New York, United States.
The US Federal Prosecutor’s Office opened this Tuesday the trial against the alleged Honduran drug trafficker Geovanny Fonts Ramírez, claiming that he collaborated for years with the current president of the country, Juan Orlando Hernández, And describing Honduras as a “narco-state.” The Honduran president has rejected the accusations and all links with Fuentes Ramírez and drug trafficking.
According to prosecutors, Fonts Ramirez operated a huge cocaine distribution business thanks to the violence and its connections with the Police, the Army and the political class, “including the current President of Honduras”.
In its initial allegation, the Office of the Public Prosecutor assured that the supposed narco was associated with Hernandez in 2013, When he was a presidential candidate, and that together they planned to send “as much cocaine as possible to the United States.”
related: Wife of witness received threats from a son of Geovanny Fonts
Prosecutors had already advanced alleged links between Fonts Ramirez and the Honduran president in previously filed documents, but on Tuesday they made it clear that this relationship will be a key part of their case.
“The defendant was a key part of a Honduran narco-state,” said a representative of the Federal Prosecutor’s Office for the Southern District of New York, who said that during the trial, evidence of “secret meetings” that the alleged trafficker will be presented. and the Honduran president held in 2013 and 2014.
At one of these meetings, according to prosecutors, Hernandez reportedly stated his intention to “put drugs in the noses of the gringos,” in reference to an alleged desire to send large quantities of cocaine to the United States.
According to them, the Honduran president received bribes from Fonts Ramírez and access to his cocaine laboratory and, in return, promised him protection and cooperation.
Read: President Hernandez: “I will continue to fight drug trafficking until my last day in the presidency”
So far, Hernandez has denied any involvement at all times, Which he reiterated this Monday via Twitter, in a series of messages in which he also launched a warning in Washington.
The Honduran president assured that he will maintain the “international alliance in the fight against drug trafficking” until the end of his term, but warned that if drug traffickers “with the magic key of lies gain US profits by false testimony, the international alliance Would lapse with Honduras then with several countries “.
Joan Orlando Hernández has been a close ally of the United States since 2014, first with President Barack Obama and later from 2017 until January of this year with Donald Trump.
too: President of Honduras says narcos give “false testimony” against him
His brother Juan Antonio “Tony” Hernandez, according to the United States, also involved in this drug trafficking case, was already convicted in October 2019 in the United States for drug and weapons trafficking offenses.
Geovanny Fonts Ramirez, 50, was arrested a year ago in Miami and has pleaded not guilty to charges of cocaine trafficking and illegal possession of weapons.
In his initial allegation, the defendant’s defense sought to discredit the witnesses he plans to present to the prosecution, assuring that among them are several criminals who only seek to receive favorable treatment from U.S. authorities.