ALBUQUERQUE— The former leader of a narcotics organization plead guilty Thursday to cocaine trafficking conspiracy and four money laundering charges, according to authorities.
Under a guilty plea, Christopher Roybal, 35, is required to serve a 14-year prison sentence. He also admitted to threatening an FBI informant, officials said.
Roybal is one of the 19 defendants charged in Dec. 2012, with drug trafficking and money laundering charges in a 60-count indictment.
Charges of witness tampering and a 20th defendant were added to the indicted on February 2014, and again in September 2014, another witness tampering charge and heroin-trafficking were included, officials said.
With Roybal’s guilty plea, all but three of the defendants have entered guilty pleas in this case.
The charges filed in the case were the result of a 16-month multi-agency investigation into a drug trafficking organization headed by Roybal, authorities stated.
According to the original indictment, these are the facts and circumstances surrounding the case:
- Roybal and ten others conspired to distribute large quantities of cocaine in New Mexico between Aug. 2011 and Dec. 2012.
- Roybal and nine others conspired to distribute marijuana between Oct. 2011 and Dec. 2012.
- The indictment also included three separate money laundering conspiracies, 22 money laundering offenses, and 18 “telephone counts,” offenses alleging the use of a communications device to facilitate a drug trafficking offense.
- The indictment was superseded in May 2014, to add a new charge against defendant George Roybal, 53, of Albuquerque, alleging that he threatened an FBI informant to prevent the informant from testifying at the trial of this case which was then scheduled to begin on May 19, 2014.
- It was superseded again in Sept. 2014, to add two new charges against defendant Kenneth Ulibarri, 36, of Albuquerque.
- The new charges alleged that Ulibarri attempted to murder an FBI informant to prevent that informant from testifying at the trial, which was scheduled in November.
- The indictment also charged Ulibarri with distributing heroin in Bernalillo County, N.M., in May 2014.
As part of his plea agreement, Roybal agreed to forfeit his Albuquerque residence and a 1967 Chevrolet Camaro, officials said.
Three of the defendants charged in this case have entered not guilty pleas and are pending trial.
Defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty.