June 26 (UPI) — Former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez must serve 45 years in a U.S. federal prison and pay an $8 million fine for drug trafficking offenses.
Southern New York District Court Judge Keven Castel on Wednesday sentenced Hernandez, 55, after a jury in March found him guilty of three drug trafficking felonies following a three-week trial.
Hernandez denied his guilt during the sentencing hearing and claimed he was “wrongly and unjustly accused.”
Castel called Hernandez a “two-faced politician” who was “hungry for power” and protected certain drug traffickers.
Those traffickers allegedly include Juan “El Chapo” Guzman, who is a notorious Mexican drug lord serving a life sentence in a U.S. supermax federal prison.
Castel in May filed a motion to retry his case due to a law enforcement officer incorrectly saying cocaine trafficking increased in Honduras while Hernandez was president.
Castel said the incorrect information was immaterial to Hernadez’s trial or conviction.
“Hernandez’s conviction was based on the testimony … of numerous witnesses whose testimony was corroborated in part by phone records and a recovered drug ledger,” Castel wrote in his rejection of the retrial motion.
Hernandez served two terms as the president of Honduras from 2014 to 2022 and ran as a candidate who said he would ensure law and order while addressing drug crimes within the nation.
The United States government provided Honduras with $50 million in assistance to fight narcotics trafficking, plus millions more for military assistance and security while Hernandez was its president.
Federal prosecutors sought Hernandez’s extradition in 2022 after learning he was involved with drug traffickers as early as 2004 and enabled them to smuggle about 500 tons of cocaine from Columbia and Venezuela and which was destined for the United States.
Several previously convicted drug traffickers testified against Hernandez, who called them “professional liars” when he testified in his own defense.
Hernandez’s brother Juan Antonio Hernandez was a former congressman in Honduras and in 2021 was convicted of separate drug charges in the same federal court in Manhattan.