Mexico fuel trafficking network operated since at least 2023,with 69 shipments and more than $150 million in profits

"The route, always the same. An oil tanker leaves the same docks in Houston, Texas, and a few days later arrives at the same piers in Tamaulipas. The warehouses, always with the same cargo: millions and millions of lubricating oil additives. The exporting companies, always the same. The importing companies, the same. So too the naval agency. The smuggling network commanded by high-ranking sailors operated with martial precision."

"The criminal network reportedly began operating at least a year earlier, in June 2023. It managed the illegal entry into port of at least 564 million liters of fuel on 69 oil tankers at four different customs offices. This crime, known as huachicol fiscal (fual tax evasion), involves smuggling refined fuel into Mexico from another country, which should be subject to the Special Tax on Production and Services (IEPS), hidden under the guise of other goods to which this tax is not applied."

A smuggling network run by high-ranking naval personnel used repeated shipping routes from Houston to Tamaulipas to import large shipments labeled as lubricating oil additives that were actually refined fuel. The network operated since at least June 2023 and executed 69 contraband shipments totaling at least 564 million liters through multiple customs offices, mainly Tampico. The scheme evaded the Special Tax on Production and Services by misdeclaring taxable fuel as non-taxed additives, producing illicit proceeds of at least three billion pesos (about $150 million). Fourteen people, including Navy officials and businessmen, were arrested.

Read at english.elpais.com