The US Justice Department announced the arrest on 17 May 2021 of Dominican deputy Miguel Andrés Gutierrez Díaz. 58-year old Diaz is a member of the Chamber of Deputies for the province of Santiago. He represents the ruling Modern Revolutionary Party. He was arrested when arriving on the evening of 17 May 2021 to the Miami International Airport. He is charged with international cocaine trafficking.
On 18 May 2021, United States Magistrate Judge Alicia Otazo-Reyes ordered the pre-trial detention trial to be held on Friday, 21 May when Gutierrez Díaz appeared before the initial federal court in Miami.
According to the indictment returned by a Miami federal grand jury on 11 March 2021, from about 2014 to 2017, Congressman Gutierrez Diaz was part of a transnational drug ring that operated in the Dominican Republic, Colombia and the United States. The federal indictment charges Gutierrez Diaz and others with three counts: conspiring to distribute cocaine, knowing that it would be imported into the United States; conspiring to import cocaine into the United States; and conspiring to possess with the intent to distribute cocaine. If convicted, Gutierrez Diaz faces up to life imprisonment.
The Justice Department announces in its press release that the DEA Miami investigated the case, with assistance from the Criminal Division’s Office of International Affairs, DEA Santo Domingo Country Office, Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigations (IRS-CI), Miami Field Office, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Homeland Security Investigations (ICE-HSI), Miami Field Office, and U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Miami Office of Field Operations. Assistant US Attorneys Richard Getchell and Ellen D’Angelo of the International Narcotics and Money Laundering Section in the Southern District of Florida are prosecuting the case.
In the press release, the US Attorney’s Office and its federal partners commend the Office of the Presidency of the Dominican Republic and the National Drug Control Agency (DNCD) for their cooperation in this investigation.
The press release explains that the prosecution is the result of the ongoing efforts by the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF), a partnership between federal, state and local law enforcement agencies. The principal mission of the OCDETF program is to identify, disrupt, and dismantle the highest-level drug traffickers, money launderers, and other priority transnational criminal organizations that threaten the citizens of the United States using a prosecutor-led, intelligence driven, multi-agency approach to combat transnational organized crime. The OCDETF program facilitates complex, joint operations by focusing its partner agencies on priority targets, by managing and coordinating multi-agency efforts, and by leveraging intelligence across multiple investigative platforms.
An indictment merely contains allegations and a defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.
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Justice Department
Diario Libre
El Dia
District Court for the Southern District of Florida
18 May 2021