A U.S. citizen living in Mexico who claimed ties to the Sinaloa cartel faces a 17-count indictment related to a drug trafficking operation between Mexico and Alaska, federal authorities announced Wednesday.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for Alaska said Miguel Baez Guevara, 38, was arrested by Mexican immigration authorities in Sonora, Mexico, on Friday. He was deported to the United States and arrested upon his arrival in Arizona, the office said in a statement.
Guevara pleaded not guilty Tuesday in federal court in Arizona, where he was being detained pending transfer to Alaska, the office said. An online court records system did not show an attorney for Guevara.
William Taylor, an assistant U.S. attorney involved in the case, was asked during a news conference if authorities had confirmed a link between Guevara and the cartel, known for its extensive drug distribution network. Taylor said he could not go into details outside the indictment, which said that Guevara “claimed membership in, and association with, the Sinaloa Cartel operating in Sonora, Mexico.”
The cartel is also known for its association with Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, who had been widely considered its leader. He was sentenced to life in prison in the U.S. in 2019, and there has been little sign since that the cartel has weakened.
The indictment against Guevara alleges Guevara controlled and participated in “a network of drug traffickers designed to transport heroin, methamphetamine, and cocaine from Mexico to Alaska and other locations in the United States for distribution.”
Alaska was targeted “because of the increased prices the Enterprise would receive due to its distance away from Mexican sources of supply,” the indictment alleges.
The indictment, signed in 2020, alleges actions dating to 2016. Taylor said the indictment was recently unsealed. The pandemic interfered with efforts to work with international agencies on an arrest, he said.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for Alaska said Guevara’s indictment and arrest are part of an ongoing investigation in which 23 people have pleaded guilty to charges.
Subscribe here for just .08 cents per day to read subscriber content, join the PVDN newsletter, and browse with site ad-free. Support local news.
Trending news on PVDN
- Government stops construction on four condominium developments in Puerto Vallarta for violations The Secretary of Environment (Semarnat) in Jalisco, Raúl Rodgríguez Rosales, reported that the government agency stopped the construction of four condominium developments in Puerto Vallarta for not complying with regulations.
- Investigation opened into taxi driver who intentionally hit and killed a woman in Puerto Vallarta The State Prosecutor’s Office is conducting investigations under the femicide protocol with a gender perspective, to clarify the facts which a woman lost her life due to being run over by a taxi, in what is believed to be intentional, in the municipality of Puerto Vallarta, yesterday, January 29, 2023, at approximately 8:09 p.m.
- Canadian woman hospitalized after being critically injured by rogue wave during her Puerto Vallarta honeymoon vacation A Canadian woman remains on a ventilator in a hospital after she was struck by a rogue wave while on her honeymoon in Mexico. Cory Moe, who is a long-term care nurse back in Carnduff, Saskatchewan, was in Puerto Vallarta with her husband Dalton for a delayed honeymoon and the pair were enjoying the water.…
- Mexico outsources justice in its most high-profile cases to the United States The Federal Prosecutor’s Office for the Eastern District of New York has become an outsourcing agency for the Mexican government, since at least in the last five years, drug traffickers and high-profile criminals, who were not prosecuted for their crimes in Mexico, have been brought to trial and sentenced in the United States. The trial…
- With new explosion and 249 minutes of tremors in the last 24-hours, warning about Mexico’s most dangerous volcano is issued In the last 24 hours, at least 128 exhalations, 249 minutes of tremors, a minor explosion, and a volcanotectonic earthquake have been recorded, which is why the population is urged not to approach the volcano.
