It’s a Colombian bombshell: According to this news item from El Espectador, the former security chief of drug-fighting President Alvaro Uribe has been indicted in U.S. federal court for, among other things, taking bribes from both drug cartels and paramilitary groups, trafficking in cocaine and betraying the names of drug informants who were later hunted down and murdered.
The El Espectador news item says in part:
The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia has indicted Mauricio Santoyo for having links to the Office of Envigado [a drug cartel] and the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia [a combine of right-wing paramilitaries classified as a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. in 2001].
A former policeman and general, Mauricio Alfonso Santoyo Velascom, who was also security chief for President Uribe during his first term, has come under the radar of U.S. justice. The U.S. District Attorney for Virginia, Neil MacBride, is investigating the retired senior officer for his alleged links with the Office of Envigado and the paramilitary forces.
According to El Tiempo, Santoyo is said to have provided confidential information obtained through illegal wiretapping to these criminal organizations, allowing their members to avoid capture, as well as facilitating drug trafficking to Central America and the United States. According to the U.S. indictment, to accomplish this, Santoyo worked with other corrupt police officers and betrayed the names of informants who were later killed.
[Editor’s Note: The May 24 indictment issued by a grand jury of the Eastern District of Virginia and unsealed last week alleges that Santoyo received “substantial bribes” in exchange for:
— Tipping off the traffickers to ongoing drug-trafficking investigations as well as wiretaps targeting them.
— Promising to “facilitate the transfer of corrupt police officers, who would further assist these drug-traffickers in their business.”
— Notifying traffickers of upcoming arrest operations, including joint Colombian investigations with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.
— Conducting unauthorized wiretaps on behalf of the traffickers.
— Provide intelligence collected by Colombian law enforcement to drug traffickers, including on people later targeted for murder by the traffickers.]
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