The U.S. Department of State is offering a reward of up to $10 million for information leading to the arrest and/or conviction of an alleged Guatemalan drug kingpin indicted on Jan. 29, 2019, in San Diego.
Eugenio Dario Molina-Lopez, aka “Don Dario” and aka “Molis,” is a fugitive who has been accused of being a leader of Los Huistas, which is a transnational criminal organization, a news release from the Department of Justice, U.S. Attorney’s Office, Southern District of California said. Molina-Lopez, 57, has been charged with “Conspiracy to Distribute Cocaine Intended for Unlawful Importation and Conspiracy to Distribute Cocaine on Board a Vessel.”
“This extraordinary case is one of this district’s most significant, comprehensive and large-scale drug trafficking prosecutions,” U.S. Attorney Randy Grossman said in the news release. “We are working tirelessly to dismantle cartels by taking down the leaders, one by one.”
Molina-Lopez’s indictment comes because of a multi-year investigation into Los Huistas, an organization “primarily based in the Huehuetenango region of Northwest Guatemala that borders Mexico.” The investigation, known as Operation Guerrilla Unit, was led by Homeland Security Investigations and the U.S. Attorney’s Office in San Diego, the news release said.
“The indictment of Molina, the leader of Los Huistas, demonstrates HSI's efforts to target these criminal organizations at their highest levels,” Chad Plantz, special agent in charge for HSI San Diego, said in the press release. “The reward proposed by the Department of State for Molina’s capture is a significant step forward in the investigation and reflects HSI's holistic approach to countering transnational criminal organizations by collaborating not only with law enforcement partners, but also with our foreign policy and regulatory agencies.”
