From the editorial
Newspaper La Jornada
Wednesday March 15, 2023, p. 3
Two Americans were arrested and charged earlier this month for trying to send more than 90 weapons, including assault rifles, grenade launchers and machine guns, to members of a cartel in Mexico
also for crimes related to drug trafficking, the Florida Middle District Attorney’s Office reported yesterday in a statement.
Yuendry Rodríguez Hilario, 28, and Saleh Yusuf Saleh, 24, residents of the city of Cleveland, Ohio, face a criminal complaint, issued by United States Attorney Roger B. Handberg, for conspiracy to transfer firearms to commit a felony and/or drug trafficking; possession of armory to promote drug trafficking, illegal transfer of rifles and pistols, trafficking in fire devices without a license, and conspiracy to violate federal laws on the matter
.
undercover agents
According to the complaint published by the prosecution on its website (rb.gy/gdnqtz), since 2021 agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) worked undercover as “members of a Mexican cartel and were presented to Rodríguez Hilario as (a) trafficker of firearms that could be smuggled into Mexico.
Covert communications with Rodríguez Hilario and others discussed the purchase of AR-15s and rocket-propelled grenade launchers. One of the conspirators described how he sold AR-15s and AK-47s to Salvadorans and had cocaine available for distribution. Rodríguez Hilario also offered fentanyl to one of the agents to make pills
detailed the prosecution.
In late 2021, members of the conspiracy sold or arranged for the sale of at least 90 rifles and a silenced Mac-10-type machine gun to undercover agents in the Middle District of Florida and Cleveland, depending on the case.
Last November, an undercover agent told Rodríguez that his associates in Mexico were fighting and losing
and they needed to buy more firearms. On the 2nd of this month, he ordered the delivery of 40 AM-15 multi-caliber firearms to the agents, the prosecutor’s office detailed.
He added that Saleh, who purchased and assembled the parts to make the firearms, came to the meeting with Rodríguez and the agents. After an undercover officer inspected one of the firearms boxes, the two defendants were arrested.
