Ecuador on Sunday extradited to the USA the chief of a violent Ecuadorian gang who relied on hitmen, bribes and navy weapons to do enterprise. It marks the primary time an Ecuadorian has been extradited to the U.S. immediately from Ecuador.
José Adolfo Macías Villamar, whose nickname is “Fito,” escaped from a jail in Ecuador final yr and was recaptured late June. In April, a U.S. Legal professional indicted him in New York Metropolis on costs he imported 1000’s of kilos of cocaine into the USA.
Macías “was faraway from the La Roca Detention Heart underneath the custody of the Nationwide Police and Armed Forces for the suitable proceedings within the context of an extradition course of,” Ecuador’s authorities company chargeable for overseeing prisons, SNAI, mentioned in a message despatched to journalists.
Particulars of the handover weren’t specified.
{A photograph} launched by SNAI confirmed Macías carrying a T-shirt, shorts, a bulletproof vest and helmet. A number of law enforcement officials have been guarding him at an undisclosed location.
MARCOS PIN/AFP by way of Getty Photographs
The Ecuadorian will seem Monday earlier than Brooklyn’s federal court docket “the place he’ll plead not responsible,” Macías’ lawyer Alexei Schacht instructed The Related Press by way of e-mail. After that, he will probably be detained in a jail but to be decided, Schacht added.
The seven-count indictment unsealed in Brooklyn costs Macías and an unidentified co-defendant with worldwide cocaine distribution, conspiracy and weapons counts, together with smuggling firearms from the USA.
The extradition choice got here after the USA despatched a doc to Ecuador providing ensures for the respect of the rights of the 45-year-old felony chief.
Since 2020, Macías has led “Los Choneros,” a felony group that emerged within the Nineteen Nineties. The gang employed individuals to purchase firearms and ammunition in the USA and smuggle them into Ecuador, in response to April’s indictment. Cocaine would circulate into the USA with the assistance of Mexican cartels. Collectively, the teams managed key cocaine trafficking routes via Ecuador, violently concentrating on regulation enforcement, politicians, attorneys and civilians who stood in the way in which.
Final yr, the U.S. categorized Los Choneros as probably the most violent gangs and affirmed its connection to highly effective Mexican drug cartels who threaten Ecuador and the encircling area.
Authorities in Ecuador have categorized the gang as a terrorist group. Whereas Macias was on the run, the Ecuadorian authorities introduced the reward for his seize can be elevated to $1 million.
Macías escaped from a Guayaquil jail the place he was serving a 34-year sentence for drug trafficking, organized crime, and homicide. He was recaptured a yr and a half afterward the nation’s central coast.
Macías has cultivated a cult standing amongst fellow gang members and the general public in his house nation. Whereas behind bars in 2023, he launched a video addressed to “the Ecuadorian individuals” whereas flanked by armed males. He additionally threw events in jail, the place he had entry to all the things from liquor to roosters for cockfighting matches.
Macías is the primary Ecuadorian to be extradited to the U.S. from Ecuador, jail authorities mentioned. Two different Ecuadorian drug traffickers have beforehand been handed over to the USA however from Colombia, the place they have been arrested.
Earlier this yr, a frontrunner of one among Ecuador’s greatest crime syndicates, Los Lobos, was arrested at his home within the coastal metropolis of Portoviejo. Carlos D, extensively identified by his alias “El Chino,” was the second-in-command of Los Lobos and “thought-about a high-value goal,” the armed forces mentioned in an announcement.
The U.S. last year declared Los Lobos to be the most important drug trafficking group in Ecuador.
