CJNG Tunnel Case: Engineer Charged in $45 Million Cocaine Route

A federal grand jury returned an indictment Thursday charging a Mexican engineer with building a cross-border drug tunnel for the Cártel de Jalisco Nueva Generación.

The U.S. Department of Justice identified the defendant as Luis Manuel Hernandez Victoria, 60, a resident of Guadalajara also known as El Ingeniero. Authorities in the state of Jalisco arrested him Oct. 15. Federal prosecutors filed four conspiracy counts against him: one covering construction or financing of a cross-border tunnel, one covering use of such a tunnel to import controlled substances, one covering importation of controlled substances, and one count of providing material support to a foreign terrorist organization.

The Trump administration designated CJNG as a foreign terrorist organization last year. The indictment states that the tunnel was built for CJNG's benefit.

Investigators located the tunnel on May 29 inside a retail store near the Otay Mesa Port of Entry in San Diego. The passage runs from Tijuana to the store, Buy 4 Less, and measures about 1,933 feet long, 55 feet deep and 4.5 feet high. The DOJ said the tunnel is equipped with walls, electricity, rail lines and ventilation systems.

More than 1 ton of cocaine valued at over $45 million was seized during the discovery, according to officials.

Hernandez is the seventh person charged in the case, and the DOJ said weapons and narcotics were recovered at the time of his arrest. The investigation involves Homeland Security Investigations, U.S. Border Patrol, the San Diego County Sheriff's Office, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the California Department of Justice and the FBI, and remains ongoing.