The owner of a longtime Southwest Detroit grocery store and remittance shop was arrested Thursday after federal investigators accused him of funneling more than $140 million to Mexico through over 100,000 wire transfers between 2022 and 2026, with nearly all of that money allegedly landing in Mexican states tied to major drug cartels. Juan Romo-Padilla, 58, owns La Posada, the Springwells Street market, restaurant, and remittance business he has run since 2005.
Federal prosecutors say the investigation began in September 2024, according to the criminal complaint, and involved structured cash transfers allegedly used to move drug proceeds to Mexico through La Posada. As reported by The Metro Detroit News, Romo-Padilla was arrested in Detroit and now faces charges including conspiracy to launder monetary instruments, international money laundering, laundering of represented drug proceeds, and violations of the Bank Secrecy Act. The case was investigated jointly by the DEA Detroit Field Division and IRS Criminal Investigation.
A Neighborhood Storefront With a Second Business Line
La Posada sits at 1930 Springwells Street near West Vernor Highway, in the heart of Southwest Detroit's Latinx business district, where small markets combining grocery sales with money-transfer services are common, per the Southwest Detroit Business Association. The business has long operated as a grocery market, restaurant, and remittance service, catering to working-class residents sending money to family in Mexico, according to the store's own description of its operations. Prosecutors allege the scale of the transfers moving through La Posada — more than 100,000 wire transactions totaling over $140 million — far exceeds what a typical small-business remittance operation would handle.
The arrest was announced under the federal Homeland Security Task Force initiative, established through Executive Order 14159, which President Trump signed in January 2025 to direct multi-agency federal resources toward dismantling cartel operations in the United States, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. United States Attorney Jerome F. Gorgon Jr. announced the criminal complaint alongside DEA Detroit Field Division Special Agent in Charge Joseph O. Dixon and IRS Criminal Investigation Detroit Field Office Acting Special Agent in Charge Todd Strom.
Cartels Named in the Complaint
The Justice Department's announcement ties the alleged transfers to Mexican states associated with major drug cartels, including the Sinaloa Cartel, the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, and La Familia Michoacana. All three organizations were designated Foreign Terrorist Organizations by the U.S. Department of State in February 2025, a designation that expanded federal authority to dismantle financial networks supporting the groups, per the Federal Register.
The case also follows a June 2025 action by the U.S. Department of the Treasury that barred U.S. money transmittals involving CIBanco, a major Mexican financial institution Treasury determined had facilitated cartel money laundering for CJNG and the Sinaloa Cartel. Federal regulators have increasingly focused on both domestic storefront remitters and international banking channels as conduits for cartel funds moving out of the country.
Structuring and the Bank Secrecy Act
Under 31 U.S.C. § 5324 and Bank Secrecy Act regulations, money remitters must automatically file reports for daily cash transfers exceeding $10,000, and intentionally splitting transfers into smaller amounts to dodge that threshold constitutes illegal structuring, according to the Internal Revenue Service. Willful violations of those reporting laws carry up to five years in prison under 31 U.S.C. § 5322, a penalty that can escalate to up to ten years and $500,000 in fines when tied to a pattern of activity exceeding $100,000 within a 12-month span, per the Office of the Law Revision Counsel.
The money laundering and conspiracy charges under 18 U.S.C. § 1956 carry their own steep exposure — up to 20 years in prison on each count, plus fines of up to $500,000 or twice the value of the funds involved, according to the Department of Justice. Those statutory maximums apply on top of, not instead of, the separate Bank Secrecy Act penalties Romo-Padilla faces.
Part of a Broader Detroit Crackdown
This is not the first large-scale cartel money-laundering case to surface out of Southeast Michigan this year. In March, the DEA Detroit Field Division and Gorgon's office unsealed a federal civil forfeiture action seeking more than $14.9 million tied to a separate trade-based cartel laundering operation in the Detroit area, according to the Drug Enforcement Administration. The pattern extends beyond Michigan, too — in August, federal prosecutors charged the operator of a Minnesota-based money-remittance business following a 21-month Homeland Security Task Force investigation into allegations of laundering drug proceeds back to Mexico for CJNG.
Hoodline previously reported on a related federal probe into Detroit business networks used to launder Sinaloa cartel money in its Peanut Brown cartel probe coverage. Federal officials have not said whether third-party wire platforms or higher-level cartel operatives directed the transactions allegedly processed through La Posada, and that question remains unresolved as the case moves forward. The charges outlined in the complaint remain allegations, and Romo-Padilla has not been convicted of any crime.
