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The son of a member of a transnational criminal organization associated with the Gulf Cartel has been sentenced to prison for threatening a federal officer.
Chief U.S. District Judge Randy Crane sentenced Hector “Torito” Reyes Jr., 20, on Thursday to two-and-a-half years in prison, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas announced in a press release.
He pleaded guilty on March 18.
His father is Hector Reyes Sr., who is known as “Padrino.”
Hector Reyes Sr. has pleaded guilty to his role in a sprawling drug trafficking conspiracy in Starr County that also resulted in the arrests of a former justice of the peace and a former city secretary for Rio Grande City who is married to the drug ring’s leader, Ignacio “Nacho” Garza.
The former justice of the peace, Roel “Role” Valdez Jr., has pleaded guilty. So has Garza.
His wife, Melissa Garza, the former city secretary, has pleaded not guilty.
Hector Reyes Sr. was arrested in April 2023 in Mexico before making a first appearance in San Diego, California for extradition to McAllen. He faces a separate charge in federal court for obtaining “a female jaguar intended for sacrifice,” court records show.
He made a first appearance in McAllen federal court on June 2, 2023 and then he appeared for a detention hearing on June 7, 2023.
Prior to that, on May, 9, 2023, Hector Reyes Jr. attended a detention hearing for his father’s girlfriend.
After that hearing, Hector Reyes Jr. spit on a federal office in the courthouse parking lot and then called his father in jail and bragged that the agent had gotten scared.
And on April 4, 2023, Hector Reyes Jr. posted a video on Snapchat that depicted multiple handheld radios transmitting an audio message in Spanish along with text that read, “A message for those that are searching up there,” according to a criminal complaint.
A translated transcript of the video states a man in the video sending the message is a high-ranking Gulf Cartel leader named “Commandante Siete.”
In the video, he gave authorities searching for Hector Reyes Sr. and ultimatum while threatening them to “stand down” while they still had time.
“Reyes posted this message intending to intimidate individuals who were searching for his father and hoped that it would impede his arrest,” the news release stated. “He also wanted the message to intimidate those individuals intending to cooperate with the government.”
The investigation into the Starr County drug trafficking ring has resulted in over 30 arrests and the seizure of around 727 pounds of methamphetamine, 77,161 pounds of marijuana, 132 pounds of cocaine and over $2.1 million in assets and currency, court records show.
Alamdar S. Hamdani called the Gulf Cartel a brutal and violent organization that his office seeks to disrupt and dismantle.
“So, there is no patience in my office when criminals, like Reyes, use the cartels to intimidate law enforcement and scare witnesses,” he said in the release. “We take such attempts seriously and will vigorously pursue those who, though such intimidation, seek to subvert our system of justice.”
