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A 37-year-old Atlanta man was sentenced Wednesday to ten years in federal prison after using fake produce companies to smuggle cocaine into the United States and send more than a million dollars in drug money back to Mexico.

What happened: Carlos Salazar-Garcia ran sham produce businesses in the Atlanta area that he used to move cocaine hidden inside shipments crossing the U.S.-Mexico border. In December 2022, federal agents in Laredo, Texas found 119 pounds of cocaine packed among electronic transformers in a shipment headed to a farmers market in Clayton County.

Less than a year later, in November 2023, agents in McAllen, Texas stopped another shipment and found about 66 pounds of cocaine hidden inside a load of limes bound for a second fake company Salazar-Garcia controlled. He and a co-defendant, 37-year-old Andrea Principe of Stone Mountain, then moved more than a million dollars in drug proceeds out of the country.

The charges: Salazar-Garcia pleaded guilty April 20 to conspiracy to possess cocaine with intent to distribute, cocaine importation, and money laundering. He was sentenced Wednesday to ten years in prison followed by five years of supervised release.

What officials said: “Salazar-Garcia laundered money for Mexican drug traffickers and attempted to smuggle nearly 200 pounds of cocaine into our country,” U.S. Attorney Theodore S. Hertzberg said.

What’s next: Principe pleaded guilty June 30 to conspiracy to commit money laundering. She is scheduled to be sentenced Oct. 15.

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B.T. Clark is the Publisher of The Georgia Sun and author of Principles Are Like Pants… You Ought to Have Some. Over two decades in journalism, he has served as Managing Editor of Neighbor Newspapers in metro Atlanta and Digital Director at Times-Journal Inc., earning multiple awards along the way. His work has appeared in newspapers across the state, including The Cherokee Tribune and The Marietta Daily Journal.

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