Jun.29, 2010, 11:06pm

Pelaez and Juan Lazaro were detained on Sunday night and charged with conspiracy and money laundering on Monday in a New York federal court. According to court documents, Pelaez and Lazaro traveled several times to an unnamed South American country from where they sent encrypted messages to their handlers and received money. Pelaez is currently an editor at the Spanish-language newspaper El Diario/La Prensa in New York. Her colleagues said they were surprised by the charges and her son called the arrests politically motivated. Both Pelaez and Lazaro have lived in the country for 20 years and are citizens. They are facing sentences ranging from 5 to 20 years if found guilty.