Another ‘cartel wife’ gets 3.5 years for hiding millions in drug money tied to El Chapo’s Sinaloa cartel

A federal judge sentenced the wife of an infamous Chicago drug kingpin to 3.5 years in prison Monday, matching the sentence he gave earlier this summer to her sister-in-law for a money-laundering conspiracy stemming from their husbands’ drug trafficking.

U.S. District Judge Matthew Kennelly handed down the sentence to Valerie Gaytan after she apologized during a sentencing hearing at the Dirksen Federal Courthouse for stashing away $2.3 million in drug money.

“I just want to apologize to everyone that was involved in the prosecution for the time it took, the resources to investigate and prosecute me, and for wasting the court’s valuable time,” Gaytan said.

The feds pointed out that the money was generated “through the sale of thousands of kilograms of drugs in the United States — drugs that harmed individuals and communities in countless ways.”

Gaytan’s husband Margarito Flores, along with his twin brother Pedro Flores, helped traffic tons of cocaine but then worked with the feds to bring down Sinaloa cartel boss Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman Loera. Then, in 2021, a grand jury indicted Gaytan and Pedro Flores’ wife, Vivianna Lopez, and accused them of hiding some of their husbands’ drug money.

Kennelly also sentenced Vivianna Lopez to 3.5 years in prison last July.

Gaytan and her sister-in-law turned over $4.2 million in drug money in August 2010 and claimed it was all that remained from the twins’ trafficking. But she admitted in April that she stashed another $2.3 million, which she understood to be drug money, with the twins’ brother, Armando Flores.

Gaytan asked Armando Flores to store the money after it arrived at his Texas home hidden inside secondhand furniture that was delivered in a U-Haul truck, according to her plea agreement.

Armando Flores buried the money under his back porch and left it alone for years. Then, in 2015, he began spending it at Gaytan’s direction, for a fee. Between 2015 and 2020, he would send Gaytan regular cash deliveries by mail. He also delivered the money to a travel agency, then let Gaytan book travel there by phone. He also bought money orders and gift cards.

Armando Flores is due to be sentenced Oct. 11. Kennelly in July gave one year in prison to Vivianna Lopez’s aunt, Laura Lopez, for her role in the conspiracy. Last month, he gave a probation sentence to Vivianna Lopez’s sister, Bianca Finnigan, for hers.

The Flores twins, who grew up in Little Village, were convicted of importing tons of cocaine into Chicago, New York, Cincinnati, Detroit, Vancouver and other North American cities from 2005 to 2008. 

Their cooperation with the government was key to the conviction of El Chapo, who is now serving a life sentence after his 2019 conviction in federal court in Brooklyn. 

The Flores twins were rewarded for their cooperation in 2015 with relatively light 14-year prison sentences, which they have served. But then-U.S. District Chief Judge Ruben Castillo warned them they would always be looking over their shoulders. 

Meanwhile, a federal indictment unsealed in Chicago this spring accused four sons of El Chapo of taking control of their father’s empire after his arrest and strengthening their grip over the cartel through brutal violence.

One of the four, Ovidio Guzman Lopez, was extradited to Chicago from Mexico earlier this month and was arraigned before U.S. District Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman.

Contributing: Frank Main