current and former Sinaloa officials who were indicted<\/a> by the United States District Court Southern District of New York on April 29, is said to have turned himself in to federal authorities in southern California.<\/p>\nEnrique Inzunza C\u00e1zarez Instagram\/Enrique Inzunza C\u00e1zarez<\/p>\n
Four Nicaraguan, alleged members of the Mexican Sinaloa Cartel AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n
He is accused of narcotics importation conspiracy; possession of machine guns and destructive devices; and conspiracy to possess machine guns and destructive devices.<\/p>\n
Inzunza Caz\u00e1rez, a member of the ruling Morena party, has held office since August 2024 and previously served as the Secretary General of Sinaloa under Governor Ruben Rocha Moya, who was also indicted and stepped down May 2.<\/p>\n
According to the 34-page superseding indictment, the Sinaloa Senator conspired with the Sinaloa Cartel faction Los Chapitos \u2013 which is run by Joaqu\u00edn \u2018El Chapo\u2019 Guzm\u00e1n\u2019s sons, to import drugs to the United States.<\/p>\n
Inzunza Caz\u00e1rez is accused of meeting with Los Chapitos leaders \u201cand agreed on specific plans for the government in Sinaloa, under Rocha Moya, to support and protect the cartel for favors from the cartel that, in turn, help the defendants and other corrupt officials in power.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Department of Justice alleged that Inzunza Caz\u00e1rez and businessman Enrique Diaz Vega, who once served as the state\u2019s Secretary of Administration and Finance from November 2021 to September 2024 and turned himself in to authorities in Arizona on Friday, assisted Los Chapitos leaders in installing dishonest officials to protect that cartel faction\u2019s drug trafficking operations and acted as middlemen between El Chapo\u2019s sons and Rocha Moya.<\/p>\n
Nine alleged drug traffickers, members of the Sinaloa Cartel AFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n
Enrique Inzunza C\u00e1zarez Instagram\/Enrique Inzunza C\u00e1zarez<\/p>\n
Ahead of the June 2021 elections, Diaz Vega provided Los Chapitos the names and addresses of Rocha Moya\u2019s opponents so that the cartel \u201ccould threaten and force those opponents to drop out of the gubernatorial race.\u201d<\/p>\n
After Rocha Moya took office, he and Inzunza Caz\u00e1rez held a meeting with Los Chapitos leaders and recognized that they helped deliver a triumphant campaign, according to the court document.<\/p>\n
In return, the indictment indicated that \u201cRocha Moya would ensure that the Chapitos had control over the Sinaloa State Police, which would allow the Chapitos to carry out its drug trafficking operations without the risk of interference by state law enforcement.\u201d<\/p>\n
Inzunza C\u00e1zares\u2019 lawyers reportedly held talks with the Department of Justice for his voluntary surrender and to become a government witness, Mexican newspaper El Universal reported May 2.<\/p>\n
\u201cA drug trafficker who surrenders and offers information primarily falls under the category of a cooperating witness,\u201d a Department of Justice source told the outlet.<\/p>\n
However, Inzunza C\u00e1zares shut down the report the same day.<\/p>\n
\u201cUtterly false,\u201d he wrote on X.<\/p>\n
Adela Piriz Castellano, who heads the social assistance and family welfare agency in Macuspana, Tabasco, credited President Donald Trump for Inzunza C\u00e1zares\u2019 apprehension.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was arrested following formal charges by the United States Department of Justice, which links him to drug trafficking and the Sinaloa Cartel,\u201d she wrote on social media. \u201cTRUMP: THE BEST PRESIDENT FOR MEXICO\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sinaloa Senator Enrique Inzunza Caz\u00e1rez, who is facing drug trafficking and weapon charges, was taken into custody in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":320142,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[7,536,4182,74,76,75,36628,3586],"class_list":["post-320141","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-california","tag-donald-trump","tag-metro","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news","tag-sinaloa-cartel","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320141","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=320141"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320141\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/320142"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=320141"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=320141"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=320141"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}