U.S. Indicts Sinaloa Governor and Nine Mexican Officials on Alleged Drug and Weapons Ties

U.S. Department of Justice unsealed an indictment on Wednesday against Sinaloa Governor Rubén Rocha Moya and nine other current and former Mexican officials on drug trafficking and weapons offenses. The indictment was unsealed in New York.

The indictment accuses the defendants of working with the Sinaloa Cartel to distribute massive quantities of narcotics to the United States. The defendants allegedly received millions of dollars in bribes from the Sinaloa Cartel. Governor Ruben Rocha Moya is 76 years old.

Ruben Rocha Moya was born in the same town as El Chapo. The indictment includes five counts: narcotics importation conspiracy, possession of machineguns and destructive devices, conspiracy to possess machineguns and destructive devices, kidnapping resulting in death, and conspiracy to commit kidnapping resulting in death.

Ruben Rocha Moya was charged with narcotics importation conspiracy, possession of machineguns and destructive devices, and conspiracy to possess machineguns and destructive devices. The defendants were tied to the Chapitos faction of the Sinaloa Cartel, led by the sons of Joaquín 'El Chapo' Guzmán.

U.S. prison. The Sinaloa Cartel is one of six Mexican narcotrafficking groups designated as foreign terrorist organizations by the Trump administration.

U.S. government. The charged officials include a Mexican senator, a Sinaloa state deputy attorney general, a former Sinaloa secretary of public security, a former deputy director of the Sinaloa State Police, and the mayor of Culiacan.

At least three of the indicted officials—Ruben Rocha Moya, the mayor of Sinaloa’s capital, and a senator—are affiliated with the Morena party. In 2024, Ruben Rocha Moya was embroiled in a scandal involving the Sinaloa Cartel, where his name appeared in a letter from a kidnapped cartel capo who believed he was meeting Rocha. U.S.