All About Lorenzanas

NEWS

Guatemala's Lorenzana Clan in Turmoil as Assassination Targets Third Generation

COCAINE / 10 MAR 2022

The recent assassination of a former drug lord's grandson may stem from disputes between members of a family clan already rocked by arrests and extraditions.

COCAINE / 22 FEB 2021

An anti-narcotics operation targeting an alleged trafficking ring in Guatemala has shed light on the increasing importance of small, often discrete transport networks in the country's cocaine trade.

COCAINE / 4 FEB 2021

Drug trafficking has been reconfigured in Guatemala. The large clans that traditionally dominated the business have broken up.

GEOGRAPHIC PROFILES / 22 JAN 2021

Izabal is one of the most important transit hubs for cocaine being smuggled from Honduras into Guatemala by land, as well as for cocaine arriving by plane or sea from…

GEOGRAPHIC PROFILES / 22 JAN 2021

In the department of Zacapa, long a transit point for cocaine and marijuana bound for Mexico and the US, drug traffickers exert much influence.

GUATEMALA / 7 MAR 2017

The "patriarch" of drug trafficking in Guatemala, Waldemar Lorenzana, was quietly released from US prison in 2015, it has emerged, adding a new twist to a saga that has reshaped…

GUATEMALA / 24 MAR 2016

A US court has convicted two sons of a top Guatemala crime figure on international drug trafficking charges, heightening the possibility they might trade information about former associates or corrupt…

EXTRADITION / 27 JUL 2015

Guatemalan authorities recently extradited drug trafficker Jairo Orellana, alias "El Pelon," to the United States, ending a criminal career that left a bloody legacy in Guatemala. …

GUATEMALA / 9 JUN 2015

Twenty years ago, the United States patiently prepared a punishment for Waldemar Lorenzana Lima, one of the most prominent drug traffickers in Guatemala. But in 2015, the case against him…

GUATEMALA / 5 MAY 2015

Loyalty is one of the strengths of family drug trafficking clans. But the Lorenzanas in Guatemala are the exception. The children of Waldemar Lorenzana Lima deceived “the Patriarch,” who has…

EXTRADITION / 1 MAY 2015

Guatemala's recent extradition of a prominent drug trafficker marks the end of the Lorenzana crime family, once considered one of Guatemala's top crime families.  …

EXTRADITION / 27 FEB 2015

The story of the precipitous fall of Guatemala's once-feared drug trafficker Waldemar Lorenzana may now include Alzheimer's.

GUATEMALA / 29 OCT 2014

The stories of the captures of Walter Montejo, Elio Lorenzana, and Walther Overdick -- three of Guatemala's criminal capos wanted by the US -- shed light on the degree of…

About InSight Crime

THE ORGANIZATION

InSight Crime Contributes Expertise Across the Board 

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This week InSight Crime investigators Sara García and María Fernanda Ramírez led a discussion of the challenges posed by Colombian President Gustavo Petro’s “Total Peace” plan within urban contexts. The…

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InSight Crime’s work on emerging coca cultivation in Honduras, Guatemala, and Venezuela was cited in the Colombian government’s…

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Human Trafficking Investigation Published in Leading Mexican Newspaper

1 SEP 2023

Leading Mexican media outlet El Universal featured our most recent investigation, “The Geography of Human Trafficking on the US-Mexico Border,” on the front page of its August 30…

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InSight Crime's Coverage of Ecuador Leads International Debate

25 AUG 2023

This week, Jeremy McDermott, co-director of InSight Crime, was interviewed by La Sexta, a Spanish television channel, about the situation of extreme violence and insecurity in Ecuador…