US files first terrorism charge against a Mexican drug trafficker

Donald Trump’s crusade against the fentanyl flooding the United States resulted in the first terrorism indictment against a Mexican drug trafficker on Tuesday. Adam Gordon, a federal prosecutor in California, unveiled the federal charges against Pedro Inzunza Noriega and his son, Pedro Inzunza Coronel, alleged leaders of the Beltrán Leyva organization. According to the U.S. government, they, along with five other defendants, facilitated the trafficking of the powerful synthetic opiate into the country and assisted in money laundering for the Sinaloa Cartel.

Inzunza Noriega, 62, is known in the criminal world by the nicknames “Sagitario,” “el 120,” and “The One in the Chair.” His son, Inzunza Coronel, is 33 is nicknamed “Pichón (Pigeon)” or “Bird.” Both are from Los Mochis, Sinaloa. They face various federal charges for money laundering, drug trafficking, and organized crime. The most serious charges, however, are narcoterrorism and assisting terrorism, which can carry minimum sentences of 20 years in prison and fines of $20 million if convicted at trial.

Pam Bondi, the United States Attorney General, has stated that the fight against the Sinaloa Cartel requires “fresh” and “powerful” legal strategies. “Their days of brutalizing the American people without consequence are over,” asserted Bondi, an official who has championed her tough-on-crime approach. The prosecutor has said that the courts will seek life sentences for the defendants accused of narcoterrorism. In addition to the Inzunzas, the other accused are Mexicans David Alejandro Heredia Velázquez, Daniel Eduardo Bojórquez, and Javier Alonso Vázquez Sánchez; Guatemalan Óscar René González Menéndez; and Costa Rican Elías Alberto Quirós Benavides.

Trump returned to the White House last January with the promise of fighting drug cartels that facilitate the entry of fentanyl into the country, a drug that is the leading cause of death among people aged between 18 and 44. The threat against these criminal groups was fulfilled on February 20, when the president issued a decree adding six Mexican cartels and two South American gangs to the list of transnational terrorist organizations. The list included the Sinaloa Cartel, which Washington identifies as the main importer of the opiate into the United States.

Prosecutor Gordon believes this indictment, part of Operation Take Back America, reflects that narcoterrorism operates like a cancer within the state. “They metastasize violence, corruption and fear. If left unchecked, their growth would lead to the death of law and order,” he stated. The lawyer took office as federal prosecutor in April. However, he has a long history of litigating in San Diego against drug traffickers accused of smuggling fentanyl into the country.

Gordon is now heading the unit that will combat narcoterrorism, which was created on April 11. This Tuesday, he announced that this group has set a goal of filing similar charges against Iván Archivaldo Guzmán Salazar, son of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán; Ismael Zambada Sicairos, son of Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada; and José Gil Caro Quintero, nephew of Rafael Caro Quintero. All of these belong to a new generation of Sinaloa drug traffickers directly linked to the organization’s historical leadership.

The Inzunzas are well-known to U.S. authorities. The Biden administration had been targeting them since late 2023, when the Treasury Department designated Inzunza Noriega and his partner, Oscar Manuel Gastélum Iribe, as leaders of the Beltrán Leyva Cartel and froze their assets and financial movements in the United States. The decision, announced by Antony Blinken, Biden’s Secretary of State, and Treasurer Janet Yellen, implicated 15 other members of the criminal organization, which has been operating in Mexico for several years despite the deaths of the brothers who gave their surnames to the cartel.

Washington accuses Inzunza Noriega of assisting Gastélum Iribe, who was in charge of overseeing the operation of drug trafficking routes from Ecuador, Costa Rica, Honduras, and Guatemala to the Mexican states of Quintana Roo, Chiapas, Oaxaca, Guerrero, and Sinaloa. Inzuza oversaw maritime shipments of the product. Above them was Isidro Meza Flores, known as “El Chapo Isidro,” currently one of the FBI’s most-wanted criminals, for whom a reward of $5 million is being offered.

The FBI alleges that Inzunza Noriega is responsible for coordinating some of the largest shipments of fentanyl and cocaine to the United States. The father and son have sent “tens of thousands of kilograms” to the country. Last December, the Mexican Navy dealt a blow to that organization by seizing 1.5 tons of fentanyl pills in Sinaloa. The Mexican government called it the largest seizure of fentanyl in history. U.S. agents claim the drugs were found in multiple locations controlled by the Inzunzas.

The drugs that the Beltrán Leyva gang’s operatives sent north traveled in stashes bearing “The Incredibles” stamps, like the Pixar animated film, rainbow-colored pills, and bricks marked with Louis Vuitton’s initials. Some of the soldiers belonging to the cartel wore caps bearing their bosses’ symbols: a 120, a bow and arrow, or a musical note, a nod to Gastélum Iribe, known in the criminal world as “The Musician.”

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