The U.S. Department of the Treasury has sanctioned five Mexican individuals allegedly associated with the Gulf Cartel, accusing them of ties to illegal red snapper fishing in the Gulf of Mexico.
The U.S. government claims the Gulf Cartel – a powerful drug-trafficking organization operating out of Mexico that has been accused of smuggling weapons and kidnapping American citizens – facilitates the illegal harvest and sale of red snapper and sharks in the Gulf of Mexico. The cartel operates out of Playa Bagdad, a beach located just south of the U.S. border in Texas.
Mexican fishermen use light, fast-moving boats called “lanchas” to cross into U.S. waters and harvest red snapper, returning across the border to Mexico where the fish are sold and oftentimes exported back to the U.S., according to the department.
“Today’s action highlights how transnational criminal organizations like the Gulf Cartel rely on a variety of illicit schemes like illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing to fund their operations, along with narcotics trafficking and human smuggling,” Acting Undersecretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Bradley Smith said in a statement. “Treasury, as part of a whole-of-government approach to combatting transnational criminal organizations, remains committed to disrupting these networks and restricting these groups’ ability to profit from these activities.”
The sanctions target ...
