Fugitive and former PEMEX chief, Emilio Lozoya, arrives in Mexico today, extradited from Spain

Chivis Martinez Borderland Beat TY GUS  Zeta Tijuana

The press won’t have access to Lozoya’s hearing. While the Judiciary Council boasts about how it is using technology to halt the spread of COVID-19, it announced Emilio Lozoya’s hearing will not be made public.... 

Emilio Ricardo Lozoya Austin, former CEO of Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex), will be extradited today July 16, from Spain to Mexico.  The Criminal Chamber of the Spanish National Court (AN) agreed that all the requirements established in the legislation to proceed with the extradition.

"The National Court has agreed to the extradition to Mexico of the former director-general of the oil company Pemex Emilio Lozoya to be tried in two cases for crimes that in his country that would constitute an illicit association, bribery, and operations with the recourse of illicit origin and which in Spanish law correspond to illicit association, bribery and money laundering ”, indicated the judicial order signed by the Spanish magistrate José Antonio Mora Alarcón.

With strong security measures, the former CEO of Pemex will leave the prison in a police van to board the plane that will take him to Mexico. Lozoya Austin will be transferred from Madrid Prison IV, in Navalcarnero, where he has been incarcerated since March 2, after being brought from the Alhaurín de la Torre prison, in Malaga, the city where he was detained on February 12, after 9 months of being sought by Interpol.

A Mexican official plane traveled on Tuesday, July 14 to Spain, to escort Lozoya Austin back to Mexico, on a flight of approximately 13 hours, which would stop in Canada, and where it will be guarded by elements of the Federal Ministerial Police ( PFM), attached to Interpol Mexico.

The Attorney General's Office (FGR) reported that the former Mexican federal official will travel accompanied by his attaché in Spain and Europe, Luis Alejandro Cervantes Vázquez.

"Once the procedures have been completed and said person [Lozoya Austin] is leaving Spain, the Federal Public Ministry (MPF) [Spanish] will inform the control judges of Mexico of the approximate time of their arrival in Mexico City "The FGR said in a statement.

The plane is expected to arrive at the FGR hangar at the Mexico City International Airport (AICM), where human rights protocols will be applied, as part of its prerogatives, and will be reviewed by a doctor from the institution to prove their physical integrity.

According to the authorities themselves, once these procedures have been fulfilled, the control judges will be notified again to indicate the date and time of the initial hearings at the North Prison in Mexico City.

The Bombardier Challenger 605 aircraft, with registration XB-NWD, which arrived early Wednesday, July 15, at Madrid Barajas Airport, in Spain, transferred on January 19, 2017, to the Sinaloan capo Joaquín Archivaldo Guzmán Loera, alias “El Chapo”, To New York, in the United States. In addition, on January 4, 2018, he brought the former Governor of Quintana Roo, Roberto Borge Angulo, from Mexico to Panama.

On July 6, the Spanish Justice agreed to extradite Lozoya Austin to Mexico for an alleged fraud of 280 million dollars in the purchase of the Agronitrogenados fertilizer plant from Altos Hornos de México (AHMSA), in 2015, and for having received about $ 10.5 million in bribes from Brazilian construction company Odebrecht.

He is also being investigated for the purchase of a mansion in Ixtapa, Gurrero, that his wife Marielle Helen Eckes made, for a sum of 1.9 million dollars. Also, for having illegally transferred resources to acquire a house in Lomas de Bezares, in Mexico City, for 38 million pesos.

The Mexican authorities attribute to the former CEO of Pemex, a crime of bribery and illicit association, as well as "operations with resources of illicit origin", which would correspond to the crime of money laundering of the Spanish Penal Code, for which the extradition was authorized.