MIAMI (AP) — A longtime informant who traveled the world partying with rogue U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents avoided a prison sentence this week after admitting he failed to pay taxes on nearly $4 million he received for years of undercover work.
Andres Zapata was sentenced Wednesday in Austin, Texas, to time served after agreeing to cooperate in a decade-long investigation that has implicated several agents in misconduct, according to two people who weren’t authorized to discuss the ongoing inquiry and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
The DEA paid Zapata, a professional money launderer, $3.8 million from 2015-2020 for his work as a confidential informant, court records show. He pleaded guilty last July to a single charge of failing to report those earnings on his tax returns. Informants are required by the DEA to report such income to the IRS but are rarely prosecuted for failing to do so.
Zapata’s lawyer, Don Bailey, argued at the sentencing hearing that it was unusual for prosecutors to target someone who had risked their life helping U.S. law enforcement combat violent cartels for an offense he didn’t even know he was committing.
U.S. District Judge David Ezra described Zapata at the hearing as having been “very cooperative” with the government and ordered him to pay $1.2 million in restitution. Internal DEA records revealed that Zapata had been an informant since 1998, earning over $4.6 million from the agency.
However, behind his cooperation lay tales of extravagance, as he reportedly took part in lavish escapades with DEA agents, raising serious questions about the ethics of their collaboration.
