Ecuador extradites chief of violent Ecuadorian drug gang to the USA

QUITO, Ecuador — Ecuador on Sunday extradited to the USA the chief of a violent Ecuadorian gang who relied on hitmen, bribes and army weapons to do enterprise.

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. Lawyer indicted him in New York Metropolis on expenses he imported 1000’s of kilos of cocaine into the USA.

Macías “was removed from the La Roca Detention Center under the custody of the National Police and Armed Forces for the appropriate proceedings in the context of an extradition process,” Ecuador’s authorities company accountable 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 sporting a T-shirt, shorts, a bulletproof vest and helmet. A number of law enforcement officials had been guarding him at an undisclosed location.

The Ecuadorian will seem Monday earlier than Brooklyn’s federal court docket “where he will plead not guilty,” Macías’ lawyer Alexei Schacht informed 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 extradition determination got here after the USA despatched a doc to Ecuador providing ensures for the respect of the rights of the 45-year-old prison chief.

Since 2020, Macías has led “Los Choneros,” a prison group that emerged within the Nineties. The gang employed individuals to purchase firearms and ammunition in the USA and smuggle them into Ecuador, in line with April’s indictment. Cocaine would circulation 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.

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 in a while 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 people” 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 had been arrested.