Cancún’s Ex-Tourist Police Chief Jailed in Juárez With a Smuggling Boss Wanted in New Mexico and Sanctioned by the U.S. — Mexico Ties Their ‘Los López’ Ring to La Línea
A federal judge in Chihuahua has ordered Erik Gutiérrez Cossío, until recently the operational chief of the Tourist Police in Cancún (Quintana Roo), to stand trial on organized-crime charges, accused of belonging to a migrant-smuggling network that Mexican prosecutors link to La Línea, the armed wing of the Juárez Cartel, Agencia Reforma reported on Oct. 5, 2026. One of his four co-defendants, alleged ring leader Jumilca Sandivel Hernández Pérez, has been under U.S. indictment in New Mexico since 2024 and was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury in 2025.
What Mexican prosecutors allege
According to Reforma’s report, which cites Mexico’s Attorney General’s Office (FGR), Gutiérrez was charged together with four alleged members of the “Los López” smuggling band: Hernández Pérez, Reyna Manuela Hernández Pérez, Eva Pérez Villagrán and Ernesto Gutiérrez Castillejos. Federal investigators say the band worked from Mexico’s border with Guatemala, ran its operations center in a Chihuahua border city and operated in Chiapas, Chihuahua and along the border with Texas.
The five were arrested on Sept. 26 in simultaneous searches of three properties in Chiapas and Quintana Roo carried out by the FGR with Mexico’s Navy and the federal Security Ministry (SSPC). The FGR said agents seized eight rounds of ammunition, a rifle, passports, IDs, credit cards and cash. A judge at the federal criminal justice center in Chihuahua charged all five with organized crime for the purpose of migrant smuggling, ordered them held in federal prisons No. 2 and 3 in Ciudad Juárez, across from El Paso, and gave prosecutors three months to complete the investigation. The organized-crime prosecutors’ unit opened the case in 2025.
The U.S. case against the alleged leader
The U.S. Treasury sanctioned Hernández Pérez on March 18, 2025, calling her a key leader of the Lopez Human Smuggling Organization, which it described as a Guatemala-based group that smuggled thousands of people from Guatemala through Mexico into the United States. Treasury said the group charged $13,000 to $16,000 per person and estimated its proceeds from September 2020 to 2023 at $104 million to $416 million. It said she coordinated with La Línea, which Treasury holds responsible for the November 2019 murders of nine U.S. citizens, including six children, in Sonora. Treasury said HSI El Paso opened the investigation in 2023 and that a federal grand jury in New Mexico indicted her on July 17, 2024. Reforma’s report does not say whether the U.S. has asked Mexico to extradite her.
Why it matters for Cancún
Gutiérrez had held his post until a few days before his arrest, according to Reforma. Visitors can find current advisories in our Cancún and Tulum safety guide. All five defendants are presumed innocent; none has been convicted, and their lawyers’ responses were not included in the report.
Sources
- El Diario de Juárez (Abel Barajas, Agencia Reforma), Procesan a ex mando de Policía Turística de Cancún, Oct. 5, 2026
- U.S. Department of the Treasury, Treasury Targets Mexico-Based Leader of Transnational Criminal Organization Responsible for Smuggling Thousands of Migrants Across the U.S. Southern Border, March 18, 2025
- Photos: El Diario de Juárez / Agencia Reforma, article above; Dennis Sylvester Hurd (public domain), via Wikimedia Commons
Reported Oct. 6, 2026, from the sources above. Mexican prosecutors’ allegations have not been tested at trial, and the U.S. indictment is an accusation, not a finding of guilt.