A New York federal judge on Wednesday afternoon sentenced former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández to 45 years in prison for his role in facilitating a state-sponsored international cocaine trafficking conspiracy, Courthouse News reports. Jurors convicted Hernández on all counts in March, finding that he while he was in office, he'd conspired with cartel-backed drug traffickers to transport truckloads of South American cocaine through the small Central American country. At trial, prosecutors accused him of dispatching heavily armed security for the drug shipments; providing the cartel with intelligence about law enforcement logistics; and literally paving specific Honduran roads to expedite the transport of cocaine. “He retained his perch through cocaine and corruption,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Jacob H. Gutwillig said Wednesday, requesting that Hernández be sentenced to life in prison plus an additional 30 years.
At the conclusion of the two-hour hearing, Hernández leaned over at the defense table toward the Spanish-speaking press in the jury box and told them, “Soy innocente." That was after Hernández spoke for nearly an hour at the hearing, fuming that he had not been given credit for reducing the international transshipment of drugs from South America through Honduras during his administration, from 90% of all northbound drugs down to just 4%. He accused the U.S. Attorney’s Office of hypocrisy for giving lenient sentences to the convicted murders who testified against him while not recognizing his efforts as president of Honduras to take down drug cartels. In administering the sentence on Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Kevin Castel, a George W. Bush appointee, noted that Hernández’s drug trafficking conspiracy benefited from the appearance of his being an anti-drug-trafficking crusader — all while he provided protection and support for select cartels who paid him bribes.