Genaro García Luna pleads not guilty in the United States of having ties to drug trafficking

One of the hearings in the case of Genaro García Luna in New York.JANE ROSENBERG / Reuters

Genaro García Luna, the head of Mexico's anti-drug strategy during the government of Felipe Calderón (2006-2012), has pleaded not guilty to five charges against him by the New York Prosecutor's Office for alleged links with drug trafficking.

This Wednesday's hearing, key to the fate of the former secretary of Public Safety, had to be suspended at the start due to the noise of Mexican reporters during the remote connection of the court.

"Silence your microphones, please," begged the court, which threatened to postpone the session indefinitely before resuming it minutes later.

García Luna is accused of receiving bribes from the Sinaloa cartel, directly participating in drug shipments to the United States and falsifying his statements.

The five new charges against the former official are lying to US authorities (perjury);

leading a criminal enterprise with five violations of US narcotics law, and three conspiracies to possess, distribute and import cocaine into the US These charges are in addition to the four that were filed last January for drug trafficking and corruption.

If the allegations are proven, García Luna could face a life sentence in prison.

"Shut up with a fuck!" Was heard on the telephone link in a chaotic hearing that filled the patience of Judge Brian Cogan.

Conversations in English and Spanish, noise from telephones and television programs, and screaming after each critical moment in the legal process have marked the journey in the Eastern District Court of New York, notorious for prosecuting Joaquín

Guzmán.

The pandemic had already forced García Luna's declaration, originally scheduled for May 30, to be postponed several times, since it was held remotely.

The hearing was key to defining the course of the case, in which it is considered that witnesses who also participated last year in the trial of

Guzmán could take the stand again.

Prosecutors have gathered more than 189,000 pages of evidence to prove the drug czar's ties to drug trafficking.

The defendant denied the charges in the voice of his lawyer César de Castro, which opens the door for the details of the accusations and new testimonies to be aired in a trial and reach the headlines of the Mexican press.

During the procedure, a “yes sir” was also heard from the accused when the judge asked him if he agreed to hold the session by videoconference.

The case against García Luna, who was arrested last December in Dallas (Texas), has explosive implications for Mexico, in a cause that has already brought Calderón's security apparatus under scrutiny, which started the so-called war against drug trafficking.

At the end of last July, the Prosecutor's Office presented an expanded accusation that includes Luis Cárdenas Palomino and Ramón Pequeno García, two key collaborators of García Luna.

Since last September 24, Cárdenas Palomino has had a search and arrest warrant in Mexico for the torture of four people in 2012. “There is close collaboration between the Department of Justice and other agencies with the Attorney General's Office in all matters related to the case of García Luna and these police officers who served at that time ”, said the president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, in his morning conference this Wednesday.

García Luna, who was also director of the Federal Investigations Agency during the Vicente Fox government (from 2000 to 2006), has been questioned in Mexico for his efforts in the fight against drug cartels, alleged television montages in the capture of criminals and for supposedly favoring Guzmán's organization.

Those suspicions, which took shape in the Guzmán trial, have turned into charges of bribery.

In 2005, there was a payment of three million dollars and two years later there was another of between three and five million, according to the testimony of Jesús

Zambada, a former member of the Sinaloa cartel.

The US Attorney's Office maintains that the negotiations to install plaza chiefs and turn a blind eye to the actions of the drug traffickers took place while García Luna maintained direct communication with the White House and coordinated the militarization of the country's Public Security.

Under his leadership the Federal Police grew from 5,000 to more than 35,000 agents.

The next hearing is scheduled for December 7.

In January, García Luna had already initially declared "not guilty" of the first charges against him, a position that he has ratified in the face of the expanded accusation.

Prosecutors had estimated the trial to last between two and three months, although the judicial process has been slowed down by the coronavirus pandemic.