Thread: Link to Mexico: The distribution and laundering drug cases

Just more of these great folks jorge boosh wants to give amnesty to.


Link to Mexico: The distribution and laundering cases trace back to two key players
By Pamela Manson
The Salt Lake Tribune

http://www.sltrib.com/ci_5015684

Celso Trinidad-Castro and Eusebio Aguilera-Meza played together as kids in their hometown of Villa Corona, Mexico.
They would grow up to run multimillion-dollar businesses in which Trinidad-Castro distributed street drugs and Aguilera-Meza laundered the profits through his money transmitter company, according to federal grand jury indictments.
The cash allegedly enabled the two men and their associates to live comfortable lives in Utah and send money home to Mexico.
But the good times are over, the feds say. By tracing the cash from the alleged drug dealing and money laundering, investigators broke up the two operations.
"Crimes that are motivated by money always leave a money trail," says Internal Revenue Service spokesman Ted Elder.
There are 11 defendants in the Trinidad-Castro case and nine in the Aguilera-Meza case. Almost all have ties to Villa Corona in the state of Jalisco, about 400 miles northwest of Mexico City.
Envios Aguilera, a Salt Lake City money wiring business, came under scrutiny first. In December 2003, the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives passed a tip that the business was engaged in illegal activities to immigration investigators.
They soon learned that not all of the company's transactions were legitimate, says Edgar Martinez, a special agent for Immigration and

Customs Enforcement (ICE).
"Information obtained through investigation indi- cates that Envios is known in drug circles as a place to wire money obtained through drug trafficking to Mexico and elsewhere," Martinez wrote in an application for search warrants for the business and Aguilera-Meza's home.
Martinez sought the warrants in fall 2005, near the end of a two-year probe that involved federal, state and local law enforcement agencies. Undercover agents had posed as drug dealers and allegedly sent $36,000 in several transactions through Envios to a bank account they set up under the name of a fake business, Zapateria El Gallo, or the Rooster Shoe Store.
In December 2005, four Aguilera-Meza brothers and five associates were indicted on money laundering charges. Most of the funds transferred between 1998 and late 2005 by their companies came from drug dealers who were funneling money to their suppliers in Mexico, investigators say.
The defendants are accused of knowingly moving drug proceeds through multiple accounts to disguise the origin of the money and structuring the transactions in amounts of less than $10,000 to avoid federal reporting requirements.
The businesses allegedly collected a fee of 1 percent to 10 percent of the amount transferred.
Bank records show that Envios allegedly deposited millions of dollars into its bank accounts before sending the money out of the country. Although some of the transfers were legitimate, much of the money was ill-gotten gains being laundered, investigators say.
In a twist, the Aguilera-Meza case eventually led to the indictment on drug and other charges of Trinidad-Castro and 10 of his alleged associates. Unlike most cases where the drug defendants are targeted at the beginning, agents first investigated the money laundering, then followed the cash backward to its alleged source: the dealers.
The Trinidad-Cast- ro group, which allegedly sold cocaine and methamphetamine, is accused of moving a big chunk of money to Mexico.
In one six-month period, the indictment charges, the Trinidad-Castro family wired about $350,000, much of it to an address in Villa Corona.
One defendant had worked for an Aguilera-Meza transmitting company before getting a job at a car repair shop operated by Celso Trinidad-Castro, according to court documents.
Martinez said sources told investigators that two Trinidad-Castro brothers had sent $200,000 to $300,000 to Mexico many times by hiding the currency in vehicles with secret compartments. In addition, the ICE agent wrote, one informant said several runners smuggled money into Mexico and narcotics into the United States by using such hiding places.
The apparent connection between the two organizations is not surprising to authorities.
"Eusebio Aguilera-Meza stated that Villa Corona was a small town and everyone knew each other," Martinez wrote.
Besides the drug counts, various defendants in the Trinidad-Castro case are charged with aggravated identity theft, illegal entry into the United States, conspiracy to commit money laundering and conducting an unlicensed money transmitting business. Financial records show that eight of the defendants laundered approximately $738,337 in drug proceeds from 1999 to 2005, the charges state.
Four defendants in the Aguilera-Meza case have pleaded guilty. The rest of the defendants in the two cases are awaiting trial, including Eusebio Aguilera-Meza, who is in custody.
pmanson@sltrib.com

There is alot of Mexican drug money laundered in the U.S. and often the money is sent back and forth by people. That is why it was originally so well tracked. Now with the illegals sending money back home the record keeping has and may become even more lax making it easier for the money launderers.