Apr.02, 2010, Source: ASSOCIATED PRESS

Sixteen people have been indicted on charges of laundering at least $7 million in drug-trafficking profits by smuggling bundles of cash in luggage on commercial flights from Puerto Rico to Miami and elsewhere, federal authorities said Wednesday.

Arrests were made in Florida, Puerto Rico and New York, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials. Most of the suspects were indicted on money-laundering conspiracy charges, which carry a maximum 20-year sentence.

An ICE affidavit filed in court charges that Herman Solorzano, 58, and his son, also named Herman, routinely smuggled about $100,000 at a time on the flights so that all the money would not be seized if they were caught. When ICE agents arrested Solorzano at his Miami-area home earlier this month, they found suitcases containing more than $447,000 in cash, according to the affidavit.

Anthony Mangione, special agent in charge of ICE's Miami office, said the drug profits were funneled through black-market currency exchanges in Latin America. These are commonly used by traffickers to launder money by exchanging drug-tainted dollars for other currency using brokers in the United States. In this case, the exchanges used Venezuela's bolivar.

Solorzano and his son pleaded not guilty at a brief court hearing Wednesday in Miami, and their attorneys declined to comment further. But according to the ICE affidavit, Solorzano admitted taking part in the operation since 2003 and helped agents nab others.

One of those was Alba Villalobos, who allegedly offered to buy $51,000 in U.S.-denominated drug proceeds, using Venezuelan bolivars in exchange. An undercover ICE agent working with Solorzano offered to meet Villalobos in a Miami parking lot, where he gave her a package containing the money. She was then arrested.

Villalobos also pleaded not guilty Wednesday.