Justice of the United States on Tuesday sentenced the former candidate to the Presidency of Guatemala Mario Estrada to 15 years in prison for drug trafficking, as reported by Voice of America.
“Geoffrey S. Berman, the prosecutor for the southern district of New York, has announced that Mario Amílcar Estrada Orellana was sentenced to 180 months in prison for participating in a conspiracy to import and distribute tons of cocaine to the United States,” said the Prosecutor in a brief statement.
The politician would have promised to help drug traffickers export drugs to the United States. In addition, he tried to organize the murders of several political rivals. “Thanks to the Administration for Drug Control, instead of coming to the Presidency in Guatemala Estrada goes to prison,” the text said.
Estrada, who was arrested in April 2019 in the city of Miami, in Florida, would have offered freeway to alleged members of the Sinaloa cartel to traffic with cocaine. Therefore, the sentence includes four years of probation and a bail of about $ 40,000.
The American judge Jed S. Rakoff, on the other hand, has asserted that “although Estrada yielded to his desire for power” and “sold the country to the Sinaloa cartel,” the revised reports and evidence have made him more lenient to the time to issue a verdict.
The Guatemalan has apologized to the judge and said he fought a long time “for the welfare of his family and his country.” “For a long time I was walking correctly but I recognize that I made a mistake. It was not my intention but I accept it,” he explained.
