A Mexican national and the co-founder of the armed, violent, and prolific Los Cuinis drug cartel was sentenced to 30 years in prison for his role in a major drug trafficking conspiracy.
According to court documents, Jose Gonzalez-Valencia, 49, of Michoacan, Mexico, was one of the top leaders — alongside his brothers, Gerardo Gonzalez-Valencia and Abigael Gonzalez-Valencia — of Los Cuinis, a major Mexican drug cartel responsible for trafficking multiple tons of cocaine from South America, through Mexico, into the United States.
Los Cuinis financed the founding and growth of the Cartel de Jalisco Nueva Generación (CJNG), which traffics hundreds of tons of cocaine, methamphetamine, and fentanyl into the United States and other countries, and is known for extreme violence, murders, torture, and corruption.
In February 2025, President Trump designated CJNG a foreign terrorist organisation.
According to court documents, the top leader of CJNG, Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, also known as “El Mencho,” is the brother-in-law of the Gonzalez-Valencia brothers.
Closely allied, Los Cuinis and CJNG form one of the most violent and prolific transnational criminal organisations in the world, responsible for sending staggering amounts of drugs into the United States and inflicting extreme violence to further that objective.
Additionally, as part of the Department of Justice’s focus on dismantling CJNG, another Mexican national, Cristian Fernando Gutierrez-Ochoa, also known as “El Guacho,” a high-ranking member of CJNG and El Mencho’s son-in-law, pleaded guilty to one count of international money laundering conspiracy.
From at least 2006 to 2016, according to court documents, Jose Gonzalez-Valencia directed and coordinated numerous multi-ton shipments of cocaine destined for the United States using air, land, sea, and underwater methods.
In 2007, the U.S. Coast Guard seized one shipment from a semi-submersible vessel that was transporting at least 4,000 kilograms of cocaine from Colombia to Mexico for further distribution into the United States.
As one of Los Cuinis’ top leaders, Jose Gonzalez-Valencia directed acts of extreme violence in furtherance of drug trafficking activities, including the murder of an individual who allegedly stole a shipment of approximately 1,000 kilograms of cocaine from Los Cuinis, according to court documents.
Jose Gonzalez-Valencia personally carried firearms in furtherance of his drug trafficking activities and supplied weapons and ammunition to the CJNG.
In 2015, Jose Gonzalez-Valencia went into hiding in Bolivia — a country that did not extradite anyone to the United States from 2001 to 2023, despite an existing extradition treaty — and resided there for over two years under a fictitious identity.
In 2017, Jose Gonzalez-Valencia was arrested in Brazil while on vacation and was subsequently extradited to the United States. Brazil’s extradition treaty required that the U.S. Government not recommend a sentence exceeding 30 years.
Pursuant to his plea agreement, Gutierrez-Ochoa admitted that he was a member of CJNG who was connected to CJNG’s top leadership. He also admitted that from at least 2023 until his arrest in 2024, he and other CJNG operatives used sophisticated money laundering methods involving real estate transactions, shell companies, and international money transfers to launder CJNG’s drug trafficking proceeds.
For example, Gutierrez-Ochoa and others completed two wire transfers totalling $1.2 million of CJNG’s drug proceeds to purchase a luxury residence in Riverside, California, titled in the name of a Mexican entity owned and controlled by CJNG.
When Gutierrez-Ochoa was arrested in November 2024, he was living at that property under a fictitious identity and possessed two untraceable and illegal firearms, approximately $2.2 million of CJNG’s drug proceeds, and numerous luxury items purchased with CJNG’s drug proceeds, including jewellery, watches, and vehicles.
Gutierrez-Ochoa is scheduled to be sentenced on November 7 and faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison. A federal district court judge will determine his sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.
Today’s sentencing of Gonzalez-Valencia and conviction of Gutierrez-Ochoa follow several recent strikes into CJNG’s most inner circle.
El Mencho’s older brother, Antonio Oseguera Cervantes, and Erick Valencia Salazar, an alleged co-founder of CJNG and El Mencho’s close advisor, were among the 29 wanted cartel leaders taken into U.S. custody on February 27, 2025.
Shortly after, on March 7, 2025, El Mencho’s son, Ruben Oseguera-Gonzalez, known as El Menchito, was sentenced to a term of life in prison plus 30 years to run consecutively and ordered to forfeit over $6 billion in drug trafficking proceeds.
Before his arrest, Oseguera-Gonzalez was CJNG’s second-in-command and led CJNG for nearly seven years.
He is responsible for trafficking more than 50 metric tons of cocaine and supervising drug labs that produced more than 1,000 metric tons of methamphetamine in Mexico. In 2013, he was one of the first contributors to the fentanyl epidemic in the United States, pledging to “do it big” and build an empire from counterfeit oxycontin pills laced with fentanyl.
As the evidence at trial showed, he also committed heinous acts of violence. According to statements made in court and trial testimony, Oseguera-Gonzalez ordered the murder of more than 100 people, some of whom he murdered himself.
