A Belizean and a Panamanian have been caught in El Salvador with half a million US dollars in what the Salvadoran authorities believes are proceeds of money Laundering.
Belizean, Oscar Lesby Itza, and Panamanian, Adam Enrique Gutierrez Moralez, were stopped by the Salvadoran law enforcement at the Oscar Romero Airport in San Salvador on Friday, September 8. The cops reportedly saw them acting suspicious, and they decided to conduct a thorough search on them. The officers searched all their bags and found 499,660 US dollars in bundles of 20 and 50-dollar bills. They have since been charged with money laundering by the Salvadoran Financial Intelligence Unit.
News reports out of that country suggest that these men reportedly told the authorities that they intended to use the money to make payments in Panama but it had traces of cocaine on it. The authorities did not buy that story, because one of the men reported has a history with a Central American gang.
Reports to the local press are that Itza has ties to a business owner in the Benque Viejo Free Zone. It is suspected that the money would have been used to buy Chinese cigarettes in Panama, which would then be imported into the free Zone. Cigarettes are regularly smuggled into Guatemala.
