A federal judge sentenced a man and woman to prison for their roles in the kidnapping and torturing of a 16-year-old male who allegedly stole a drug load in Laredo, Texas. The kidnappers tried to get the teen’s family to pay for the stolen drugs.
Court documents revealed that Hector Jose Lopez, 31, and Nancy “La Nancy” Yvette Garcia, 33, went before U.S. District Judge Marina Garcia Marmolejo in Laredo who sentenced the pair to a prison sentence of 8 years and 15.5 years, respectively. The extortion charges came from the kidnapping of a 16-year-old teen male in Laredo, Texas.
Lopez pleaded guilty in September 2021 as part of a plea deal. Court documents revealed that at the time of the kidnapping, he was on probation for a human smuggling conviction.
Garcia, who was described in court documents as Lopez’s boss, made a cold plea in October 2021, meaning a deal had not been made at the time.
The case began on January 26, 2021, when Lopez and Garcia kidnapped a 16-year-old male. The teen was lured by a friend who took him to negotiate a drug deal. Once there, Garcia accused him of stealing five bundles of marijuana. Garcia abducted the teen and drove him to Lopez’s apartment, where they covered his head, zip-tied his wrists, and placed a rag in his mouth before beating him.
The group used a Mexican cell phone number to call the teen’s mother and demanded $30,000 for the stolen drugs or they would kill him. They also posted photographs of the teen on social media and also sent them directly to his mother. The mother contacted the FBI and worked with negotiators to organize a release.
Two days after the initial kidnapping, the teen managed to escape and called his mother. FBI agents and Laredo Police went to pick up the teen and interviewed him before taking him to a local hospital. Based on the teen’s information, authorities set up a surveillance operation and were able to arrest Lopez and Garcia.
During questioning after his initial arrest, Lopez told authorities that Garcia was going to pay him $500 for the kidnapping and that he worked for her by smuggling migrants.
While court documents do not mention the involvement of a particular cartel, the Laredo-Nuevo Laredo area is controlled by the Cartel Del Noreste faction of Los Zetas. That criminal organization ruthlessly controls all drug trafficking and human smuggling activity in the region.
Luisana Moreno is a contributing writer for Breitbart Texas.
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