Once Colombia’s most-wanted drug lord, the kingpin known as Otoniel gets 45 years in prison in US

By JENNIFER PELTZ
Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — A Colombian man once seen as one of the world’s most dangerous drug lords has been sentenced to 45 years in prison in the U.S. Dairo Antonio Úsuga — known as Otoniel — was sentenced Tuesday in a federal court in New York. He pleaded guilty in January to high-level drug trafficking charges. Úsuga headed the Gulf Clan, a cartel and paramilitary group with a blood-drenched grip on much of northern Colombia. Úsuga was Colombia’s most-wanted kingpin before his arrest in 2021. When pleading guilty, he admitted smuggling tons of U.S.-bound cocaine and acknowledged “there was a lot of violence.”