Ecuador's biggest drug trafficker, "Fito," was extradited to the United States

The drug lord "left the La Roca Detention Center," guarded by police and military personnel, "as part of an extradition process," the prison authority (SNAI) said in a message sent to journalists. He landed in New York on the night of Sunday to Monday, according to the air traffic monitoring website Flightradar. According to a document published Sunday by the US Department of Justice, "Fito" is due to appear in federal court on Monday "on the basis of a supplementary indictment."

From his cell in a maximum-security prison, he agreed to be extradited to the United States last week during a videoconference hearing. He thus becomes the first Ecuadorian to be extradited by his own country since Ecuador reinstated this procedure by referendum in 2024, a measure championed by Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa in his fight against organized crime.

"Forever, Fito," Daniel Noboa reacted on X Sunday evening. "Fito is already in the United States. It's thanks to you, Ecuadorians, who said yes to the popular consultation" organized in April 2024 and whose main themes were the fight against drug trafficking and crime. "Fito" escaped in January 2024 from the Guayaquil penitentiary center (southwest Ecuador) where he had been serving a 34-year prison sentence since 2011 for organized crime, drug trafficking, and murder. Leader of one of the country's main gangs, the Choneros, which notably rules over cocaine trafficking, "Fito" was linked to the assassination in August 2023 of one of the main candidates in the Ecuadorian presidential election, Fernando Villavicencio.

A former taxi driver, he had become public enemy number one in Ecuador, with authorities designating him a "criminal with extremely dangerous characteristics." His escape sparked an unprecedented wave of violence in the country, resulting in dozens of deaths and leading to prison riots, gang-related street fighting, and a hostage-taking on a television set. Daniel Noboa then declared the country to be in "internal armed conflict" and deployed the army to try to neutralize the twenty or so criminal groups involved.