A U.S. judge Tuesday delayed the arraignment of Gilberto Rodriguez Orejuela, the most powerful drug lord ever extradited by Colombia, for a month to give his lawyer time to figure out how he will be paid.
Rodriguez Orejuela, a former boss of the Cali cartel who was sent to the United States this month, had been expected to enter an innocent plea in a Miami federal courtroom on charges of running his multibillion-dollar cocaine business from a Colombian jail cell.
But the brief hearing ended without a plea being entered. U.S. District Judge Federico Moreno set another arraignment for Jan. 28.
Rodriguez Orejuela’s lawyer, Jose Quinon, said he was trying to get clarification from the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control as to whether Rodriguez Orejuela’s assets or those of his relatives could be used to pay legal fees.
U.S. prosecutors accused Rodriguez Orejuela, 65, of conspiring to import cocaine by hiding it in concrete posts, chlorine cylinders, watermelons and vegetables. He is also accused of conspiracy to distribute cocaine, of killing or bribing witnesses, and of conspiracy to launder money.
U.S. prosecutors say the Cali cartel once was responsible for 80 percent of the cocaine entering the United States. They want to seize $2.1 billion in unspecified assets they say were the proceeds of the money laundering.