2 Hondurans Sentenced for Cocaine
The former Honduran consul general in Los Angeles and a countryman Monday were sentenced to federal prison for trying to smuggle about $10 million worth of cocaine into the United States.
U.S. Senior District Judge A. Andrew Hauk sentenced the former diplomat, Oscar Judas Oqueli-Hernandez, 39, to 5 1/2 years in prison and fined him $10,000. Gustavo Alvarado, 34, now living in Glendale, received three years in prison and was fined $5,000.
In handing down the sentences, Hauk belittled the two men’s contention that they did not know how the cocaine found by Customs inspectors got into the former diplomat’s luggage last July 22 at Los Angeles International Airport.
Hauk called their explanation a “ridiculous story,” adding “anybody who’d believe that would believe in Santa Claus.”
Alvarado, who was carrying the suitcase containing the cocaine as the two arrived from a vacation in Brazil, was arrested at the scene. Oqueli-Hernandez, consul-general in 1983 and 1984, was arrested later that day when he returned to the airport to pick up the suitcase, said Asst. U.S. Attorney Manuel Medrano, who prosecuted.
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