Mexico judge issues 7 arrest warrants in ‘Fast and Furious’ trafficking operation News
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Mexico judge issues 7 arrest warrants in ‘Fast and Furious’ trafficking operation

Mexico’s attorney general announced Sunday that a district judge issued arrest warrants for seven people involved in the decade-long “Fast and Furious” firearms trafficking operation.

The accused allegedly sought to illegally traffic over two thousand firearms into Mexico from the US. According to Mexico’s attorney general, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) investigated the scheme and confirmed the accusations, finding that illegally trafficked firearms were used in crimes throughout Mexico from 2009 until now.

These charges stem from Operation Fast and Furious, which was a failed DOJ investigation involving tracked guns that were permitted to travel from Arizona to Mexico. The operation aimed to stop weapons trafficking by high-level arms dealers.

Mexico’s Office of the Special Prosecutor for Organized Crime also investigated the accusations and confirmed US investigators’ findings. Like the US, Mexican investigators found that the accused illegally brought firearms into Mexico and that those firearms were used to commit crimes throughout Mexico. Mexican investigators further found that Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzman led the criminal firearms organization for an extensive period.

Based on the investigators’ report, a judge also issued warrants against former Secretary of Public Security Genaro Garcia Luna and against Intelligence Coordinator of Police Luis “C.” Garcia was arrested in the US in 2019 for accepting multimillion-dollar bribes to permit El Chapo’s Sinaloa Cartel to operate. Two other Mexican judges also issued warrants for Garcia’s arrest in other alleged crimes. Consequently, Mexico is seeking to extradite Garcia.

The recent arrest warrants come after US President Joe Biden declared a national emergency to deal with “an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy, and economy of the United States.” Just last month Biden signed two new executive orders targeting transnational criminal and drug trafficking networks. When signing the orders, Biden stated that the US must modernize and update its response to drug trafficking.

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