Top El Chapo lieutenant gets more than 19 years in federal prison from Chicago judge

A top aide to drug kingpin Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman Loera was sentenced Tuesday to more than 19 years in federal prison for his role in the Sinaloa cartel’s drug trafficking.

With a dozen relatives in the courtroom gallery at the Dirksen Federal Courthouse, Felipe Cabrera Sarabia, known as “The Engineer,” showed little reaction as he listened to an interpreter’s translation of the sentence handed down by U.S. District Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman.

Cabrera was accused of coordinating the Sinaloa cartel’s heroin deliveries to the United States and overseeing shipments of cash to Mexico from U.S. customers. Mexican authorities said Cabrera ran the cartel’s operations in the northern states of Durango and Chihuahua.

He was charged in a 2012 indictment that targeted the top hierarchy of the Sinaloa cartel. In January, Cabrera pleaded guilty to a lone count related to a six-figure heroin deal with El Chapo and top lieutenants Ismael Zambada, Zambada’s son Vicente Zambada Niebla, and twin brothers Pedro Flores and Margarito Flores.

The Flores twins, from Chicago, were federal Drug Enforcement Administration informants who helped bring down El Chapo.

Cabrera’s sentence was slightly below the 20 years prosecutors wanted. He will get credit toward his sentence for the more than eight years he spent in jail while awaiting trial on charges brought by Mexican authorities before he was extradited to face charges in Chicago.

Attorneys for Cabrera, 52, depicted him as an esteemed member of his community in the tiny mountainside town of Vascogil, some 200 miles from Durango, Mexico. In letters to the judge, community leaders and family members described Cabrera as a generous owner of a large ranch.

The eldest of nine children, Cabrera dropped out of elementary school to help on the family farm, the lawyers said. He was in charge of his own cattle herd at 12, elected as a town “representative” and judge by 18, and got a mining company to build roads and schools for the isolated region.

La Voz Sidebar

Lea este artículo en español en La Voz Chicago, la sección bilingüe del Sun-Times.

A sentencing memorandum drafted by Cabrera’s lawyers said Zambada was in charge of the Sinaloa territory and approached Cabrera with an offer to “alleviate (Cabrera’s) concerns regarding the future of his family and hometown.”

Ralph Mezcyk, one of Cabrera’s lawyers, said his client’s standing in the community made him a target for Zambada, who exploited Cabrera’s reputation to avoid scrutiny from authorities.

Outside the courtroom, Mezcyk pointed out that prosecutors had presented wiretap evidence of only a single — though large — drug deal implicating Cabrera in the Sinaloa operation. Investigators relied on statements from Zambada’s son as proof Cabrera was involved in other deals, he said.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Erskine said Zambada would hide from authorities on Cabrera’s ranch.

In a wiretapped conversation, Cabrera appeared to know about many prior drug transactions and customers, and his role in a purported deal for six tons of heroin indicated that Zambada, known by the nickname Mayo, was close with Cabrera, the prosecutor said.

“Mayo clearly trusted this defendant, at minimum,” Erskine said. “It’s clear that Mayo trusted Felipe Cabrera with the role that he gave him in that transaction. So again he’s operating at the highest levels of the Sinaloa cartel.”

Coleman, unswayed by talk of Cabrera’s good works in Mexico, pointed to the massive amount of drugs trafficked into Chicago by the Sinaloa cartel.

“I give you credit for how you’ve treated people in Durango with jobs, legitimate jobs, charity and educational support,” the judge told Cabrera. “That’s good for your community. My community up here has been decimated.”