A former Hidalgo County deputy will be swapping his badge for prison garb as he prepares to serve a 46-month sentence for his role in a drug trafficking scheme. Baldemar Cardenas, 39, pleaded guilty in April last year to conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute cocaine, acting U.S. Attorney Jennifer B. Lowery announced.
Cardenas' sentencing took into consideration his former status as a law enforcement officer and highlighted the troubling issue of police involvement in narcotics distribution. He is expected to not only serve time behind bars but also undergo three years of supervised release following his imprisonment. In an effort to cleverly outmaneuver the system, Cardenas admitted that he conspired to feed law enforcement authorities false information about drug seizures, according to a statement made by the Department of Justice.
The intricacies of Cardenas' crimes included working with a drug trafficking organization from which members would receive high-purity cocaine, then create and distribute low-purity sham cocaine. Cardenas facilitated the seizure of these fakes by local law enforcement, allowing his co-conspirators to evade detection for the theft and lucrative trade of the original drugs. In one particular instance, information he falsely attributed to a confidential source led to the seizure of about 33 kilograms of sham cocaine in Mission with a purity of just 1.5%.
While awaiting his surrender to a yet-to-be-determined federal prison facility, Cardenas was allowed to remain on bond. The investigation that uncovered his actions was the collaborative effort of several agencies, including the FBI and Homeland Security Investigations under the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces program, which aims to systematically disrupt high-level criminal organizations threatening the U.S. Assistant U.S. Attorney Roberto Lopez Jr. prosecuted the case, bringing to a close this chapter of law enforcement corruption.
