A federal judge in San Diego on Monday handed down a prison sentence of five years and 10 months to a Mexican drug broker with alleged but disputed links to the ultra-violent Cártel Jalisco Nueva Generación.
Rubén Velázquez Aceves, 69, was extradited to the U.S. from Mexico in April 2023 and pleaded guilty in February to a drug distribution conspiracy charge. In his plea agreement, Velázquez admitted to coordinating shipments of cocaine totaling at least 990 pounds and marijuana totaling at least 2,200 pounds, as well as heroin and methamphetamine in lesser amounts.
Nicknamed “El Ingeniero,” or The Engineer, Velázquez was the lead defendant in a 12-person indictment handed down in 2014 by a federal grand jury in San Diego. A federal judge issued a warrant for his arrest that same year, and he was one of the Drug Enforcement Administration’s most-wanted fugitives before his arrest by Mexican authorities in July 2020 near Guadalajara.
Beyond that, few details about Velázquez’s case or his alleged connections to the new Jalisco cartel, known by its Spanish acronym CJNG, have become public. Prosecutors have largely kept the case, one of the first to target CJNG in San Diego federal court, under wraps, releasing few details in public court documents.
His attorney on Monday denied there was any connection between Velázquez and the CJNG.
“It doesn’t exist, it never existed,” Matthew Lombard told the Union-Tribune. “I’m mystified as to where it came from. He is not a representative of, or connected to, CJNG.”
Assistant U.S. Attorney Kyle Martin told U.S. District Judge John Houston on Monday that Velázquez “was someone who sat in Guadalajara” brokering drug shipments by phone and electronic communications. Martin told the judge that Velázquez did not work exclusively for one organization but rather used his business connections to broker deals with multiple individuals or groups.
Lombard said Velázquez’s role as a broker able to deal with large amounts of drugs may have been misconstrued to make it appear he had more authority within drug trafficking circles than he actually did. As a broker, he may also have been “sucked into” other conspiracies involving CJNG members, Lombard said, though he said he couldn’t speak to whether Velázquez’s co-defendants were members of CJNG. The attorney also noted that drug trafficking organizations are not always as strictly hierarchical as sometimes portrayed.
Martin asked Houston to sentence Velázquez to 70 months in prison, the low end of the recommended guidelines, and the judge followed that recommendation. Lombard had asked that his client be sentenced to the time he’s already served and be released.
Lombard told the judge that Velázquez deserved the lighter penalty because he suffers from several medical conditions, has strong family support to ensure he won’t reoffend and quickly agreed to extradition upon his arrest in Mexico. With credit for the time he’s already been in custody, Velázquez has about 20 more months left in prison.
“At this age, it’s very embarrassing and painful to be going through all this,” Velázquez told the judge. “I give you my word that never again in my life would I participate in something as dishonorable as this.”
Mexican media reports have suggested that Velázquez was a top lieutenant to CJNG’s leader, Nemesio “El Mencho” Oseguera Cervantes. Oseguera, the subject of a $10 million bounty by the DEA, is one of the most wanted drug lords in the world.
Lombard denied those reports. He said Velázquez accepted responsibility for the crimes he did commit and was looking forward to paying his debt to society and returning to his children and grandchildren in Mexico.
