A Florida court has ordered Mexico’s former head of public security to pay more than $748m to his home country for his alleged involvement in government corruption.
Thursday’s ruling brought to a close a civil case first filed in September 2021 by the Mexican government.
The case centred on Genaro Garcia Luna, who served as Mexico’s security chief from 2006 to 2012. Garcia Luna is currently serving more than 38 years in a United States prison for allegedly accepting millions of dollars in bribes from the Sinaloa cartel.
The Mexican government alleges that Garcia Luna also stole millions in taxpayer funds, and it has pledged to seek restitution, namely by filing a legal complaint in Miami, Florida, where it says some of the illegal activity took place.
On Thursday, Judge Lisa Walsh in Miami-Dade County not only required Garcia Luna to pay millions, but she also ordered his wife, Linda Cristina Pereyra, to pay $1.7bn. Altogether, the total neared $2.4bn.
In its initial 2021 complaint, the Mexican government – led at the time by former President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador – accused Garcia Luna, his wife and their co-defendants of having “concealed funds stolen from the government” and smuggling the money to places like Barbados and the US.
“Under the direction of the Defendant GARCIA LUNA, the funds unlawfully taken from the government of MEXICO were used to build a money-laundering empire,” the complaint wrote.
It alleged those funds were used to finance “lavish lifestyles” for Garcia Luna and his co-conspirators, including real estate holdings, bank accounts and vintage cars, among them Mustangs from the 1960s and ’70s.
Separately, Garcia Luna faced criminal charges for corruption, with US authorities accusing him of pocketing millions while in office for working on behalf of the Sinaloa cartel.
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