Florida court awards Mexican government massive civil judgment against former security chief
Florida court awards Mexican government massive civil judgment against former security chief
MEXICO CITY (AP) — A Florida court awarded the Mexican government a massive civil judgment Thursday against its former security chief who is now serving a lengthy prison sentence in the United States for taking bribes from drug traffickers.
Judge Lisa Walsh ordered Genaro García Luna to pay more than $748 million and his wife Linda Cristina Pereyra to hand over more than $1.7 billion.
García Luna was sentenced to more than 38 years in a U.S. prison last October for taking massive bribes to help drug traffickers.
Mexico’s former secretary of public security was convicted by a New York jury in 2023 of accepting millions of dollars in bribes to protect the violent Sinaloa cartel that he was supposedly combating. He is the highest-level Mexican government official to be convicted in the United States.
He served as secretary of public security to then-President Felipe Calderón from 2006 to 2012.
After leaving office García Luna moved to Florida. His lawyers said he was a legitimate businessman who did consulting in Florida before he was arrested in 2019.
García Luna and associates set up companies that got 30 dubious government contracts while he was Mexico’s top security official in 2006-2012 and for six years afterward.
The contracts were for things like surveillance, monitoring and communications equipment used in prisons and in intelligence work. The contracts were presumably inflated. In one case, the contract was simply falsified.
García Luna allegedly channeled money from the prison security and government intelligence technology contracts to offshore accounts, many in Barbados, then sent it to Miami to buy fancy condos and vintage cars.
García Luna and his associates bought several vintage Mustangs from the 1960s and ’70s. They also bought luxury sports cars like Lamborghinis and Ferraris.
The Florida lawsuit was filed in September 2021.
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