Genaro Garcia Luna Writes His Letter Calling Out AMLO, Turned Down a Six Month Plea Deal

 "Socalj" for Borderland Beat

As we saw recently, "El Mayo" Zambada issued a statement via a letter through his lawyer Frank Perez detailing the events leading to and accusations against government officials.

Last year, Los Chapitos, issued a lengthy letter disputing various portions of the new superseding indictment against them, to which "El Mini Lic," provided Borderland Beat with exclusive rebuttals to their claims of innocence regarding fentanyl and certain deaths. Former Los Zetas leader "Z-40" wrote a letter denying that he is the same person authorities claim him to be.

The practice of drug lords penning letters to the media and US authorities to either proclaim their innocence, dispute allegations and indictments and spread propaganda about rival cartels and government officials is not a recent trend. 

Prime examples include "El Chapo" denying the charges laid out in a large Texas indictment in 2012 and a letter written by "La Barbie" accusing Mexican officials of collaborating with the cartels.

And now journalist Keegan Hamilton received a handwritten letter from Genaro Garcia Luna, currently awaiting sentencing at the Brooklyn MDC (Metropolitan Detention Center). "El Mayo" was just transferred to the same facility as his trial in New York proceeds. It is highly unlikely they have any direct contact with each other there.

In the letter he details the offer to become a witness in exchange for a 6-month prison term, which he declined and reasoned that his arrest was not necessary for his cooperation against criminals as he claimed to have done so throughout his career in Mexico.

He also makes claims of agreements and collaboration between various government officials including President AMLO, citing current judicial reform as evidence of this corruption.

The letter also goes to length defending his innocence and claims that no evidence aside from witness testimony of drug traffickers who were arrested and extradited during his time as the Secretary of Public Security for Mexico under President Felipe Calderon.

Below are key translated portions of the letter provided by Luna's lawyer.

 6 Month Cooperation Deal

"After the arrest and during the first few days I was repeatedly offered a deal with the New York Attorney's Office to charge me with crimes related to drug trafficking in exchange for being detained for a short time (6 months) and receive financial benefits in this way to become a witness." 

Denial of Trial Evidence

"In February 2023, I went to trial. As is public knowledge, the prosecutors did not present a single piece of evidence or proof of the crimes that were being indicated-essentially crimes linked to drug trafficking. They did not present any documents, photographs, videos, audio, telephone communication records, tax or financial documents, bank accounts, or any record of contact with any member of the drug trade or their family, as the Mexican government claimed."

"Similarly, in Mexico, a Collegial Court of the Judiciary ruled in October 2023 (after a trial) that there was no evidence to prove illegal income in my assets prior to 2012, during more than 20 years that I served as a public official. In short, both in the U.S. and Mexico, the respective judicial branches ruled that my assets of more than 20 years are legal, that there is not a single peso-dollar linked to drug trafficking." 

 

"These witnesses were arrested, imprisoned without escaping, and extradited in the same period of time that I was Secretary of Public Security of Mexico."

Accusing AMLO of Working with Traffickers

"...President of Mexico Andrés López Obrador and his operators with the leaders of drug trafficking and their families, particularly with drug traffickers who were used as witnesses against me during the trial, who even during the trial accused President Lopez Obrador and his operators of being linked to them and drug trafficking."

 

AMLO's Response

Following the allegations made by former Secretary of Security Genaro García Luna, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador challenged him to present evidence of his alleged links to drug trafficking, “so that he does not fail, to ask his friends at the DEA and the U.S. State Department for the information.”

"If one is a leader and wants to transform a reality of oppression, injustice, and privilege, one must have moral authority, one must be honest, because otherwise one cannot do it, they will destroy one. In my decades-long career as a leader, I have suffered many accusations and they have not been able to do it." President AMLO stated during his morning press conference.

President López Obrador said that if, as Garcia Luna says, he is innocent, "why doesn't Calderón defend him? Then those who rewarded him, the United States Embassy in Mexico, the DEA, of course the State Department, the Department of Justice in the United States."

Sources Keegan Hamilton, Proceso