DANVILLE, Va. – A Henry County restaurant owner with ties to Pittsylvania County has been sentenced for laundering millions of dollars for a Mexican drug cartel.

Ana Bella Sanchez-Rios was sentenced to 96 months in federal prison for using her business in Martinsville to launder more than $4.3 million in profits for an international drug cartel.

Prosecutors say Sanchez-Rios laundered the funds for the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, a Mexican-based criminal organization considered by the Department of Justice to be one of the most dangerous transnational organizations in the world.

Sanchez-Rio, 48, owned and operated Bella’s Tortilla & Meat Market. She was one of 13 Axton area residents named in federal indictments returned in 2019.

In June 2020, Sanchez-Rios pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit money laundering and operating a business that transmitted criminally derived funds. She was sentenced last week.