to this report. Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week. This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.
Los Angeles Times
28-03-2025
- Los Angeles Times
Del Records CEO found guilty after doing business with cartel-linked concert promoter
A federal jury Thursday convicted the chief executive of Del Records, a Bell Gardens-based label that produces Latin music, of conspiring to violate a federal law that prohibits U.S. residents and companies from doing business with known drug traffickers and their associates. After a nine-day trial, Ángel Del Villar, 44, and his talent agency, Del Entertainment, were found guilty of one count of conspiracy to do business with sanctioned people connected to drug trafficking, in violation of the Kingpin Act and 10 counts of violating the Kingpin Act, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office in L.A. The Kingpin Act prohibits anyone in the U.S. from engaging in deals or transactions with people or businesses sanctioned by the Treasury Department. Federal authorities arrested and charged Del Villar in 2022. In April 2018, Del Villar and the talent agency did business with Jesús Pérez Alvear, a.k.a. 'Chucho,' a Guadalajara-based music promoter who had been sanctioned by the Treasury Department, according to evidence presented at trial. Treasury officials said at the time that Pérez had laundered drug money for the Cartel de Jalisco Nueva Generacion and a related trafficking group, Los Cuinis. Pérez was accused of commingling the traffickers' profits with legitimate revenue from ticket and refreshment sales. He also promoted singers of narcocorridos, ballads which 'glorify' traffickers and their crimes, Treasury officials said. Pérez had previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to do business with sanctioned people connected to drug trafficking. He promoted concerts for Del Entertainment in Mexico until March 2019. He was murdered in Mexico in December 2024. During the trial — which featured testimony from a popular singer of Mexican regional music named Gerardo Ortiz — Del Villar's attorneys tried to shift the blame onto a former employee of Del Records, Brian Gutiérrez. One of Del Villar's attorneys, Marissa Goldberg, said in her opening statement that the case centered around 'misplaced trust' and 'manipulation.' Goldberg accused Gutierrez of working with the government, 'to manufacture a gotcha situation to take down someone that they perceived to be on top.' Del Villar's attorneys did not return a request for comment on Thursday. According to the U.S. attorney's office, Del Villar and Del Entertainment willfully did business with Pérez, 'by continuing to have a Del Entertainment musical artist perform at concerts in which Pérez and Del Entertainment had a financial interest.' 'The defendants here chose to get into business with an individual they knew had ties to the CJNG and had been designated a narcotics trafficker under the Kingpin Act,' said acting U.S. Atty. Joseph McNally. 'Cartels and transnational criminal organizations cause immeasurable harm to our country. We are using every tool to eliminate these organizations and will prosecute those that do business with cartels.' During the trial, Goldberg, Del Villar's attorney, told the jury that her client, an immigrant from Mexico, had 'accomplished the American dream.' She said he had a passion for Mexican regional music, the music of his childhood, and started his record label two decades ago. The trouble, authorities said, began in 2018. Ortiz, one of Del Records' artists, had been scheduled to perform at a concert organized by Pérez in the state of Aguascalientes, Mexico, when the promoter was sanctioned, FBI Special Agent Lauren Radke wrote in an affidavit filed in court. Del Villar's employees drafted a news release at the time, stating the company had 'no choice' but to 'obey U.S. law and not allow the bookings of any of my shows to individuals the Dept. of Treasury has deemed sanctioned.' The news release was never distributed, but agents used a search warrant to obtain the draft a year later, Radke wrote. That news release came up repeatedly throughout the trial. Radke and other agents met with Ortiz at an airport in Phoenix, where they handed the singer a letter from the Treasury Department and told him he was prohibited from doing business with Pérez. Later that day, Del Records' chief financial officer, Luca Scalisi, left a voice message with an employee of the record label. Scalisi said Del Villar wanted the chief financial officer to go to Mexico to collect a debt that Pérez owed to a Mexican company affiliated with Del Villar, Radke wrote. Scalisi said he was concerned about creating a 'paper trail' leading to Pérez because the concert promoter was 'under surveillance,' Radke wrote. Authorities have also charged Scalisi, 58, with violating the Kingpin Act. He has pleaded not guilty and his trial is scheduled for July. Ortiz ultimately did perform at the concert Perez staged in Aguascalientes, Radke wrote. Del Villar's credit card was used to pay for a private jet that transported Ortiz from Van Nuys Airport to the performance in Aguascalientes, according to the U.S. attorney's office. On multiple other occasions in 2018 and 2019, authorities said Pérez and Del Villar continued to do business by arranging for Ortiz to perform at concerts in Mexico. The 'Para Qué Lastimarme' singer admitted in court that he performed at the 2018 Feria de San Marcos in Aguascalientes, Mexico, despite already being made aware of Pérez's status, according to Univision. Ortiz, who was signed under Del Records from 2009 to 2019, has already pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy tied to the case. Del Villar is set to be sentenced on August 15 and faces up to 30 years in prison on each count. Del Entertainment will face a sentence of five years of probation and a fine of $10 million for each count. Times staff writers Matthew Ormseth and Carlos De Loera contributed to this report.
The Guardian
28-02-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Mexican drug lord pleads not guilty to killing of DEA agent after US extradition
After years as one of US authorities' most wanted men, the Mexican drug cartel boss Rafael Caro Quintero was brought into a New York courtroom on Friday to answer charges that include orchestrating the 1985 killing of a US federal agent. Caro Quintero pleaded not guilty to running a continuing criminal enterprise. Separately, so did Vicente Carrillo Fuentes, the leader of another cartel. Carrillo is accused of arranging kidnappings and killings in Mexico but not accused of involvement in the death of the DEA agent Enrique 'Kiki' Camarena. Caro Quintero, Carrillo Fuentes and 27 other Mexican prisoners were sent on Thursday to eight US cities, a move that came as Mexico sought to stave off Donald Trump administration's threat of imposing 25% tariffs on all Mexican imports next week. For Camarena's family, the arraignments marked a long-awaited moment. 'For 14,631 days, we held on to hope – hope that this moment would come. Hope that we would live to see accountability. And now, that hope has finally turned into reality,' the family said in a statement thanking Trump and everyone who has worked on the case over the years. The White House, in a statement Friday ahead of the arraignments, called Caro Quintero 'one of the most evil cartel bosses in the world'. In exchange for delaying tariffs, Trump had insisted that Mexico crack down on cartels, illegal immigration and fentanyl production. But members of Mexico's security cabinet on Friday framed the transfer of the 29 prisoners as a national security decision. 'It is not a commitment to the United States. It is a commitment to ourselves,' said Mexican attorney general Alejandro Gertz Manero. 'The problem of drug trafficking and organized crime has been a true tragedy for our country.' Mexican security secretary Omar García Harfuch said the people sent into US custody were 'generators of violence' in Mexico and represented a security threat to both countries. Caro Quintero had long been one of America's top Mexican targets for extradition. He was one of the founders of a Guadalajara-based cartel and one of the primary suppliers of heroin, cocaine and marijuana to the US in the late 1970s and 1980s. Caro Quintero had Camarena kidnapped, tortured and killed in 1985 because he blamed the agent for a raid on a huge marijuana plantation the year prior, authorities said. Camarena's killing marked a low point in US-Mexico relations and was dramatized in the popular Netflix series Narcos: Mexico. Caro Quintero had been 28 years into a 40-year sentence in Mexico when an appeals court overturned his verdict in 2013. After his release, he returned to drug trafficking and unleashed bloody turf battles in the northern Mexico border state of Sonora until he was arrested by Mexican forces in 2022, authorities said. Sign up to Headlines US Get the most important US headlines and highlights emailed direct to you every morning after newsletter promotion Caro Quintero told the Spanish newspaper El País in 2018 that he 'never went back to drugs'. 'Whoever's saying it is a liar!' he said, according to the newspaper. 'I'm not working any more, let's be clear about that! I was a drug trafficker 23 years ago, and now I'm not, and I won't ever be again.' The US, which had added Caro Quintero to the FBI's 10 most wanted list in 2018 with a $20m reward, sought his extradition immediately after his 2022 arrest. It happened days after the Mexican and US presidents at the time, Andrés Manuel López Obrador and Joe Biden respectively, met at the White House. But the request remained in limbo as López Obrador severely curtailed his country's cooperation with the US to protest undercover American law enforcement operations targeting Mexican political and military officials. Then, in January, a non-profit group representing the Camarena family sent a letter to the new Trump administration urging it to renew the extradition request. Carrillo Fuentes is the brother of the drug lord Amado Carrillo Fuentes, known as 'The Lord of The Skies', who died in a botched plastic surgery in 1997. Carrillo Fuentes, who was known as 'The Viceroy', continued his brother's business of smuggling drugs over the border until his arrest in 2014. He was sentenced in 2021 to 28 years in prison for organized crime, money laundering and weapons violations. Among the others extradited are leading members of Mexican organized crime groups recently designated by the Republican administration as 'foreign terrorist organizations'. They include cartel leaders, security chiefs from both factions of the Sinaloa cartel, cartel finance operatives and a man wanted in connection with the killing of a North Carolina sheriff's deputy in 2022.
Los Angeles Times
28-02-2025
- Politics
- Los Angeles Times
Mexican drug lord Rafael Caro Quintero pleads not guilty in 1985 killing of U.S. agent
NEW YORK — After years as one of U.S. authorities' most wanted men, Mexican drug cartel boss Rafael Caro Quintero was brought into a New York courtroom Friday to answer charges that include orchestrating the 1985 killing of a U.S. federal agent. Caro Quintero pleaded not guilty to running a continuing criminal enterprise. Separately, so did Vicente Carrillo Fuentes, the leader of another cartel. He's accused of arranging kidnappings and killings in Mexico but, unlike Caro Quintero, is not accused of involvement in the death of DEA agent Enrique 'Kiki' Camarena. Caro Quintero, Carrillo Fuentes and 27 other Mexican prisoners were sent Thursday to eight U.S. cities, a move that came as Mexico sought to stave off the Trump administration's threat of imposing 25% tariffs on all Mexican imports next week. For Camarena's family, the arraignments marked a long-awaited moment. 'For 14,631 days, we held on to hope — hope that this moment would come. Hope that we would live to see accountability. And now, that hope has finally turned into reality,' the family said in a statement thanking President Trump and everyone who has worked on the case over the years. Caro Quintero had Camarena kidnapped, tortured and killed in 1985 because he blamed the agent for a raid on a huge marijuana plantation the year prior, authorities said. Camarena's killing marked a low point in U.S.-Mexico relations and was dramatized in the popular Netflix series 'Narcos: Mexico.' The White House, in a statement Friday ahead of the arraignments, called Caro Quintero 'one of the most evil cartel bosses in the world.' In exchange for delaying tariffs, Trump had insisted that Mexico crack down on cartels, illegal immigration and fentanyl production. But members of Mexico's Security Cabinet on Friday framed the transfer of the 29 prisoners as a national security decision. 'It is not a commitment to the United States. It is a commitment to ourselves,' said Mexican Atty. Gen. Alejandro Gertz Manero. 'The problem of drug trafficking and organized crime has been a true tragedy for our country.' Security Secretary Omar García Harfuch said the people sent into U.S. custody were 'generators of violence' in Mexico and represented a security threat to both countries. Caro Quintero has long been one of America's top Mexican targets for extradition. He was one of the founders of a Guadalajara-based cartel and one of the primary suppliers of heroin, cocaine and marijuana to the U.S. in the late 1970s and 1980s. Caro Quintero had been 28 years into a 40-year sentence in Mexico when an appeals court overturned his verdict in 2013. After his release, he returned to drug trafficking and unleashed bloody turf battles in the northern Mexico border state of Sonora until he was arrested by Mexican forces in 2022, authorities said. Caro Quintero told the Spanish newspaper El País in 2018 that he 'never went back to drugs.' 'Whoever's saying it is a liar!' he said, according to the newspaper. 'I'm not working anymore, let's be clear about that! I was a drug trafficker 23 years ago, and now I'm not, and I won't ever be again.' The U.S., which had added Caro Quintero to the FBI's 10 most wanted list in 2018 with a $20-million reward, sought his extradition immediately after his 2022 arrest. It happened days after the Mexican and U.S. presidents at the time, Andrés Manuel López Obrador and Joe Biden, respectively, met at the White House. But the request remained in limbo as López Obrador severely curtailed his country's cooperation with the U.S. to protest undercover American law enforcement operations targeting Mexican political and military officials. Then, in January, a nonprofit group representing the Camarena family sent a letter to the new Trump administration urging it to renew the extradition request. Carrillo Fuentes is the brother of drug lord Amado Carrillo Fuentes, known as the 'Lord of the Skies,' who died in a botched plastic surgery in 1997. Carrillo Fuentes, who was known as the Viceroy, continued his brother's business of smuggling drugs over the border until his arrest in 2014. He was sentenced in 2021 to 28 years in prison for organized crime, money laundering and weapons violations. Among the others extradited are leading members of Mexican organized crime groups recently designated by the Republican administration as 'foreign terrorist organizations.' They include cartel leaders, security chiefs from both factions of the Sinaloa cartel, cartel finance operatives and a man wanted in connection with the killing of a North Carolina sheriff's deputy in 2022. Marcelo and Peltz write for the Associated Press. Associated Press writer Fabiola Sánchez contributed to this report from Mexico City.
