The former president of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernández, 55, also known as JOH, was sentenced Wednesday to 45 years in prison for cocaine importation and related weapons offenses, officials stated.
The former two-term president was in office until weeks before his extradition to the United States in April 2022. Hernández was convicted on March 8 following a three-week jury trial.
“As President of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernández abused his power to support one of the largest and most violent drug trafficking conspiracies in the world, and the people of Honduras and the United States bore the consequences,” said Attorney General Merrick B. Garland.
From 2004 to 2022, Hernández, the former two-term president of Honduras and ex-president of the Honduran National Congress, was central to a major drug-trafficking conspiracy.
During his political career, Hernández abused his power to facilitate the importation of over 400 tons of cocaine into the U.S. His co-conspirators, armed with machine guns and grenade launchers, protected their cocaine shipments, money, and territory.
Hernández received millions in bribes from major drug-trafficking organizations in Honduras, Mexico, and elsewhere, using these funds to advance his political career.
In return, he protected his co-conspirators, allowing them to move large quantities of cocaine, commit violence, and help make Honduras one of the most dangerous countries.
Despite publicly supporting anti-narcotics measures, Hernández enriched and protected drug traffickers in his circle. He selectively extradited certain traffickers to the U.S. while protecting those who bribed him.
Hernández and his associates also exploited Honduran institutions, such as the National Police and military, to safeguard their operations.
They used heavily armed police to protect their cocaine shipments and employed violence and murder to eliminate rivals and maintain control over the cocaine trade.
Several of Hernández’s co-conspirators have been convicted.
His brother, Tony Hernández, was sentenced to life in prison in 2019, and Geovanny Fuentes Ramirez received the same sentence in 2021.
Other associates, including former police chief Juan Carlos Bonilla Valladares and Hernández’s cousin Mauricio Hernández Pineda, have pleaded guilty and are awaiting sentencing.
Overall, Hernández and his co-conspirators trafficked over 400 tons of cocaine through Honduras, equivalent to around 4.5 billion individual doses.
(News Report Two Years Ago)
The DEA investigated the case, with assistance from the Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs, in securing Hernández’s arrest and extradition.
Trial Attorneys Andrea Broach and Jessica Fender of the National Security Division’s Counterterrorism Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Jacob H. Gutwillig, David J. Robles, Elinor L. Tarlow, and Kyle A. Wirshba for the Southern District of New York prosecuted the case.