The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) on Wednesday imposed sanctions on Jimena Romina Araya Navarro, a Venezuelan actress linked to the Tren de Aragua (TdA) terrorist organization.
OFAC accused Araya, who goes by the stage name “Rosita,” of being part of an entertainment industry network providing material support to TdA. The actress is believed to be romantically linked with TdA’s leader Héctor “The Child” Guerrero and has had past relationships with other notorious Venezuelan criminals who have died in gruesome ways.
“Under President Trump, barbaric terrorist cartels can no longer operate with impunity across our borders. The Tren de Aragua network’s narcotrafficking and human smuggling operations have long posed a grave threat to our nation,” Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent said. “At the direction of President Trump, we will continue to use every tool to cut off these terrorists from the U.S. and global financial system and keep American citizens safe.”
Araya is a 42 year-old Venezuelan actress, model, and DJ that first launched her career as a model in the early 2000s before working in Venezuelan telenovelas and eventually landing a role in Telemundo’s El Cuerpo del Deseo (“The Body of Desire”) in 2005.
Araya also starred in Venevision’s Cheverísimo and A qué te ríes comedy shows, which often involved raunchy situations. She maintains an active presence on Instagram with over 3.5 million followers.
The actress first gained local infamy in Venezuela in 2012 after authorities accused her of having allegedly helped TdA leader Guerrero escape from Venezuela’s Tocorón prison. The Venezuelan newspaper El Nacional noted on Wednesday that Araya was released after posting bail at the time, “but her public image was damaged,” affecting her television career, which led her to launch a DJ career in 2017.
Guerrero was eventually recaptured in 2013 and sent back to Tocorón — a prison that Tren de Aragua eventually transformed into its headquarters and retrofitted with numerous amenities such as its own zoo, baseball field, bars, a casino, a nightclub, a bank, a pool, a cryptocurrency farm, and playgrounds.
Guerrero’s whereabouts remain unknown since Venezuela’s socialist regime “raided” Tocorón in September 2023 and emptied the prison. The United States has an active $5 million bounty out for information leading to Guerrero’s arrest.
“Rosita performs as a DJ in various nightclubs around Colombia. A portion of the revenue generated during her performances and events is remitted to TdA leadership,” OFAC detailed. “Specifically, Rosita has performed in the Bogota nightclub Maiquetia VIP Bar Restaurant, which is owned by her former bodyguard and manager, Eryk Manuel Landaeta Hernandez (a.k.a. “Eryk”). Additionally, Rosita is a shareholder and the president of a Venezuela-based company, Global Import Solutions S.A.”
Colombian law enforcement officials arrested Landaeta in Bogotá in October 2024, accusing him of being one of Tren de Aragua’s top financial leaders and the leader of the terrorist group’s Colombian faction. According to Colombian authorities, Landaeta used his front man facade as organizer of “parties with international DJs” to manage the Tren de Aragua’s high-value criminal finances in Colombia.
“He [Landaeta] organized events featuring international artists and DJs, including Rosita. These parties were used to sell narcotics for TdA; the proceeds of the drug sales were then laundered,” OFAC detailed. “Specifically, Eryk is known to have laundered money for Niño Guerrero and sanctioned senior TdA leader Mosquera Serrano.”
In addition to her presumptive romantic links with Tren de Aragua’s Guerrero, Araya is infamous in Venezuela for her past relationships with at least two high profile criminals, both of whom died in violent circumstances.
Araya reportedly had a relationship with Tren de Aragua leader Carlos Rafael Galíndez, also known as “Carlos Breaker,” whose body was found dismembered on a Caracas highway in 2015. She also had a relationship with Venezuelan ex-convict and artist Luidig “Dead Face” Ochoa, who was shot and killed in 2014 when someone tried to steal his motorcycle.
According to local outlets, Ochoa first engaged in criminal activities at the age of 14 and served time in a Caracas prison before being arrested again and sent to Tocorón on drug trafficking charges. Although Venezuelan outlets do not identify Ochoa as a member of Tren de Aragua, he climbed the ranks of Venezuela’s pranato prison fiefdom system during his stay in Tocorón, reaching the rank of Lucero — second only to the topmost position, the Pran.
Her known relationships with three notorious criminals in the early 2010s led to Venezuelan entertainment outlets awarding Araya with the title of “The Black Widow of Aragua” in 2015.
The Mexican Finance Secretariat stated on Wednesday that a “Venezuelan public figure linked to the entertainment industry, who has recently been present in Mexico and has registered financial activity in the country” is among those sanctioned by OFAC on Wednesday, presumptively referring to Araya.
The Secretariat announced that its Financial Intelligence Unit (UIF) is coordinating with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) to locate the individual in national territory and, if applicable, proceed to add them to the List of Blocked Persons, file the corresponding complaint with the Public Prosecutor’s Office, and issue alerts to the financial sector regarding them and the rest of the identified targets.
Christian K. Caruzo is a Venezuelan writer and documents life under socialism. You can follow him on Twitter here.
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