Reputed cocaine kingpins set to plead guilty in Miami federal court

The Colombian brothers who built the world's biggest cocaine empire are planning to plead guilty as early as next week in Miami federal court to conspiring to smuggle tons of the white powder into the United States, according to a half-dozen sources familiar with the case.

Lawyers for Gilberto and Miguel Rodriguez-Orejuela, reputed founders of the Cali cartel, have been negotiating for weeks with the U.S. Attorney's Office on a deal that would spare their family members from prosecution and allow them to keep some of their wealth, the sources said. The agreement would also would spare the brothers from having to cooperate in other investigations of Colombian narco-traffickers.
But the Rodriguez-Orejuelas, who were allegedly once responsible for most of the cocaine sold on U.S. streets during the previous decade, would have to spend the rest of their lives in federal prison. The brothers, now in their mid-60s, were facing up to 30 years' imprisonment.

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The Rodriguez Orejuela brothers were arrested by Colombian officials in 1995 and incarcerated in Bogotá until their extraditions to Miami in 2004-05.
Their lawyers asserted they ended their involvement in the Cali cartel's drug trafficking when they entered the Colombian prison. They said their clients could not be prosecuted for illegal activity before that time, citing a 1997 extradition treaty with the United States.
Federal prosecutors Ed Ryan, Dick Gregorie and Matt Axelrod said the brothers allegedly continued to operate the drug cartel from behind bars, smuggling at least two loads of cocaine containing hundreds of kilos into the United States after the extradition treaty took effect.

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The Rodriguez Orejuela brothers' empire reached its height in the early 1990s, when they allegedly exported more than 4,000 kilos of cocaine per month to the United States.
The Miami indictment, issued in September 2003, also seeks the forfeiture of $2.1 billion -- their alleged profits between 1990 and July 2002.