The chief of the Del Golfo clan recognized his responsibility in international cocaine traffic in a New York court. He faces life imprisonment.
mo12345lemonde with AFP
The chief of the Colombian gang Clan Del Golfo, “Otoniel”, extradited in the United States in May 2022, pleaded guilty on Wednesday January 25 of international trafficking in justice in New York. He faces life for life.
At the end of the hearing before the Federal Court of Brooklyn, Dairo Antonio Usuga, alias Otoniel, 51, read a statement in which he admitted having made more than 96 tonnes of cocaine in the United States, via central America and Mexico.
After recognizing that in the context of “military work, murders were committed” by his organization, which was able to count up to 6,000 men, he also said that the clan “assured the safety of the laboratories and drug traffickers and took taxes “for cocaine transitting through the territories under their control.
“When he is convicted, Usuga David will incur a compulsory minimum sentence of twenty years in prison and until life prison. As part of the plea-guilty agreement, he also accepted a judgment of Confiscation of $ 216 million, “announced the Federal Prosecutor of Brooklyn, Breon Peace.
assassinations campaign after his extradition
otoniel, who had reigned since 2012 at the head of the organization, formed by vestiges of extreme right paramilitary groups, pleaded guilty of continuous criminal business management, conspiracy to make and distribute cocaine , as well as a maritime conspiracy to traffic drugs, a charges contained in a procedure before a federal court of Florida.
His extradition in May 2022, seven months after his arrest in Colombia, had been followed by a bloody campaign of assassinations against police in his country. But after the election at the head of Colombia of the left president Gustavo Petro, favorable to negotiations with several armed groups, Otoniel had asked in August 2022 to his gang to put an end to this wave of murders.
According to the DEA, the American anti-Drogue agency, the Gulf cartel collaborated with the Mexican cartels Sinaloa and Jalisco New Generation to introduce clandestine drugs in the United States.
According to the agency, 90 % of the drugs arriving on the American market come from Colombia and are often mixed with fentanyl, a powerful and deadly substance added by Mexican cartels.
In 2021, the United States recorded 108,000 deaths by overdose, a record.