What do the charges in New York say against “Fito”, the leader of the Los Choneros band in Ecuador, about the massive presence of US weapons in Latin America

Joseph Adolph Maciah, Alias "Issue"walk in the custody of numerous military around him in Ecuador — Photo foot, Three of the positions weighing on José Adolfo Macías in the United States are linked to firearms.

- Author, Gerardo Lissardy
- Author's title, BBC News World
3 hours

The Ecuadorian José Adolfo Macías, aka “Fito”, was presented to a New York court as a skilled navigator of the “Iron River” that floods Latin America with weapons from the United States.

Three of the seven positions that Macías faces in the Federal Court of Brooklyn after being extradited by Ecuador on Sunday are linked to the purchase and smuggling of US weapons, or their use to traffic drugs.

It is not just about short weapons: from machine guns to grenades and assault rifles were used by “Fito” and members of the criminal organization led by him, the choneros, according to the US Department of Justice.

In his first judicial hearing in New York, Macías declared innocent Monday of all charges, which also include crimes of cocaine traffic and could cost him from 20 years in prison to life imprisonment.

Specialists expect the process to shed light on the hidden networks of US arms transport to the south of the continent, which contributed to impose in a short time in Ecuador one of the greatest homicide rates in the region.

The case of Macías “reveals with evidence that there is a whole structure that allows weapons to flow from the US to Latin America, in a river of steel, which feeds the serious levels of violence we face,” says BBC Mundo Carla Álvarez, an expert Ecuadorian political scientist on this subject.

A special figure

At 45, “Fito” is seen as someone emblematic of the unusual spiral of deaths and crime that ravaged Ecuador in recent times.

He was the most wanted criminal in the country until his capture last month, more than a year after his escape from a prison where he turned a penalty of 34 years for several crimes, including murder.

José Adolfo Macías descends from an airplane after being recaptured under the custody of military in Ecuador, in June 2025 — Photo foot, “Fito” was recaptured in June and sent to the United States on Sunday, the first extradition case since they were enabled in 2024.

That escape, as well as the parties and videos that Macías starred in prison, showed how Ecuadorian prisons had become sites controlled by theirs and other organized crime bands that are disputed drug trafficking.

By force of bribes, homicides and extortion of authorities, the choneros contributed to making Ecuador a crucial point of cocaine traffic to the US for their links with Mexican posters, or Europe through Balcanic groups.

The South American country, once quiet for the standards of the region, went from having less than seven homicides every 100,000 inhabitants in 2019 to 46 in 2023.

The proportion of murders with firearms also increased in that short period: it went from 55% to 88% of the total, according to studies.

“Fito” is also the first extradited by Ecuador to another country since last year a reform was approved for this, promoted by President Daniel Noboa.

Everything indicates that the US will pay special attention in weapons transfers that Macías may have made from that country.

Rifles and ammunition seized in an operation of the Armed Forces and the Police of Ecuador in March 2025. — Photo foot, American prosecutors argue that “Fito” and the Choneros smuggled many of their weapons from the US to Ecuador.

Federal prosecutor Joseph Nocella defined him as “a ruthless and infamous drug and weapons trafficker.”

The charges against them related to firearms include conspiracy for buying them for testaferros, smuggling them from the US and use for drug trafficking.

“The Choneros obtained many of their firearms and ammunition by trafficing and illegally exporting them from the United States to Ecuador,” the Department of Justice said.

He added that according to the allegations, “Fito” used people who bought weapons, components of them and ammunition in the US to smuggle them to Ecuador.

In statements to the press in front of the Brooklyn court on Monday, Macías's lawyer, Alexei Schacht, described those charges as “a bit weird.”

“It is the first time of my client in the US,” he said, “but supposedly this man trafficked weapons in the US, and this makes no sense.”

Whether “Fito” goes to trial as if he decides to change his statement to guilty and cooperate with the US authorities giving them information, their process in New York could serve to reveal important issues.

“What does the US?”

The specialist Álvarez believes that “for Ecuadorians and in general for all Latin Americans, it is of special interest to know information” about the Testoferros networks in the US that according to the accusation they operated with Macías.

“What are the logistics and media routes used for the business?” He asks. “What does the US do to dismantle networks of arms traffickers and to cut the supply chain?”

Facade of the Federal Court of Brooklyn in New York — Photo foot, In the Federal Court of Brooklyn, Macías declared himself innocent of the charges and a judge ordered that he continue to stop until his trial.

The case arises after the Mexico Government seemed to demand the US weapons manufacturers for alleged responsibility in their own domestic wave of narco violence, something that the US Supreme Court rejected last month.

But Álvarez believes that Ecuador lacks interest in following the path undertaken by Mexico and that “as long as there is not enough interest, cooperation and political will of the affected countries” the flow of weapons will continue.

In Latin America and the Caribbean, about a third of homicides around the world occurs, according to studies, although only 8% of the population of the planet lives in the region.

In turn, approximately two out of three homicides in the American continent are committed with firearms, said a United Nations report in 2023.

Katherine Aguirre, a investigator at the Igarapé Institute based in Brazil, points out that the weapons that circulate in Latin America come from old armed conflicts, of robberies and deviations from arsenals of security forces, or the US border with Mexico.

“We must recognize (…) the importance of the US as a source of weapons that pass for Latin America,” Aguirre tells BBC Mundo.

Semi -automatic weapons exhibit in a Texas store, United States — Photo foot, The weapons of origin of the US reach different corners of Latin America, by legal or clandestine.

There are different indications about the massive presence of US weapons in the region.

Nearly two thirds of weapons linked to the crime that recover and track in Mexico come from the US, according to 2022 data from the alcohol, tobacco, firearms and explosives agency (ATF).

In Central America they are more than half.

In Brazil, the Military Police reported that 60% of the 254 rifles that seized this year until the mid -May had American origin.

Aguirre believes it is necessary to better control access to US weapons that are “sold in a super free way” and filtered to the region, in addition to working in international agreements to regulate the armament trade and worry about demand from countries.

“A case like these (from Macías) can lead to unraveling those dynamics,” he says, “for which weapons arrive in Latin America.”