May 19, 2020 — Federal prosecutors are finally admitting that the Flores brothers, the two twins that took down world-famous Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin (El Chapo) Guzman, may have hidden assets waiting for them when they return from prison. Pedro (Little Pete) Flores and Margarito (Junior) Flores, 38, were the Sinaloa Cartel’s top distribution lieutenants in the United States, operating the cartel’s main hub in Chicago throughout most of the 2000s until they flipped and helped build the landmark case against their boss. Junior Flores is seeking an early release from a federal prison protection unit due to the Coronavirus pandemic. The Flores twins were sentenced to 14-year terms, but Junior, according to the BOP website, is slated for release in November. They were denied a re-sentencing in 2019. The DEA has called the Flores brothers the two most important informants in U.S. history. In a response brief to Junior’s request for sentence relief related to the health crisis filed this week by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Illinois, the government concedes that it no longer holds the view that “all recoverable proceeds were turned over upon arrest.” The brief noted that the office officially changed its position back in March. Despite U.S. District Judge Ruben Castilla expressing doubt that the Flores twins were turning over all their assets at their 2015 sentencing hearing, prosecutors backed the Flores’ claim that they had. The current motion for a “compassionate release” is being decided by U.S. District Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman. The Flores brothers forfeited more than $4,000,000 after they cut their deal with prosecutors in 2008. Little Pete Flores gifted his wife a $200,000 Bentley automobile in the days before he reported to prison. He was the star witness at El Chapo’s trial last year. El Chapo, the biggest narcotics trafficker on the planet, was extradited to the U.S. in 2016 and is doing life prison in the Supermax facility in Colorado. Born and raised in Chicago’s Little Village neighborhood, the Flores twins got connected to the Sinaloa Cartel in the early 2000s, eventually becoming El Chapo’s go-to guys in the U.S. and given control of the cartel’s most prized North American satellite. Junior Flores visited with El Chapo in the Northern mountains of Mexico in October 2008, shortly following his decision to cooperate. Over the next year, he and his brother recorded 75 phone calls between them and El Chapo, many of them discussing drug shipments.
