Colombian drug kingpin sentenced to 22 years in prison in Florida

Colombian drug kingpin sentenced to 22 years in prison in Florida

2011-07-01 01:52:41 GMT+7 (ICT)

MIAMI, FLORIDA (BNO NEWS) -- Prosecutors on Thursday announced that a Colombian drug kingpin was sentenced to 22 years in prison by a Miami Court over drug trafficking charges.

Edgar Vallejo-Guarin, 50, pleaded guilty to having organized and directed drug shipments totaling thousands of kilograms cocaine from Colombia to the United States, which were smuggled via motor boats, freighters, and airplanes into Miami, San Juan, New York City and Houston.

The Colombian national was extradited to the United States in 2010 after he was arrested in Spain by the Guardia Civil, one of the Spanish national police agencies. He was located in the European country by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in September 2008.

Vallejo was indicted in 2001 after law enforcement officers in the U.S. and Colombia determined that he was the owner of a large cocaine shipment seized in the Caribbean two years before.

In June 1999, U.S. Coast Guard officers traveling aboard a British Royal Navy warship located and seized a freighter which was carrying more than 4,000 kilos of cocaine. Vallejo had been at large until his 2008 arrest.

After his extradition, the Colombian drug kingpin admitted running criminal organizations dedicated to distributing cocaine in various U.S. cities, including New York, Chicago, Detroit and Miami.

The illegal proceeds of the drug trafficking enterprises were sent to him in Colombia. Vallejo acknowledged running these criminal drug organizations between 1987 and 2001, when he was indicted and became a fugitive.

In addition to his prison term, the defendant was ordered to pay a $1 million fine. Under Federal law, Vallejo will have to serve 85 percent of his sentence in a United States prison.

Furthermore, the U.S. Attorney's Office has been able to seize and forfeit an airplane worth more than $2 million, and bank accounts in the United States, Switzerland, and Austria holding more than $10 million in drug proceeds.

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