By Canadian Press

No bond for ex-Mexico security official charged with bribery

Dec 17, 2019 | 1:25 PM

DALLAS — A judge on Tuesday ordered Mexico’s former top security official to remain held without bond in a Texas jail as he awaits trial for allegedly accepting a fortune in drug-money bribes for letting the notorious Sinaloa cartel operate with impunity.

Genaro Garcia Luna, 51, was indicted on three counts of cocaine trafficking conspiracy and a false statements charge. His detention hearing in Dallas came a week after the federal indictment against him was made public in New York City.

The judge ordered him held in Texas until marshals could transfer him to New York, where Sinaloa kingpin Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman was tried in 2018.

Drug Enforcement Administration agents arrested him in North Texas last Monday.

During Guzman’s trial, a former cartel member testified that he personally paid Garcia Luna $6 million in bribes, secretly delivering him cash at a restaurant in Mexico between 2005 and 2007. Prosecutors have said other co-operating witnesses confirmed the Sinaloa cartel paid Garcia Luna tens of millions of dollars to clear the way for it to ship drugs to the U.S.

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Garcia Luna lived in Florida before his arrest. From 2001 to 2005, he led Mexico’s Federal Investigation Agency and from 2006 to 2012 served as Mexico’s secretary of public security before relocating to the U.S., authorities said.

Jake Bleiberg, The Associated Press