Jersey woman on trial accused of laundering son's drug money

It has been reported that a 55-year-old woman is standing trial in Jersey's Royal Court accused of letting her son channel almost £40,000 in drug-trafficking proceeds through her bank account.

• Mariela Josefina Gomez Marquez denies a single charge of money laundering and
• Maintains she didn't know where the money came from and treated it as none of her business.

The Crown's response:

• Suspicion alone is enough to establish liability for money laundering, and wilful blindness isn't a defence.

Prosecutors allege her son, Javier Gomez, generated the cash through a significant cocaine-trafficking operation uncovered by Customs as part of "Operation Mink" an investigation that led to the seizure of commercial quantities of the drug, some of it hidden inside battery-charging devices smuggled through customs.

Three others, including Gomez himself, have already been convicted over the operation, with Gomez described by the Crown as playing a leading role.

Crown Advocate Matthew Maletroit told the two Jurats hearing the case that when Barclays capped Gomez's cash deposits at £20,000 a year in July 2024, his mother's HSBC account became the workaround.

Bank records shown to the court allegedly reveal a pattern of frequent same-day cash deposits followed by transfers to her son on one occasion in October 2024,

• Four deposits within minutes of each other totalling £1,760,
• Followed by a £1,700 transfer to Gomez.

The prosecution laid out a year-by-year escalation:

• 34 deposits worth £2,325 in 2023, rising to 99 deposits worth £21,660 in 2024 (more than her stated income), and
• 43 deposits worth £15,460 in the months before her account was frozen in April 2025.
• Transfers to her son totalled
• £17,250 in 2024 and
• £11,550 in the partial 2025 period.

The Crown also pointed to payments made to a company called Venworld, which the defendant said she used to send money to Venezuela, but which prosecutors characterised as a reward for turning a blind eye to her son's activities.

Advocate Maletroit noted she was a waitress with limited income and existing debts, which he argued made the pattern of deposits more suspicious, and alleged she used deposit machines specifically to avoid explaining the cash to bank staff.

Gomez Marquez maintains she didn't know where the money came from and treated it as none of her business.

The Crown's response:

• Suspicion alone is enough to establish liability for money laundering, and wilful blindness isn't a defence.

Commissioner Patricia Lees is presiding, sitting with Jurats Le Heuzé and Opfermann.

The trial continues.

Source:

Jersey Evening Post, reporting by Megan Davies  app.jerseyeveningpost.com

By Megan Davies megan@allisland.media https://app.jerseyeveningpost.com/woman-accused-of-helping-son-launder-tainted-money/content.html

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