- The New York Times reveals that “El Cangrejo” supported an organization that stole boats in Florida to take Cuban migrants to the US
- Baseball players Yasiel Puig and Adeiny Hechavarría, along with thousands of other Mexicans, were taken off the island via Quintana Roo.
14ymedio, Havana, August 11, 2026 / Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro, known as El Cangrejo (The Crab) and grandson of Raúl Castro, appears to be part of the Cuban Mafia network in Quintana Roo, in southeastern Mexico. His name was mentioned by José Miguel González Vidal, a member of the organization who in 2023 was sentenced to 25 years in prison in the United States.
The link was published this Tuesday in The New York Times, which notes in an extensive account that the interlocutor and key figure in the negotiations with Washington in the dialogue that both countries have opened has not been accused as part of the plot.
González Vidal, 38, one of at least six members of the mafia who pleaded guilty in the United States, reported that he gifted a boat to Raúl Castro’s grandson, along with a Rolex watch, a Suzuki motorcycle, and Louis Vuitton clothing. According to court records, the gifts were given in exchange for allowing goods purchased by the network in Mexico with stolen credit cards to pass through Cuban customs.
The Cuban government called the accusations involving Rodríguez Castro “slander,” and El Cangrejo did not respond to requests for comment, according to the New York newspaper.
The Cuban government described the accusations involving Rodríguez Castro as “slander.”
The claim that a boat was handed to Raúl Castro’s grandson is significant because of the role that boats and other stolen goods played in the activities attributed to the Cuban Mafia in Quintana Roo.
David Bolton, a veteran private investigator quoted by the newspaper, described the group as “the true pirates of the Caribbean” and “ruthless killers.” The organization was primarily dedicated to trafficking thousands of migrants from Cuba to Mexico and, ultimately, to the United States. To do this, the Times reported, the mafia stole luxury boats and nautical equipment “for years,” at least since 2009, in cities across southwest Florida, from Sarasota to Naples and Marco Island.
Through Operation Sisyphus, a special unit of the FBI and the Office of Investigations of Homeland Security, after more than 10 years of investigation, the U.S. Department of Justice was able to link the thefts to human trafficking from the island. In 2020, it filed charges against several Cubans residing in Mexico for smuggling thousands of migrants out of Cuba.
According to prosecutors, they charged around $10,000 for the transfer. Those who couldn’t pay were held captive in Mexico and were “tortured with stun guns, and their families were extorted.” According to court documents, some women were forced to work in strip clubs, the US media outlet reports.
According to court documents, some women were forced to work in strip clubs, the US media outlet reports.
“We used physical punishment,” one of the traffickers, Reynaldo Crespo Márquez, testified in 2023, after pleading guilty in a U.S. federal court in Miami. “Sometimes we beat them with a wooden board or a Taser gun,” he confessed.
According to the Department of Justice, members of the criminal organization contacted the victims’ families and threatened to torture, starve, and kill them if the families refused to pay. Those who did pay were sent by bus to the U.S.-Mexico border and instructed on how to apply for asylum.
Authorities were able to document that around 25 people died during the journeys.
Among the migrants smuggled were professional baseball players, including shortstop Adeiny Hechavarría, who played for several teams in the Major Leagues from 2012 to 2020, and Los Angeles Dodgers slugger Yasiel Puig.
Another area exploited by the Cuban Mafia was the purchase of goods with stolen credit cards to smuggle them into Cuba.
Another area exploited by the Cuban Mafia was the purchase of goods with stolen credit cards to smuggle them into Cuba – a task in which the presence of El Cangrejo was vital – and sell them in Cuban government stores.
Some members of the organization also trafficked boats, cars, and trucks. Some were used as bribes, as noted in the case of Raúl Castro’s grandson, or sold to pay off foreign officials, according to the documents.
The group suffered its latest blow in April, when a key financier of the Quintana Roo cartel was arrested. Remigio Valdez Lao, 59, known as El Milo, was a “priority target” and was wanted for extradition to the United States on charges of human trafficking and organized crime, according to Mexico’s Secretariat of Security and Citizen Protection.
According to the Mexican government report, El Milo was located when security agents were conducting patrols in the Residencial Arbolada subdivision of the municipality of Benito Juárez, on the Caribbean coast. Along with Valdez Lao was Joseline García Biscaino, an alleged member of the same group, from whom 38 doses of marijuana and a pickup truck were seized.
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