Executives at a Los Angeles freight forwarding company smuggled billions of dollars in goods into Mexico from the U.S. for over a decade in a lucrative scheme involving drug cartels and corrupt customs agents, federal prosecutors say.
Ralph Olarte, 55, and Humberto Lopez Belmonte, 53, used “fraudulent documents, shell companies, bribes to public officials, and kickbacks to Mexican cartels” in the scheme, which lasted from at least 2013 to 2024, according to the 22-count indictment against Olarte, Lopez and their company, Sport LA Inc., in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.
Olarte, a U.S. citizen, and Lopez, a citizen of Mexico, allegedly hid the nature of the goods as well as the identities of the actual recipients from U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Among items originating in the U.S. and exported to Mexico or funneled through the U.S. from other countries and then to Mexico were contraband including counterfeit cell phone batteries and medical devices, as well as goods that required licenses, such as handguns, ammunition, electronic cigarettes and marijuana, the indictment states. Mexican shell companies received the goods.
The defendants avoided paying hundreds of millions of dollars in duties owed to the Mexican government by bribing Mexican customs officials, according to a statement from the U.S. Attorney’s Office.
They used WhatsApp to direct truck drivers into specific Mexican customs lanes where officials who had been bribed were assigned. The agents permitted the trucks to enter Mexico without paying duties, the indictment alleges.
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