Over the past five years, the son of the former Rector of the Autonomous University of Sinaloa, Héctor Melesio Cuén Ojeda, has purchased properties, mostly commercial premises or luxury apartments, in developing areas in Mazatlán and Guasave.
An investigation by Noroeste in the Public Property Registry and physical locations in Guasave and Mazatlán revealed that Héctor Melesio Cuén Díaz, on behalf of his company Beisbox and his wife Belinda Portugal, made property transactions exceeding 33.1 million pesos between 2018 and 2023. When these purchases began, Cuén Díaz was still an official at UAS under the Rectorship of Juan Eulogio Guerra Liera.
In his last asset declaration available on the National Transparency Platform, dated May 2022, Cuén Díaz declares owning only one property: a house for which he does not report value or characteristics and which he would have acquired in cash.
Cuén Díaz, son of the now “PRI member” Héctor Melesio Cuén Ojeda, faces half a dozen legal processes along with the current Rector separated from his position, Jesús Madueña Molina, and other former UAS officials, accused of crimes related to corruption.
Moreover, the accusations are focused against Cuén Díaz, who until last year held the highest position in the UAS’s Asset and Inventory Control Department and was responsible for negotiating, endorsing, and signing the operations for which the former university officials now face these legal processes.
Even after his resignation and amid the processes, he closed the year 2023 with the acquisition of a commercial premise in the City Plaza Culiacán Building, located on Enrique Sánchez Alonso Boulevard, in the Tres Ríos Urban Development.
The purchase was made with a bank transfer for one million 60 thousand pesos, on December 26, 2023, as recorded in the purchase agreement.
Cuén Díaz resigned in May 2023 from his university management position, amid an investigation by the Sinaloa Asset and Economic Intelligence Unit, which has been ongoing since April against him and his father on suspicions of unexplained enrichment.
Cuén Ojeda, the founding leader of the Sinaloense Party in 2012, is today a plurinominal candidate for a federal deputy position in the fifth spot of the constituency that includes Sinaloa, propelled not by the PAS but by the Institutional Revolutionary Party, both institutions in alliance with the so-called Broad Front, Strength and Heart for Mexico in Sinaloa.
Judicial processes began after Noroeste published evidence of irregular operations from the University, such as overpriced purchases for 634 million pesos, to networks of companies related to each other, relatives of the Cuéns, and even active officials of the UAS; as well as to companies without formal addresses, offices, or visible identification.
Furthermore, on April 28, a group of citizens filed complaints against Cuén Ojeda and Cuén Díaz, accusing them of irregular performance as UAS officials.
In recent years, Noroeste has published journalistic investigations that revealed how the family of the former Rector has already accumulated more than 100 million pesos in the purchase of over 79 properties, whose operations have been carried out by the entire family, but mostly through Cuén Díaz and his wife Belinda Portugal.
After his resignation as a UAS official, Cuén Díaz began to collect his debts and make real estate investments.
According to the Public Property Registry, there are deeds of transfer for debts from other companies in favor of Beisbox and Cuén Díaz, for 14 million pesos in three different operations: two in Mazatlán and one in Culiacán.
The operations involving the most money was in Mazatlán, where in 2019, Cuén Díaz, with his company Beisbox, contributed two plots of land located on Avenida del Mar, in the coastal area, for the execution of a project, and in exchange received eight apartments.
At Beisbox, José Fausto Centeno Félix serves as commissioner, an active employee of the UAS who is paid as a “C” Director in Assets and Inventories, as recorded in the act available in the Public Registry of Commerce.
Deed 132 by notary María Amparo Verdugo Ochoa, dated September 19, 2023, details that the deal did not go as expected due to the Covid 19 pandemic in Sinaloa.
Since SYC Desarrollos has not been able to complete the building and could not pay the 24 million pesos agreed upon for the contribution and development of the project, it was agreed that Beisbox would receive an apartment in Marina Platino Plus condominiums, in Marina Mazatlán, for 3.6 million pesos as partial payment of the debt.
The other case, also dated December 19, 2023, is for the same situation; according to deed 134 from the same notary 296, Beisbox received a penthouse in the La Ventanna condominium development, also in Mazatlán, for 6 million 671 thousand pesos, which was also credited to settle the debt.
And the third operation was also recorded on September 19, 2023, through which Cuén Díaz acquired another commercial property in Culiacán, through another transfer of debt by SYC Desarrollos.
It is a commercial premise in the City Plaza Culiacán building, located on Enrique Sánchez Alonso Boulevard, in an area undergoing commercial development. This last operation was for 3.8 million pesos, also as a payment towards the debt.
But Cuén Díaz’s real estate interests are not only in Mazatlán, as on February 1, 2018, Belinda Portugal closed a deal in Guasave.
According to deed 771, the family acquired eight lots or parcels of land located in an area known as ejido Guasave, a commercial development area to the west of the city, located on Juan S. Millán Boulevard.
Portugal, according to the act consulted by Noroeste, made a single transfer for 4 million 280 thousand pesos for the lots to the firm Construcciones Mocorito, whose owner and legal representative is Carlos Antonio Sosa Valencia.
In July 2010, the newspaper Reforma revealed that there were “suspicious movements” from the Tres Ríos Project in Sinaloa to benefit Constructora Inzunza, owned by Sosa Valencia.
Recently, the name of Sosa Valencia again appeared in the media, as the Financial Intelligence Unit conducted investigations for alleged activities related to money laundering, even blocking his bank accounts in 2021 and subsequently releasing them.
The lands acquired by Portugal had different prices, ranging from 410 thousand to 840 thousand pesos, and are located between the boulevard and a light traffic alley called Algodones. To this area, the people of Guasave refer to it as the “megaproject.”
Source: Noreste
