Narco-Terrorist Pleads Guilty To Billion-Dollar Drug Empire: Feds

BROOKLYN, NEW YORK — A Colombian "narco-terrorist" faces life in prison after confessing Tuesday that he pumped billions of dollars worth of cocaine into the U.S., Brooklyn prosecutors announced.

Daniel “Don Mario” Rendon Herrera pleaded guilty to decades of criminal activity that included murder, kidnap and torture in Brooklyn Federal Court, U.S. Attorney Breon Peace said.

“Once the most feared narco-terrorist in Colombia, [Rendon Herrera] admitted to leading one of the world’s largest and most violent drug cartels and flooding the streets of America with cocaine," Peace said.

"Rendon Herrera also admitted to providing material support to a designated terrorist organization that brutally killed, kidnapped, and tortured rival drug traffickers and civilians.”

Rendon Herrara, 56, pleaded guilty to conspiring to support terrorism and engaging in criminal enterprise as a former leader of the designated foreign terrorist organization Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia and the drug cartel Los Urabeños, federal investigators said.

Autodefensas Unidas, which waged war for years against Colombian guerrilla groups, was funded by "taxes" it levied on cocaine trafficking from the mid-1990s until it disbanded in about 2006, prosecutors said.

But Los Urabeños continued to finance paramilitary activity through the trafficking of cocaine, which landed in the U.S. by the ton, according to prosecutors.

“All roads travelled by international drug cartels seem to lead straight to our cities," said FBI representative Michael Driscoll, "where their members poison our neighbors and wreak deadly havoc."

Rendon Herrera was captured by the Colombian National Police in 2009 and, as part of his plea deal, admitted to trafficking at least 73,000 kilograms of cocaine, according to Brooklyn prosecutors.

He is also wanted by the Republic of Colombia to serve sentences linked to homicides, weapons, and narcotics trafficking convictions, according to a press release from the U.S. Attorney's office.

“This notorious founder and leader of Clan Usaga is facing the consequences of his billion-dollar cocaine empire that spread fear, drug addiction, and death throughout Colombia and the United States,” said Ray Donovan of New York's Drug Enforcement Administration division.

"Don Mario’s guilty plea has left footprints for other drug kingpins to follow."