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Prosecutors say a former DEA financial operations chief used his expertise in a rogue effort for personal gain, agreeing in a federal sting to assist what he believed was a cartel. This installment of Crossings in Wartime examines what happens when the people who know how the machine works decide to run it in reverse.
by Susan Katz Keating
The hotel meeting room in Tampa was where it all became real. Outside, along the retention ponds, alligators lay in the sun, barely moving, part of the landscape. Inside, Paul Campo — 25-year veteran of the Drug Enforcement Administration, former deputy chief of the agency’s worldwide financial operations — sat across from an official from the Jalisco New Generation Cartel. Or so he thought. The 61-year old Campo had met him two weeks earlier in Manhattan, where they discussed how money moves when no one is supposed to see it move.
In war and in peace, systems rely on controlled crossings: checkpoints, handlers, vetted intermediaries. When one of those breaks down, the system does not collapse all at once. It leaks. Campo is not simply the subject of a corruption case. He is a visible seam in a larger fabric of movement and vulnerability, where those with insider knowledge begin to move in directions it was designed to stop.
READ MORE: Crossings in Wartime: A Soldier of Fortune Investigative Project
Earlier in Manhattan, Campo had met the “official,” known as CS-1, and laid out his credentials and established that he had much to offer. Now, in Tampa, the conversation turned to numbers.
Campo and his associate Robert Sensi agreed to launder up to $12 million in cartel proceeds, beginning with a $200,000 transaction routed through Charlotte, North Carolina. They discussed fees, timelines, and structure. Campo suggested a diversion to keep the heat off their operation. According to federal documents, he said the cartel should create the perception that fentanyl operations were shifting from Mexico to Colombia in order to draw DEA attention away from where the activity actually remained.
But the man across the table was not a cartel operative. He was “CS-1,” a confidential source working under federal direction, and he was recording every word. Campo and Sensi believed they were entering into a working relationship. In reality, they were stepping into a controlled case that had already begun to close around them. The trap had been baited in New York and set in Tampa. Campo and Sensi just didn’t know it yet.
The Fall of the Money Man
On December 5, 2025, an indictment unsealed in federal court in Manhattan made that reality public. Campo — once a central figure in financial counter-narcotics enforcement — had been arrested and charged with conspiring to serve the same organization he spent decades trying to dismantle. The charges include narco-terrorism conspiracy, conspiracy to distribute narcotics, conspiracy to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization, and conspiracy to commit money laundering. Sensi, 75, of Boca Raton, Florida, faces identical charges.
Prosecutors allege the two men agreed to launder $12 million in cartel proceeds and successfully moved $750,000 through a series of transactions, converting bulk cash into cryptocurrency while relying on Campo’s knowledge of how federal investigations detect illicit financial activity. The scale alone places the case among the most serious corruption allegations in the history of the agency.
Who Is Paul Campo?
Campo joined the DEA in the early 1990s in New York, working narcotics investigations in one of the most active enforcement environments in the country. Over the next 25 years he rose through the ranks, eventually becoming Deputy Chief of the Office of Financial Operations. In that role, he oversaw efforts to track cartel money, identify laundering networks, and coordinate with financial institutions to disrupt the financial infrastructure behind narcotics trafficking.
After retiring in 2016, Campo moved into private consulting, founding a firm focused on financial compliance and anti-money laundering work. He reportedly retained security clearances and maintained professional relationships developed during his time in government.
Who Is Robert Sensi?
Robert Sensi followed a different trajectory that intersected with the same edges of institutional authority. His documented interactions with U.S. intelligence date back to the 1980s, and his record includes a federal conviction tied to theft involving Kuwait Airways funds. He later appeared in an SEC complaint connected to a Hong Kong-based fraud scheme, where he was described as managing regulatory issues across multiple countries. He filed for bankruptcy in Florida in 2023.
Sensi’s role in the case was to make the connection. According to prosecutors, he approached the confidential source in late 2024 and offered access to someone who understood the internal mechanics of DEA financial investigations. The pitch was based on an existing relationship. Sensi’s son was employed at Campo’s firm, handling the South American division.
How the Sting Unfolded
The first face-to-face meeting between Campo, Sensi, and the confidential source took place on March 10, 2025, at a restaurant in Manhattan. When the source asked how he could be sure Campo wouldn’t arrest him, Campo noted he had been retired for years and was now in the consulting business. Then he showed the source his DEA retirement badge.
The Tampa meeting two weeks later was where the scheme hardened into a plan. The agreed figure was $12 million total. The first transaction would be $200,000, picked up in Charlotte. Campo and Sensi would take an 8% fee. Campo proposed using the proceeds to invest in real estate and other vehicles to preserve the assets and generate a return for the cartel.
On June 3, 2025, Sensi met the confidential source in Charlotte and took delivery of $200,000 in cash. It was DEA funds, but Sensi believed it was cartel money.
As they parted, the source said to Sensi: “Welcome to the fucking cartel.”
Campo and Sensi converted the cash into cryptocurrency and returned approximately $187,000 to a wallet they believed belonged to CJNG. It was controlled by the DEA.
On July 16, the three met again at a Manhattan restaurant, where they discussed laundering an additional $12 million.
On September 23, Sensi met the source again in Charlotte for a second cash pickup, for $300,000. He placed the money in a black backpack and met Campo and other co-conspirators at a hotel to concert it to cryptocurrency. The currency went to a wallet the men believed belonged to CJNG. It was controlled by DEA.
The source then met Sensi in Boca Raton and offered the two men a chance to participate in a cocaine deal: 220 kilograms, valued at roughly $5 million, coming into the United States. Campo and Sensi would convert $250,000 in cash to cryptocurrency and send it to the cocaine’s owner as payment. In return they would receive 30% of the proceeds — approximately $1.5 million — plus a 10% conversion fee.
On October 16 and 17, Sensi collected $250,000 in cash in Manhattan. Campo, Sensi, and co-conspirators sent approximately $225,000 in cryptocurrency to a wallet they believed was controlled by the cocaine’s owner. It was controlled by the Internal Revenue Service. There was no cocaine. The money went to the IRS. The trap had closed.
Drones, Explosives, and Fentanyl
The indictment shows that the plan evolved to include weapons. During their meetings with the confidential source, Campo and Sensi agreed to explore procuring an arsenal for the CJNG. This would include AR-15 semi-automatic rifles, M4 carbines, M16 rifles, grenade launchers, and rocket-propelled grenades. They discussed using weaponized drones.
The source explained the tactic directly. They would attach explosives, send the drone, and detonate the payload. The source asked Sensi how much C-4 explosive the drones could carry. Sensi estimated approximately six kilograms; enough, he said, to “blow up the whole fucking…” and then stopped himself.
What This Means
The CJNG — Cartel de Jalisco Nueva Generación — is not your grandfather’s drug cartel. Formed around 2011 from the remnants of the Milenio Cartel, it has grown into one of the most powerful and violent criminal organizations on the planet. Designated a foreign terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department, the group operates in dozens of countries, uses military-grade weaponry, and runs a franchise-based command structure that allows it to expand while leadership collects a percentage from semi-independent cells.
It is led by Nemesio Ruben “El Mencho” Oseguera-Cervantes. He is one of the most wanted fugitives in Mexico, and has a U.S.-issued $15 million bounty for his arrest. His CJNG illicitly transports cocaine, methamphetamine, fentanyl, and other controlled substances into the United States.
On February 20, 2025, the United States Secretary of State designated CJNG as a Foreign Terrorist Organization under Section 219 of the Immigration and Nationality Act.
What Comes Next
Campo and Sensi were arrested in New York on December 4, 2025. They were ordered held without bail. The narco-terrorism count alone carries a mandatory minimum of 20 years, with maximums of life on both the narco-terrorism and narcotics distribution charges.
Investigators surely are working to determine what, if any, operational intelligence Campo may have shared before his arrest. He understood the system. That kind of knowledge is not static. It travels with the individual.
In conflict zones and systems under pressure, similar transfers occur when insiders move knowledge across boundaries that are supposed to hold. When one of those points fails, the movement does not stop. It redirects.
Campo did not just cross that line. He became part of the way it was crossed.
Crossings in Wartime tracks what moves through the seams of systems under pressure. In every previous installment of this series, the crossing was a place. A border. A checkpoint. A zone where oversight went dark. Paul Campo is the first crossing who could shake your hand.
Susan Katz Keating is the publisher and editor in chief at Soldier of Fortune.
