SHERMAN, Texas — A retired U.S. Defense Department official testified Wednesday that after the 2020 indictments, that included an aircraft trust company’s operator, on narcotrafficking allegations that there was an immediate and precipitous drop in U.S. registered planes carrying cocaine into Guatemala.
“It was obvious that something had happened,” Jesus Daniel Romero, the former intelligence officer, said in federal court.
Romero said that for a brief time, “It actually stopped the flow of cocaine into the country.”
Debra Lynn Mercer-Erwin, the owner of Aircraft Guaranty Corp., is on trial in federal court in Sherman. Federal prosecutors have accused her of “looking the other way” when she allegedly conspired to traffic drugs and conceal the registered ownership and whereabouts of planes.
Prosecutors and investigators have said that a series of stories WFAA first aired in 2019 spurred a federal investigation that resulted in the indictments of Mercer-Erwin, her daughter and others.
Aircraft Guaranty, based in Oklahoma City, registered planes in the United States in trusts on behalf of non-U.S. citizens. The FAA allows foreign nationals to gain U.S. registration for their aircraft by transferring the title to a trust company.
All U.S.-registered aircraft have an N tail number. However, if you checked the FAA’s records, the aircraft under non-citizen trusts would be registered in the name of the trust company, not the actual name of the foreign owner.
Romero, who handled interdiction efforts in Central and South America, said there had been a spike in the use of U.S.-registered planes in 2018 and 2019. He also said that drug traffickers moved from smaller planes to larger and faster planes.
He said within 90 to 120 days of the indictments, he saw a dramatic drop in the use of N-numbered aircraft used in drug smuggling.
Prosecutors also began presenting evidence Wednesday about planes registered by Mercer-Erwin’s company that were later seized in Latin and Central America loaded with drugs.
One plane, seized in February 2020 in Belize, was at that time the largest cocaine seizure in that country’s history.
That plane had been registered in trust by Aircraft Guaranty a few months on behalf of Heriberto Gastelum-Calderon, who authorities later determined was a convicted drug trafficker. After the plane was seized in February 2020, Mercer-Erwin sent Gastelum a letter stating that AGC was deregistering the plane. Her daughter then filed a bill of sale transferring the aircraft back to Gastelum even though the aircraft remained in government custody in Belize, documents show.
Mercer-Erwin, along with one of her alleged accomplices, Federico Machado, is also accused of running a Ponzi scheme that involved fake plane deals. Prosecutors have presented evidence that she made $4.9 million and Machado received $75 million.