The U.S. Department of the Treasury on Tuesday announced sanctions against three men and two casinos in Tamaulipas for their alleged involvement with the Cartel del Noreste, or Northeast Cartel (CDN), one of six Mexican cartels that the U.S. government has designated as foreign terrorist organizations.
The individuals sanctioned include the president of the Nuevo Laredo Human Rights Committee, Raymundo Ramos, against whom the Ministry of National Defense used Pegasus spyware during Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s presidency (2018-24), according to a 2022 investigation by three civil society organizations.
The Treasury Department said in a statement that Ramos is in fact “a CDN associate that leads the CDN disinformation campaign against Mexican authorities while posing as a ‘human rights’ activist.”
“Under the guise of human rights activism, Ramos solely advocates for violent cartel members by filing false complaints against the Mexican military, paying individuals to attend protests, and protecting the reputations of fallen or arrested CDN members,” Treasury said.
“On the CDN payroll, Ramos engages in these activities with the goal of boosting the public opinion of CDN and discrediting Mexican authorities’ law enforcement initiatives against the cartel,” it stated, adding that “Ramos has supported CDN in this capacity for over a decade.”
The Nuevo Laredo Human Rights Committee president has previously denied links to the Northeast Cartel.
The other two individuals designated and sanctioned by the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) on Tuesday are Eduardo Javier Islas Valdez and Juan Pablo Penilla Rodríguez.
Treasury said that Islas, aka “Crosty,” is “in charge of CDN human smuggling operations in Nuevo Laredo.”
It said that Islas “oversees human smugglers” and “grants permission to move the migrants, acting as a gatekeeper for human smuggling along the Rio Grande into Texas.” Treasury said that the 41-year-old “also ensures the continuity of cross-border activities that sustain the cartel’s criminal enterprise by controlling cash stash houses in Nuevo Laredo.”
Penilla is a defense attorney who “provides illegal services to CDN members,” according to the Treasury. It said that Penilla “assisted” former Zetas leader Miguel Treviño “in Mexican prison — despite OFAC’s sanctions against him — by serving as his intermediary to the current leadership of CDN and other criminal associates.”
Treviño’s faction of the Zetas morphed into the CDN over the last decade. Treviño is now in U.S. custody, having been transferred to the United States along with his brother and 27 other cartel figures in February 2025.
Treasury said that Ramos, Islas and Penilla as well as Casino Centenario in Nuevo Laredo and Diamante Casino in Tampico are “involved in a money laundering and cash smuggling enterprise” operated by CDN.
It also said that “the three individuals designated today play central roles in advancing CDN’s criminal dominance over the Nuevo Laredo plaza in Tamaulipas, Mexico, supporting the cartel’s broader illicit operations, which include fentanyl trafficking, human smuggling, money laundering, and extortion.”
Treasury’s sanctions freeze all U.S.-based assets of the designated individuals and casinos and ban any U.S. person or business from transacting with them, effectively cutting them off from the U.S. financial system.
1 of the designated casinos is just 2 miles from the Mexico-US border
Treasury said that Casino Centenario in Nuevo Laredo is “located just two miles [3.2 km] from the U.S. border.”
The casino is “utilized by CDN as a stash house for fentanyl pills and cocaine, as well as a vehicle to launder illicit proceeds and integrate them into the legitimate financial system through its gaming operations,” Treasury said.
“CDN also uses the backrooms of Casino Centenario to torture and intimidate alleged enemies of the cartel. Many CDN members also frequent Casino Centenario,” the department said.
Treasury said that the same entity that operates Casino Centenario — a company known as CAMSA — “also operates Diamante Casino, which has a location in Tampico, Tamaulipas and a gambling website with the same name.” The company is also subject to the sanctions.
Treasury said that “CDN is primarily based in the Mexican states of Tamaulipas, Coahuila, and Nuevo Leon” and for a period of “decades” has been involved in drug trafficking.
“CDN is involved in violent criminal activity on both sides of the border, including the kidnapping and killing of individuals that threaten their criminal enterprise on the southern border,” it said.
