A suspected member of the Mexican Sinaloa drug cartel was sentenced today by a Makati court to life imprisonment for selling drugs in the Philippines.
Mexican national Horacio Hernandez Herrera was convicted by the Makati City Regional Trial Court (RTC) Branch 63 for violating the Comprehensive Dangerous Drugs Act, the Philippine Star reported.
Aside from being sentenced to life imprisonment, Herrera was ordered to pay a fine of PHP500,000 (US$9,601) to PHP10 million (US$192,023) by the RTC, the same newspaper reported.
Hernandez was arrested in a buy-bust operation in Makati on Jan. 11, 2015 at a Korean restaurant where he was caught in possession of two and a half kilos of high-grade cocaine estimated to be worth PHP12 million (US$230,324), reported ABS-CBN News.
He was selling the drugs to undercover agents but he had denied doing so, reported GMA News. He also alleged that he was abducted by the authorities so they could extort money from him.
However, the RTC said that “the prosecution was able to establish the legality of [the] accused’s (Hernandez) arrest, that he was arrested for selling dangerous drugs.”
According to authorities, Hernandez is one of the top men in the Sinaloa cartel’s hierarchy, but he has denied this as well.
The Philippines’ Department of Justice said that Hernandez supplied ecstasy, methamphetamine, and cocaine in Metro Manila and nearby provinces, CNN Philippines reported.
The Sinaloa drug cartel is named as such because its operation is mostly based in the state of Sinaloa in Mexico. It’s reportedly the largest supplier of illegal drugs in Latin America and the United States, the International Business Times said.
Its former leader, Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzmán, who was a fugitive for over a decade, was convicted in New York this month.
According to the Philippine Drug Enforcement Authority, the cartel started selling drugs in the Philippines in 2013.
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