Former Honduran national police chief gets 19 years in US prison for cocaine distribution

NEW YORK (AP) — The former head of Honduras’s National Police was sentenced Thursday to 19 years in prison after pleading guilty to conspiracy to protect cocaine shipments bound for the United States.

Juan Carlos Bonilla Valladares, 64, better known as “El Tigre,” was a member of the Honduran National Police for decades before becoming its leader for a year in 2012.

He rose to power by allowing large-scale cocaine trafficking and using violence, including murder, to protect the drug trade, prosecutors said in a pre-sentencing brief. They had asked for a 30-year prison sentence.

The sentence in Manhattan federal court was announced by Judge P. Kevin Castel.

In a pre-sentencing brief, attorney Donald Vogelman asked for a 10-year prison sentence. He wrote that Valladares “was not always involved in illegal activity” and that while he admitted guilt in a drug conspiracy, he “strongly denies being involved in any murder.”

“He occasionally got involved in illegal drug trafficking. In fact, most of the time he was doing a good job serving his country. He was a very talented man who led a double life, which was unfortunate,” Vogelman said.

The lawyer said his client was in poor health and “will be a marked man” if he survives imprisonment and is returned to Honduras.

“He will not commit any more criminal acts. That chapter of his life is now behind him,” the lawyer said.

Prosecutors said Valladares accepted lucrative bribes in exchange for providing armed protection while cocaine was transported through Honduras. They said he ordered other corrupt law enforcement officials to protect those shipments and provided confidential information to law enforcement about pending raids on his co-conspirators.

He was arrested on March 9, 2022, after U.S. prosecutors labeled him a co-conspirator of former President Juan Orlando Hernández and the president’s brother Tony Hernández. Prosecutors said before his sentencing that the brothers were Valladares’ “powerful political allies.”

In June, Juan Orlando Hernandez was sentenced to 45 years in prison in Manhattan federal court after being found guilty in March on drug charges following a two week trial that was closely followed in their country of origin.

Tony Hernandez, former Honduran congressman, was sentenced to life imprisonment in a US prison in 2021 in the same court for his own conviction for drug charges.

In a statement, U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said Valladares “committed the very crimes he swore to prevent.”

DEA Administrator Anne Milgram said Valladares exploited his position as head of the Honduran National Police to “traffic cocaine to the United States and protect drug traffickers.”