US Sanctions Mexican Frozen Dessert Company, Pharmacy Linked to Sinaloa Cartel

September 25, 2024

The U.S. Treasury Department on Tuesday sanctioned two Mexico-based companies—a pharmacy and a frozen dessert company—that it said were owned by the Sinaloa Cartel.

The Treasury said the Sinaloa Cartel is “one of the most notorious and pervasive” drug trafficking organizations, responsible for the trafficking of vast amounts of illicit fentanyl and other drugs into the United States.

It said that members of the cartel have allegedly been using proceeds from illicit drug trafficking to establish businesses that can appear to operate legitimately.

The two Sinaloa-linked companies targeted in the sanctions are the Sonora-based Farmacia y Mini Super Trinidad pharmacy and Nieves y Paletas EVI, a frozen dessert business with multiple locations in Culiacan, Pueblos Unidos, and Tacuichamona.

The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) said that Jesus Norberto Larranaga Herrera and Karla Gabriela Lizarraga Sanchez allegedly used proceeds from fentanyl trafficking to establish Nieves y Paletas EVI. The pair were sanctioned by OFAC in March.

Farmacia y Mini Super Trinidad is owned by alleged drug trafficker Jose Arnoldo Morgan Huerta, the brother of Juan Carlos Morgan Huerta, whom OFAC described as a Sinaloa Cartel “plaza boss” responsible for overseeing drug trafficking into the United States. Both were sanctioned in November 2023.

The OFAC also sanctioned five leaders of Clan del Golfo (CDG), also known as Los Urabeños, which it identified as a “significant foreign narcotics trafficker” in Colombia.

According to OFAC, CDG is one of Colombia’s largest drug trafficking organizations that sends “multi-ton quantities of cocaine” to Panama, Mexico, and other countries in Central America via maritime routes.

CDG is also known for its role as a “key contributor” to human smuggling through the Darién Gap, a stretch of rainforest jungle straddling the Colombia-Panama border, according to the Treasury’s statement.

The sanctioned CDG leaders are Jose Miguel Demoya Hernandez, Alexander Celis Durango, Jose Gonzalo Sanchez Sanchez, Jose Emilson Cordoba Quinto, and Wilder de Jesus Alcaraz Morales. Three of them are wanted by Colombian authorities and remain at large.

The federal government is “committed to using every tool at our disposal to combat the cartels that are poisoning our communities with fentanyl and other deadly drugs,” Deputy Secretary of the Treasury Wally Adeyemo said in a statement.

The sanctions were announced as OFAC Acting Director Lisa Palluconi is scheduled to visit Colombia and Mexico this week for talks with the governments of both nations, according to the Treasury.

Palluconi’s visit was aimed at enhancing U.S. regional ties, promoting sanctions compliance, and safeguarding the financial system from the proceeds of illicit drug trafficking, the Treasury said.

Two factions of the powerful Sinaloa cartel have clashed in the state capital of Culiacan recently, with teams of gunmen—or sicarios—shooting at each other and the security forces.

The uptick in violence followed the capture of Ismael Zambada in El Paso, Texas, on July 25. Zambada has alleged that he was kidnapped in Mexico and flown to the United States by Joaquín Guzmán, a senior crime boss in a rival faction of the Sinaloa Cartel who had been holding talks with the United States about surrendering.

Asked if the U.S. government was “jointly responsible” for the violence in Sinaloa, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said last week, “Yes, of course ... for having carried out this operation.”

López Obrador, who is due to step down next month, said that U.S authorities “carried out that operation” to capture Zambada and that “it was totally illegal, and agents from the Department of Justice were waiting for Mr. Mayo.”

U.S. Ambassador Ken Salazar rejected the allegations that the United States was responsible for the upsurge in violence, which has left at least 30 people dead.

“What is being seen in Sinaloa is not the fault of the United States,” Salazar told reporters in Mexico on Saturday, adding that the country cannot be held responsible for “the massacres we see in different places.”

The Poch Times