Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera gave money directly to the former president of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernándezas part of their drug trafficking businesses to the United States.
This was revealed by Amílcar Alexander Ardón Soriano, former mayor of El Paraíso, Honduras, the second witness in the trial of the former Honduran president in the Southern District Court of New York.
He stated that he witnessed when the former leader of the Sinaloa Cartel delivered at least one million dollars to “JOH,” as the former Honduran president is also known.
The accusation against Hernández mentions that his Collusions with organized crime included business with the Sinaloa Cartelparticularly with the group of “El Chapo” Guzmán, who is currently serving a life sentence in a Supermax prison in Florence, Colorado.
Hernández faces three charges: conspiracy to import cocaine; possession of machine guns and destructive devices, and conspiracy to possess machine guns and destructive devices.
“As part of that conspiracy, Juan Orlando Hernández, alias ‘JOH,’ the defendant, received millions of dollars from multiple drug trafficking organizations in Honduras, Mexico and elsewhere, including from former Sinaloa Cartel leader Joaquín Guzmán Loera, alias ‘El Chapo’ (‘Guzmán Loera’),” the accusation says.
In the presentation of the case, Prosecutor David Robles listed some of the witnesses who will take the stand to speak against JOH, including a “former member of the Sinaloa Cartel.”although the name was not specified.
Robles also noted that the protection that the former president of Honduras provided to drug traffickers allowed the trafficking of cocaine from South America to Central America, Mexico and finally the United States.
The first witness, José Sánchez, the accountant of one of the former Honduran president’s partners, recounted Hernández’s corruption structure and connected him directly with drug trafficker Geovanny Fuentes Ramirez, who is convicted in the United States.
Although the defense accused that prosecutors do not have videos, photographs, recordings or other types of evidence, the witnesses report first-hand events, that is, those in which they participated as witnesses or active members.
This is like the case of Sánchez, who wrote checks and gave cash to former President Hernández on the orders of his former boss Fuad Jarufe, owner of the Graneros Nacionales rice company in the city of Choloma, Honduras.
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