Miami-Dade widower worked for drug traffickers for years before his wife was killed, records show

MIAMI – A widower who co-owned Miguelito Barber Shop in Miami-Dade County’s Florida City stands accused of moving cocaine and cash while working in both cocaine trafficking and money laundering for traffickers, records show. Investigators say he worked in the Orlando and Miami areas, Colombia, and his native Dominican Republic.

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Court records show both FBI and DEA agents had already identified Miguel Aguasvivas — whose 31-year-old wife Katherine Guerrero was killed in April — as a money courier who earned commissions to help launder dirty money through cryptocurrency for years.

Investigators reported Guerrero, who was born in the Dominican Republic, was supposed to pick up over $160,000 on April 11 in the Orlando area, so she drove a white 2017 Dodge Durango from deep south Miami-Dade County to Seminole County and vanished.

A witness recorded a video showing a carjacking at East Lake Drive and Tuskawilla Road. A man with a rifle jumped out of a 2002 green Acura and took Guerrero hostage. Shortly after, witnesses reported hearing gunshots and seeing smoke at a construction site in Osceola County. Firefighters found Guerrero dead in the burning Dodge Durango.

According to a court order of detention pending trial, the DEA was investigating a drug trafficking organization in Colombia earlier this year. Records show the agents linked Aguavivas to a $111,0000 drop on March 15, and drug dogs focused on cash that Aguavivas was carrying on April 4.

While detectives were searching for Guerrero’s killers, Aguasvivas met with an undercover DEA agent to negotiate 15 kilos of cocaine, and a man who said his father was a prolific drug trafficker in the Dominican Republic told a DEA undercover agent on June 5 that Aguavivas worked with him.

FBI agents had already linked Aguasvivas to a $210,860 drop on Nov. 29, 2021, to buy Tether, a Stablecoin; to a brick of cocaine on Dec. 2, 2021; to a $228,340 drop on Dec. 6, 2021; kilos of cocaine on Dec. 13; and to a $98,940 drop and a $100,000 drop on Dec. 14, 2021.

In 2022, an undercover DEA agent reported coordinating a cash drop, and the DEA seized nearly $273,245 and two firearms from Aguavivas’s car. The grand jury indictment against Aguavivas for money laundering was filed on Oct. 16 and a judge issued an order of detention on Oct. 28.

Seminole County Sheriff’s Office deputies investigated the carjacking and kidnapping, and Osceola County deputies investigated the homicide. There was a related homicide in Orange County.

There were six arrests related to the cases. U.S. Marshals Services arrested Jordanish Torres, a suspect, on an unrelated charge on April 19. Detectives also arrested Dereck Rodriguez, Giovany Crespo, and Kevin Ocasio.

Homeland Security investigators sent a package with cocaine to Crespo in Osceola County and his live-in girlfriend Monicsabel Romero Soto accepted it. She was arrested on a cocaine trafficking charge.

Detectives also linked the crimes to the April 10 murder of Juan Luis Cintron-Garcia, a 39-year-old father who worked as a tow truck driver, in Orange County’s Taft neighborhood. He had towed the kidnappers’ Acura on March 19, police said. Detectives reported both crime scenes had the same type of 10 mm shell casings.

Orange County Sheriff’s Office Deputy Francisco Estrella was arrested on April 14 after he used his law enforcement privileges to get information about Guerra’s murder investigation to Aguasvivas, deputies said. It was allegedly a personal favor since Estrella’s wife was Aguavivas’s childhood friend.

On Friday, Aguavivas, who is also known as Miguel Angel Aguasvivas Lizardo, was facing a federal grand jury charge of conspiracy to engage in money laundering. Guerrero was also known as Katherine Altagracia Guerrero De Aguasvivas. She did not have a criminal record and was a mother.