After learning of the verdict, a group of about 15 Mexicans shouted outside the Court for the Eastern District of New York, in Brooklyn, where for the last three weeks the defense of the former official and the US government prosecutor’s office presented their witnesses and their arguments. “Yes it could! Yes, it was possible!” they intoned.
(Photo: DAVID DEE DELGADO/REUTERS)
García Luna was found guilty of participating in the management of a criminal enterprise whose activity continues; conspiring to distribute five kilograms or more of cocaine with the intent to distribute it in the United States; conspire to import the same amount or more; and make false statements to the United States government.
The Eastern District Court building is a concrete and glass monolith in front of a large park, Cadman Plaza Park, where at the time the sentence was announced, a dozen children played with a ball and threw a soccer ball. American.
(Photo: Gonzalo Soto)
The first to leave, half an hour after the condemnatory reading, were the prosecutors, led by saritha komatireddy . It was she who, especially in the last session of the trial, spent hours linking García Luna with the network of criminal drug traffickers in Mexico.
Looking straight ahead and not allowing himself to gesture, Komatireddy walked briskly behind one of the Court officials and between two members of his team toward the Eastern District Attorney General’s office, located 130 meters away. His haste was only stopped by the pedestrian stop on Tillary Street, a road with a small median that separates both buildings. Despite the fact that there was not a single car crossing, he waited for his follow to advance to his destination.
The deputy prosecutor never let slip or glimpse a response to the siege of the press. “Do you agree with the verdict? What do you think of the result? Will the defense appeal?” Komatireddy was a moving statue.
(Photo: KENA BETANCUR/AFP)
Only hours later, and through a statement, Breon Pearce, attorney general for the Eastern District of New York, called García Luna a “traitor to the country” and a traitor to his honest companions who for years tried to fight organized crime.
“It is inconceivable that the defendant betrayed his duty as Secretary of Public Safety by greedily accepting millions of dollars in bribes that were stained with the blood of cartel wars and drug-related battles on the streets of the United States and Mexico, instead of protecting those murderers and traffickers he swore to investigate,” he said in the letter.
