Feds Want 6-Year Prison Sentence For Del Records CEO Ángel del Villar After Conviction On Cartel Ties

Federal prosecutors want Latin music executive Ángel Del Villar to go to prison for more than six years following his conviction on felony charges of doing business with a concert promoter linked to Mexican drug cartels.

The feds asked a judge Friday to sentence the Del Records CEO to 78 months (6.5 years) in prison, three years supervised release, and a $300,000 fine for violating the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act, a law that bars U.S. residents from working with drug traffickers.

In the filing, the government told the judge a stiff sentence would “confirm that willful and brazen violations of sanctions law come with serious consequences.”

“He knew the federal government imposed these sanctions [over alleged money laundering to] one of the world’s most brutal criminal organizations,” prosecutors wrote. “At no time has he accepted any responsibility for his actions.”

A court hearing for Del Villar’s sentencing is currently scheduled for next week.

Prosecutors allege that Del Villar repeatedly arranged concerts with Jesus Pérez Alvear, a promoter with ties to Mexican cartels. At a March trial, regional Mexican superstar Gerardo Ortiz took the stand to testify against Del Villar, saying he had seen Pérez Alvear at the Del Records offices and had himself performed at one of the promoter’s concerts.

Del Villar’s defense attorneys argued at the trial that he had been “manipulated” into working with Pérez Alvear by a “trusted” former employee. But the jury didn’t buy it, finding him guilty on 10 counts of violating the Kingpin law, as well as one conspiracy charge.

At the time, Del Villar’s attorneys vowed to appeal the verdict, saying that the case was “unique and unprecedented” and that “the criminal justice system got it wrong.” Such appeals typically take place after sentencing.

Founded by Del Villar in 2008, Del Records later grew into a top record company for regional Mexican music. The label was home to música mexicana supergroup Eslabon Armado, whose global hit, “Ella Baila Sola” with Peso Pluma, became one of the biggest songs of 2023, as well as Lenin Ramirez and other chart-topping artists.

But in June 2022, Del Villar, 41; CFO Luca Scalisi, 56; and Del Records itself were all charged with conspiring to violate the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act. Passed in 1999, the law allows the U.S. to impose targeted sanctions on foreign individuals involved in the illegal drug trade and ban U.S. residents from doing business with them.

The U.S. Treasury Department added Pérez Alvear to the sanctions list in 2018, claiming he and his company, Gallistica Diamante, had helped cartels “exploit the Mexican music industry to launder drug proceeds and glorify their criminal activities.” According to court records, he has since died.

The case alleged that Del Villar and Scalisi used Pérez Alvear to arrange four Mexican concerts for an undisclosed Del Records artist, then accepted nearly $200,000 in payments from him, all while aware that he had been sanctioned. Charging documents cite a never-sent Del Records press release acknowledging that status, as well as private messages in which Scalisi noted that Pérez Alvear was “under homeland security watch” and Del Villar was directly told that Pérez Alvear was “a sanctioned U.S. person.”

In Friday’s new filing on sentencing, prosecutors repeatedly cited such red flags to argue that Del Villar knew what he was doing was wrong, but simply “ignored” the restrictions and chose to work with Perez Alvear anyway.

“The whole point of the sanctions regime — to economically isolate and cripple foreign bad actors — depends on U.S. persons taking sanctions designations seriously,” prosecutors write in the new filing. “Defendant did not. And he directed several others not to do so.”

Del Villar’s attorneys did not immediately return a request for comment on Monday.