The Fiscalía General de la República stated that it holds robust evidentiary data linking former Baja California governor Ernesto Ruffo Appel to the strategic direction and administrative control of Ingemar, a marine services firm at the center of an illegal fuel smuggling scheme known as fiscal huachicol.
The Specialized Fiscalía Especializada en materia de Delincuencia Organizada detailed that its ongoing investigation integrates comprehensive forensic expert opinions, witness interviews, procedural diligence, and detailed financial analysis. These investigative steps tie Ruffo Appel directly to Ingemar as an active shareholder and secretary of the administrative board. The institution headed by Ernestina Godoy Ramos emphasized how the probe uncovered an elaborate logistics ring utilizing railway tank cars—known as ferrotanques—to move foreign fuel under fraudulent customs declarations.
The firm, while officially tied to port services, dredging, and maritime operations, exhibited severe financial anomalies. Investigators flagged multi-million-peso movements in national bank accounts that bore no logical relation to the company’s declared fiscal profile. The state’s case centers on an intricate pattern of financial routing, where domestic accounts received capital and quickly transferred it abroad through bridge accounts designed to mask illicit trade.
Conflicting Accounts of Corporate Governance and Import Volumes
Key admissions were made by Ruffo Appel during media appearances following his departure from the El Altiplano maximum-security prison on September 28, 2026. The former governor acknowledged ownership of 49 percent of Ingemar’s shares while speaking in a live interview with journalist Carmen Aristegui. He also admitted to being aware, at least since 2024, that transport trucks and rail cars holding between 30 mil and 112 mil liters of hydrocarbons were routinely cleared through customs using pedimentos declaring a mere 10 mil liters.
While the Fiscalía maintains that Ruffo Appel actively orchestrated these operations to drive tax evasion, the former governor’s legal representation and public statements present a starkly different narrative. Ruffo Appel attributed operational management and customs procedures entirely to the general management and his business partner, José Merino Valdés Cuervo. Furthermore, his defense attorney, Arturo Germán Rangel, asserted in late September that his client’s capital stake ranges between 39 and 40 percent, maintaining that the former official held no physical office inside the company and played no role in daily executive decisions.
Ruffo Appel claimed that the commercializing firm Crismón—implicated in filing the restricted import volumes—was selected from a registry of five companies provided by the Secretaría de Energía during the administration of former President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
Financial Scale of the Fiscal Huachicol Operation
The federal government’s broader crackdown on cross-border fuel smuggling initially came to light when authorities secured more than 15 million liters of diesel, gasoline, and petroleum distillates across 129 carrotanques in Coahuila. Investigators calculated that fiscal evasion under the Impuesto Especial sobre Producción y Servicios reached 88 millones 511 mil 516 pesos, alongside an additional 18 millones 289 mil 304 pesos in unpaid Value Added Tax.
The operation exploited structural loopholes in customs declarations, systematically underreporting heavy cargo volumes to bypass federal duties. The FGR maintains that these illicit imports originated directly from the United States, generating outsized profit margins through undeclared domestic distribution.
Judicial Status and Upcoming Legal Proceedings
Having spent 72 days in preventive detention at the El Altiplano federal prison in Almoloya de Juárez following his July 16, 2026 arrest, Ruffo Appel transitioned to home confinement in Ensenada on September 26, 2026. Criminal proceedings remain fully active before the competent judicial authority.
The court will determine the final legal outcome based strictly on the evidentiary data formally introduced and debated during the ongoing judicial hearings. Under Article 218 of the National Code of Criminal Procedures, the investigative registry remains under formal confidentiality rules, while the constitutional presumption of innocence under Article 20 protects the accused until a definitive judicial sentence is handed down.
