The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit affirmed the conviction and lengthy prison sentence of Christopher Texidor, who orchestrated a major drug trafficking operation that shipped nearly 3,000 kilograms of marijuana from California to Pennsylvania through the U.S. Postal Service.
In an opinion issued Jan. 8, 2026, Circuit Judge Chung writing for a three-judge panel rejected all of Texidor's appeals challenging his 24-year sentence. The court upheld both his 292-month sentence for drug and firearm offenses and a concurrent 240-month sentence for wire fraud.
Texidor, who used the alias "Fats," was convicted after a six-day trial on multiple drug and firearm charges. He separately pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud in a related case. The convictions stemmed from his leadership role in a sophisticated drug trafficking organization that operated between 2020 and his arrest.
According to court documents, Texidor and five co-defendants were indicted Nov. 4, 2020, on charges related to their roles in the drug trafficking conspiracy. The organization used Texidor's legitimate business, Fastlane Auto Sales, LLC, as a front operation to conceal their illegal activities. Texidor's residence served as the physical headquarters for coordinating the drug shipments.
Federal investigators built their case through intercepted phone calls that captured extensive communications between Texidor and various participants in the scheme. The recorded conversations documented Texidor's communications with family members and friends whom he had recruited to receive drug parcels, his direct dealings with customers purchasing marijuana, and his coordination with other co-conspirators regarding logistics of drop-offs, pickups, sales, debts, and payments.
The scale of the operation was substantial, involving the trafficking of nearly 3,000 kilograms of marijuana across state lines. The organization's use of the U.S. Postal Service to ship drugs demonstrates the sophisticated nature of their distribution network and their efforts to avoid detection by law enforcement.
On appeal, Texidor raised four main challenges to his conviction and sentence. First, he argued that the district court abused its discretion by failing to strike certain portions of his Presentence Investigation Report. Second, he contended that the court committed clear error by applying a four-level leadership enhancement when calculating his advisory sentencing range under the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines.
Texidor also challenged the length of his sentences, arguing that the district court abused its discretion by imposing the 292-month aggregate sentence for his drug conspiracy conviction and the concurrent 240-month sentence for his wire fraud conviction.
The Third Circuit panel, which included Circuit Judges Porter, Freeman, and Chung, heard oral arguments in the case Oct. 22, 2025. After reviewing Texidor's arguments, the court found no merit in any of his challenges and affirmed the district court's rulings across the board.
The leadership enhancement that Texidor challenged reflects the federal sentencing system's approach to holding organizers of criminal enterprises more accountable than lower-level participants. Under the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines, defendants who play leadership roles in criminal organizations face increased penalties that can add years to their prison terms.
The case was prosecuted in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, where Judge Jennifer P. Wilson presided over the proceedings. The district court's handling of both the drug conspiracy case and the separate wire fraud case demonstrates the comprehensive approach federal prosecutors take when addressing complex criminal enterprises that span multiple types of offenses.
The affirmance by the Third Circuit sends a strong message about the serious consequences facing those who organize and lead large-scale drug trafficking operations. The court's rejection of all of Texidor's arguments suggests that the district court carefully followed proper legal procedures in both the conviction and sentencing phases.
This case illustrates several important aspects of federal drug prosecution, including the government's ability to use wiretap evidence to build cases against drug trafficking organizations, the enhanced penalties available for leadership roles in criminal enterprises, and the coordination between different federal charges when defendants engage in multiple types of criminal activity.
The decision also highlights the challenges defendants face when appealing federal drug convictions, particularly when the government has built a strong evidentiary record through electronic surveillance and the defendants played central organizational roles in the criminal activity.
Texidor's case demonstrates the federal justice system's commitment to pursuing lengthy sentences for those who organize and profit from large-scale drug trafficking operations, especially when those operations involve the use of legitimate businesses as covers and the recruitment of family members and associates to facilitate the criminal enterprise.