A Colombian drug lord dubbed “the Prince of Semi-Submersibles” was sentenced to over 20 years in jail for working a fleet of narco-submarines that smuggled hundreds of kilos cocaine into the U.S. from South America, federal prosecutors introduced Monday.
Narco-submarines are makeshift nautical automobiles painted in ocean colours which have one objective: to smuggle narcotics in hermetically sealed containers throughout hundreds of miles of ocean to illicit ports of name in completely different international places. The know-how has progressed at present and has develop proper into a large drive inside the worldwide drug commerce.
Oscar Adriano Quintero Rengifo, 35, additionally referred to as “Guatala,” was sentenced to twenty years and 10 months in federal jail for smuggling cocaine in narco-subs, the U.S. legal professional’s office for the center District of Florida mentioned in courtroom papers.
Quintero Rengifo was a part of a transnational felony group that smuggled cocaine from South America to Central America for final importation into the usa, in response to a federal plea settlement. The group primarily despatched self-propelled semi-submersible vessels to Guatemala, the place the cocaine was then smuggled over the Guatemala and Mexican borders, after which into the U.S., prosecutors mentioned.
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a press launch by federal prosecutors described Quintero Rengifo as “the Prince of Semi-Submersibles,” a time period initially coined for him by media in Colombia. Quintero Rengifo rose through the ranks of a Colombian-Guatemalan drug group to become an educated worldwide smuggler.
“The group primarily despatched vessels corresponding to self-propelled semi-submersible vessels to Guatemala, the place the cocaine was then smuggled over the Guatemala/Mexican border after which into the usa,” courtroom paperwork mentioned. “A former mayor in Guatemala, who managed drug routes in northern Guatemala into Mexico, oversaw the smuggling of cocaine to Mexican cartel members. Quintero Rengifo progressed all through the group, from organizing smuggling operations, to in the end investing in shipments and securing retailers.”
From at the least as early as January 2015 through September 2019, the U.S. Coast Guard interdicted at the least 4 vessels, collectively with two semi-submersibles, straight linked to the defendant’s group, and involving better than thirteen,000 kilograms of cocaine, prosecutors mentioned.
Quintero Rengifo was arrested in Colombia on the request of the usa on January 29, 2021, and extradited to the usa on January 26, 2022. He pleaded responsible on might 20, 2022. He was sentenced to jail by U.S. District decide Charlene Edwards Honeywell.
For years, narco submarines have been utilized by cartels to smuggle cocaine and completely different medicine, primarily from Colombia and Ecuador to Central America, Mexico and the usa. they allow Colombian gangs, in affiliation with Mexican drug cartels, to maneuver medicine quick and enhance earnings.
This case was investigated by the Panama categorical Strike drive, a standing Organized Crime Drug Enforcement job drive (OCDETF) comprised of brokers and analysts from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland safety Investigations (HSI), the U.S. Coast Guard Investigative Service, and the U.S. Southern Command’s Joint Interagency job drive South.
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“inside the final decade, the submersibles manufacturing has elevated as a consequence of good curiosity by felony organizations,” mentioned Mario Pazmiño, former chief of intelligence on the Ecuador navy and a safety analyst.
Since 2018, effectively over a hundred narco-submarines have been seized, Colombian authorities mentioned. On common, the vessels carry round 286,600 kilos of cocaine and 1,543 kilos of marijuana. Mexico, Panama, Costa Rica and El Salvador are basically the most used routes by drug traffickers.
Given narco-submarines carry merchandise worth tens of millions of dollars, traffickers lease engineers to assemble them.
“They want particular teaching on enchancment, ship design to have the vitality to make them protected first,” Pazmiño mentioned. “they’ve two very important traits: Their profiled displacement on the coast makes them a lot much less detectable as a consequence of their look,” and massive volumes of medicine “may even be loaded and transported quickly.”
Contributing: Karol Suárez, the Louisville Courier Journal
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