Joaquín Archivaldo Guzmán Loera (born April 4, 1957), commonly known as “El Chapo” and “JGL”, is a Mexican former drug lord and a former leader within the Sinaloa Cartel, an international crime syndicate. He is considered one of the most powerful drug traffickers in the world.
Guzmán was born in Sinaloa and grew up in a poor farming family. He suffered much physical abuse at the hands of his father, through whom he also got into the drug trade and helped him grow marijuana for local dealers during his early adulthood. Guzmán began working with Héctor Luis Palma Salazar, one of the country’s rising drug lords, in the late 1970s. He helped Salazar map out routes to transport drugs through Sinaloa to the United States. He later oversaw the logistics of Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, one of the country’s leading leaders in the mid-1980s, but Guzmán founded his own cartel in 1988 after Félix’s arrest.
Guzmán oversaw operations that involved the massive production, smuggling, and distribution of cocaine, methamphetamine, marijuana, and heroin throughout the United States and Europe, the world’s largest users. He accomplished this by pioneering the use of distribution cells and long-distance tunnels near borders, which allowed him to export more drugs to the United States than any other trafficker in history. Guzmán’s leadership of the cartel also brought enormous wealth and power; Forbes ranked him as one of the most powerful people in the world between 2009 and 2013, while the Drug Enforcement Administration estimated that he rivaled the influence and wealth of Pablo Escobar.
Guzmán was first captured in 1993 in Guatemala and subsequently extradited and sentenced to 20 years in prison in Mexico for murder and drug trafficking. He bribed several prison guards and escaped from a federal maximum-security prison in 2001. His status as a fugitive resulted in a combined reward of $8.8 million from Mexico and the US for information leading to his capture. and he was arrested in Mexico in 2014. He escaped prior to formal sentencing in 2015, through a tunnel dug by staff to his prison cell. Mexican authorities recaptured him after a gunfight in January 2016 and extradited him to the US a year later. In 2019, he was found guilty of a number of criminal charges related to his leadership of the Sinaloa Cartel, was sentenced to life imprisonment and imprisoned in ADX Florence, Colorado, United States.
Early life
Joaquín Archivaldo Guzmán Loera was born on April 4, 1957 to a poor family in the rural community of La Tuna, Badiraguato, Sinaloa, Mexico. His parents were Emilio Guzmán Bustillos and María Consuelo Loera Pérez. His paternal grandparents were Juan Guzmán and Otilia Bustillos, and his maternal grandparents were Ovidio Loera Cobret and Pomposa Pérez Uriarte. His family lived in La Tuna for generations. His father was an official rancher, like most in the area where he grew up; however, according to some sources he could also have been a gomero, a poppy farmer. He has two younger sisters named Armida and Bernarda and four younger brothers named Miguel Ángel, Aureliano, Arturo and Emilio. He had three unnamed older brothers who reportedly died of natural causes when he was very young.
Few details are known about Guzmán’s upbringing. He sold oranges as a child and dropped out of school in the third grade to work for his father, making him functionally illiterate. He was known as a prankster and enjoyed playing pranks on his friends and family when he was young. He was regularly beaten and sometimes fled to his maternal grandmother’s house to escape such treatment. However, he rebelled against his father to protect his younger siblings from abuse. It is possible that Guzmán incurred his father’s wrath for trying to avoid hitting them. His mother was his “base of emotional support.” The nearest school to his home was about 60 miles away, and in his early years he was taught by traveling teachers. The teachers stayed for a few months before moving to other areas. With few job opportunities in his hometown, he turned to poppy cultivation, a common practice among local residents. During the harvest season, Guzmán and his brothers walked through the hills of Badiraguato to cut the bud of the poppy. After the plant was stacked in kilos, his father sold the harvest to other suppliers in Culiacán and Guamúchil. He sold marijuana in commercial centers near the area while accompanied by Guzmán. His father spent most of the profits on liquor and women and often returned home penniless. Fed up with his mismanagement, Guzmán cultivated his own marijuana plantation at the age of 15 with cousins Arturo, Alfredo, Carlos and Héctor Beltrán Leyva, and supported his family with his marijuana production.
When he was a teenager, his father kicked him out of the house and he went to live with his grandfather. It was during his adolescence that Guzmán acquired the nickname “El Chapo,” Mexican slang for “shorty,” due to his 1.68 meters (5 ft 6 in) build and stocky physique. Most people in Badiraguato worked in the poppy fields of the Sierra Madre Occidental for most of their lives, but Guzmán left his hometown in search of greater opportunities through his uncle Pedro Avilés Pérez, one of the pioneers of the Mexican drug trade. human trafficking. He left Badiraguato in his twenties and joined organized crime.
Early career
During the 1980s, the most important crime syndicate in Mexico was the Guadalajara Cartel, which was led by Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo (alias “El Padrino” or “The Godfather”), Rafael Caro Quintero, Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo (alias “Don Neto “), Juan José Esparragoza Moreno (alias El Azul, “The Blue One”) and others. In the 1970s, Guzmán first worked for drug lord Héctor “El Güero” Palma by transporting drugs and monitoring their shipments by air from the Sierra Madre region to urban areas near the US–Mexico border. Since his first steps into organized crime, Guzmán was ambitious and regularly pressured his superiors to allow him to increase the share of narcotics smuggled across the border. He also advocated a violent and serious approach to business; If one of his drug shipments did not arrive on time, Guzmán would simply kill the smuggler himself by shooting him in the head. Those around him learned that it was unwise to cheat him or go with other competitors, even if they offered better prices. The leaders of the Guadalajara Cartel liked Guzmán’s business acumen and in the early 1980s introduced him to Félix Gallardo, then one of the most important drug lords in Mexico. Guzmán worked as a driver for Félix Gallardo before taking charge of logistics, where Guzmán coordinated drug shipments from Colombia to Mexico by land, air and sea. Palma ensured the deliveries arrived in the United States. Guzmán earned enough respect and went to work directly for Félix Gallardo.
During most of the late 1970s and early 1980s, Mexican drug traffickers also served as middlemen for Colombian trafficking groups, transporting cocaine across the US-Mexico border. However, Mexico remained a secondary route for the Colombians as most of the drugs trafficked by their cartels were smuggled through the Caribbean and the Florida corridor. Félix Gallardo was the leading drug lord in Mexico and friend of Juan Ramón Matta-Ballesteros, but his activities continued to be restricted by his counterparts in South America. However, in the mid-1980s, the US government increased law enforcement oversight and put pressure on the Medellín and Cali cartels by effectively reducing drug trafficking in the Caribbean corridor. Realizing that it was more profitable to transfer operations to their Mexican counterparts, the Colombian cartels gave Félix Gallardo more control over their drug shipments. This shift in power gave Mexican organized crime groups more influence over their Central American and South American counterparts. However, in the 1980s, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) conducted undercover groundwork in Mexico, where several of its agents worked as informants.
One DEA agent, Enrique Camarena Salazar, worked as an informant and became close to many top drug lords, including Félix Gallardo. In November 1984, the Mexican army – acting on intelligence information provided by Camarena – raided a large marijuana plantation owned by the Guadalajara Cartel and known as “Rancho Búfalo”. Angered by the suspected betrayal, Félix Gallardo and his men exacted revenge when they kidnapped, tortured and murdered Camarena in February 1985. Camarena’s death enraged Washington, and Mexico responded by launching a massive manhunt to arrest. those involved in the incident. Guzmán took advantage of the internal crisis to gain ground within the cartel and take over more drug trafficking operations. In 1989, Félix Gallardo was arrested; while in prison and through a number of envoys, the drug lord called for a summit conference in Acapulco, Guerrero. During the conclave, Guzmán and others discussed the future of the Mexican drug trade and agreed to divide the territories previously owned by the Guadalajara Cartel. [citation needed] The Arellano Félix brothers formed the Tijuana Cartel, which controlled the Tijuana corridor and parts of Baja California; in the state of Chihuahua, a group controlled by the Carrillo Fuentes family formed the Juárez Cartel; and the remaining faction left for Sinaloa and the Pacific coast, forming the Sinaloa Cartel under traffickers Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, Palma and Guzmán. Guzmán was specifically in charge of the Tecate, Baja California, and Mexicali and San Luis Río Colorado drug corridors, two border crossings connecting the states of Sonora and Baja California with the US states of Arizona and California.
When Félix Gallardo was arrested, Guzmán was reportedly living in Guadalajara, Jalisco for some time. However, one of his other centers of operations was in the border town of Agua Prieta, Sonora, where he more closely coordinated drug trafficking activities. Guzmán owned dozens of properties in different parts of the country. People he trusted bought the properties for him and registered them under assumed names. Most were located in residential areas and served as warehouses for drugs, weapons and cash. Guzmán also owned several ranches throughout Mexico, but most were in the states of Sinaloa, Durango, Chihuahua and Sonora, where locals working for the drug lord grew opium and marijuana. The first time Guzmán was arrested by US authorities for his involvement in organized crime was in 1987, when several protected witnesses testified in a US court that Guzmán was in fact the head of the Sinaloa cartel. An indictment in the state of Arizona alleged that Guzmán coordinated the shipment of 2,000 kg (4,400 lb) of marijuana and approximately 4,700 kg (10,400 lb) of cocaine from October 19, 1987 to May 18, 1990 and received approximately US$1.5 million. of drug proceeds sent back to his home state. Another indictment alleged that Guzmán made $100,000 for trafficking 32,000 kg (70,000 lb) of cocaine and an unspecified amount of marijuana over a three-year period. In the border areas between Tecate and San Luis Río Colorado, Guzmán ordered his men to transport most of the drugs by land, but also via a few planes. By using the so-called piecemeal strategy, in which drug traffickers kept the quantities of drugs relatively low, the risks were reduced. Guzmán also pioneered the use of sophisticated tunnels to transport drugs across the border into the United States. In addition to pioneering the tunnels, Palma and Guzmán packaged cocaine in chili pepper cans under the brand name “La Comadre” before shipping them to the US by train. In return, the drug lords were paid through large suitcases filled with millions of dollars in cash. These suitcases were flown from the US to Mexico City, where corrupt customs agents at the airport prevented the deliveries from being inspected. Large sums of that money were reportedly used as bribes for members of the Public Prosecution Service.
Tijuana Cartel Conflict: 1989-1993
When Félix Gallardo was arrested, the Tijuana corridor was turned over to the Arellano Félix brothers, Jesús Labra Áviles (alias “El Chuy”), and Javier Caro Payán (alias “El Doctor”), cousin of the former leader of the Guadalajara Cartel Rafael Caro Quintero. However, fearing a coup, Caro Payán fled to Canada and was later arrested. Guzmán and the rest of the Sinaloa Cartel leaders became angry with the Arellano Félix clan over this. In 1989, Guzmán sent Armando López (alias “El Rayo”), one of his most trusted men, to speak to the Arellano Félix clan in Tijuana. Before he had a chance to speak to them personally, López was murdered by Ramón Arellano Félix. The body was disposed of on the outskirts of the city and the Tijuana Cartel ordered an attack on the remaining members of the López family to prevent future reprisals. That same year, the Arellano Félix brothers sent Venezuelan drug trafficker Enrique Rafael Clavel Moreno to infiltrate Palma’s family and seduce his wife Guadalupe Leija Serrano. After convincing her to withdraw US$7 million from one of Palma’s bank accounts in San Diego, California, Clavel decapitated her and sent her head to Palma in a box. It was known as the first drug trafficking-related beheading in Mexico. Two weeks later, Clavel killed Palma’s children, Héctor (age 5) and Nataly (age 4), by throwing them off a bridge in Venezuela. Palma retaliated by sending his men to kill Clavel while he was in prison. In 1991, Ramón killed another Sinaloa Cartel associate, Rigoberto Campos Salcido (alias “El Rigo”), causing greater conflict with Guzmán. In early 1992, a Tijuana Cartel-affiliated and San Diego-based gang known as Calle Treinta kidnapped six of Guzmán’s men in Tijuana, tortured them for information, and then shot them in the back of the head. Their bodies were dumped on the outskirts of the city. Shortly after the attack, a car bomb exploded outside one of Guzmán’s properties in Culiacán. No injuries were reported, but the drug lord became fully aware of the intended message.
Guzmán and Palma struck back against the Arellano Félix brothers (Tijuana Cartel) with nine murders on September 3, 1992 in Iguala; Among the dead were lawyers and relatives of Félix Gallardo, who was also believed to have orchestrated the attack on Palma’s family. Mexico’s attorney general formed a special unit to investigate the killings, but the investigation was dropped after the unit discovered that Guzmán had paid off some of Mexico’s top police officials with $10 million, according to police reports and confessions from former police officers. In November 1992, gunmen from Arellano attempted to kill Félix Guzmán as he drove a vehicle through the streets of Guadalajara. Ramón and at least four of his accomplices shot at the moving vehicle with AK-47 rifles, but the drug lord managed to escape unharmed. The attack forced Guzmán to leave Guadalajara and live under an assumed name, for fear of future attacks. However, he and Palma responded to the assassination attempt in a similar manner; Several days later, on November 8, 1992, a large number of men from the Sinaloa Cartel posing as police officers stormed the Christine discotheque in Puerto Vallarta, saw Ramón, Francisco Javier Arellano Félix and David Barron Corona and opened fire on them. The shooting lasted at least eight minutes and more than 1,000 bullets were fired by both Guzmán and Arellano Félix’s gunmen. Six people were killed in the gunfight, but the Arellano Félix brothers were in the toilet when the raid began and reportedly escaped through an air conditioning duct before leaving the scene in one of their vehicles. On December 9 and 10, 1992, four alleged associates of Félix Gallardo were murdered. The antagonism between Guzmán’s Sinaloa Cartel and the Arellano Félix clan caused even more deaths and was accompanied by more violent events in the states of Baja California, Sonora, Sinaloa, Durango, Jalisco, Guerrero, Michoacán and Oaxaca.
The war between the two groups continued for another six months, but none of their respective leaders were killed. In mid-1993, the Arellano Félix clan sent their best marksmen on a final mission to kill Guzmán in Guadalajara, where he regularly moved to avoid possible attacks. Since this was not successful, the Tijuana Cartel hitmen decided to return to Baja California on May 24, 1993. While Francisco Javier was at Guadalajara International Airport booking his flight to Tijuana, informants told him that Guzmán was waiting in the airport parking lot for a flight to Tijuana. Puerto Vallarta. After spotting the white Mercury Grand Marquis car in which Guzmán was believed to be hiding, about 20 Tijuana Cartel gunmen got out of their vehicles and opened fire around 4:10 p.m. However, the drug lord was in a green Buick sedan. a short distance from the target. Inside the Mercury Grand Marquis was the Cardinal and Archbishop of Guadalajara Juan Jesús Posadas Ocampo, who died on the spot from fourteen gunshot wounds. Six other people, including the Cardinal’s driver, were caught in the crossfire and killed. Amid the gunfight and confusion, Guzmán escaped and went to one of his safe houses in Bugambilias, a neighborhood 20 minutes away from the airport.
Flight and first arrest 1993
The night the cardinal was murdered, Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari flew to Guadalajara and condemned the attack, declaring it “a criminal act” against innocent civilians, but giving no indication of the involvement of organized crime. The death of Cardinal Posadas Ocampo, a prominent religious figure, outraged the Mexican public, the Catholic Church and many politicians. The government responded by launching a massive manhunt to capture the people involved in the gunfight, offering approximately $5 million in bounties for each of them. Photos of Guzmán’s face, previously unknown to the public, began appearing in newspapers and on television throughout Mexico. Fearing his capture, Guzmán fled to Tonalá, Jalisco, where he reportedly owned a farm. The drug lord then fled to Mexico City and stayed in a hotel for about ten days. He met one of his associates at an unknown location and handed him $200 million to take care of his family in case of his absence. He gave that same amount to another of his employees to ensure that the Sinaloa Cartel would run its daily operations smoothly in case he was away for some time.
After obtaining a passport under the false name Jorge Ramos Pérez, Guzmán was transported to the southern state of Chiapas by one of his trusted associates before leaving the country and settling in Guatemala on June 4, 1993. Guatemala with his girlfriend María del Rocío del Villar Becerra and several of his bodyguards and settle in El Salvador. During his journey, Mexican and Guatemalan authorities monitored his movements. Guzmán paid a Guatemalan military official $1.2 million to allow him to hide south of the Mexican border. However, the unnamed official passed on information about Guzmán’s whereabouts to police. On June 9, 1993, Guzmán was arrested by the Guatemalan military at a hotel near Tapachula, close to the Guatemala–Mexico border. He was extradited to Mexico two days later aboard a military plane, where he was immediately taken to the Federal Social Readaptation Center No. 1 (often simply “La Palma” or “Altiplano”), a maximum security prison in Almoloya de Juárez, state of Mexico. He was sentenced to 20 years and nine months in prison on charges of drug trafficking, criminal association and bribery. Initially imprisoned in the Federal Social Readaptation Center No. 1, on November 22, 1995 he was transferred to another high-security prison, Federal Center for Social Rehabilitation No. 2 (also known as “Puente Grande”) in Jalisco, after he had been convicted of three crimes: possession of firearms, drug trafficking and the murder of Cardinal Ocampo (the charges would later be dismissed by another judge). He had been tried and convicted in the federal prison on the outskirts of Almoloya de Juárez, Mexico.
While in prison, Guzmán’s drug empire and cartel continued to operate unabated, led by his brother, Arturo Guzmán Loera, known as El Pollo, with Guzmán himself still considered a major international drug trafficker by Mexico and the US, even while he was riding in the back. beams. Associates brought him suitcases of cash to bribe prison staff and allow the drug lord to maintain his lavish lifestyle even in prison, with prison guards acting like his servants. He met his longtime mistress and later Sinaloa associate, former police officer Zulema Hernández, while in prison, where she was serving time for armed robbery. Hernández later controlled Sinaloa’s expansion into Mexico City, but in 2008 her body was found in a trunk carved with multiple Zs, meaning Los Zetas, Sinaloa’s archrivals.
Guzmán
‘s Sinaloa Cartel was the richest and most powerful drug cartel in Mexico at the time of his arrest. It smuggled multi-ton cocaine shipments from Colombia through Mexico to the United States by air, sea and road, and had distribution cells throughout the US. The organization has also been involved in the production, smuggling and distribution of Mexican methamphetamine, marijuana and heroin from Southeast Asia.
When Palma was arrested by the Mexican army on June 23, 1995, Guzmán took over leadership of the cartel. Palma was later extradited to the United States, where he remains in prison on drug trafficking and conspiracy charges.
After Guzmán escaped from prison nearly a decade after his first arrest, he and close associate Ismael Zambada García became Mexico’s undisputed biggest drug lords following the 2003 arrest of their Gulf Cartel rival Osiel Cárdenas. Until Guzmán’s arrest in 2014, he was considered the “world’s most powerful drug trafficker” by the US Treasury Department. Guzmán also had a close associate, his trusted friend Ignacio “Nacho” Coronel Villarreal.
A US indictment alleges that Guzmán and the Sinaloa Cartel bribed Juan Orlando Hernández with millions of dollars starting in 2012, helping him become president of Honduras in 2013. This influence helped the cartel and its allies control and protect vital maritime and air transshipment destinations between the United States and South America.
His drug empire made Guzmán a billionaire, and he was ranked the 10th richest man in Mexico and 1,140th in the world in 2011, with a net worth of about $1 billion. To support its drug trafficking, the Sinaloa Cartel also built a shipping and transportation empire. Guzmán has been called the “greatest drug lord of all time”, and the US DEA considered him “the godfather of the drug world” and strongly estimates that he has surpassed the influence and reach of Pablo Escobar. In 2013, the Chicago Crime Commission named Guzmán “Public Enemy Number One” due to the influence of his criminal network in Chicago (however, there is no evidence that Guzmán ever visited the city). The last person to gain such fame was Al Capone in 1930.
At the time of his arrest in 2014, Guzmán was importing more drugs into the United States than anyone else. He took advantage of the power vacuum created by the crackdown on Colombia’s cartels, gaining sales and market share there as Colombia’s own cartels were decimated. He similarly took advantage of the situation when his rival cartels were crushed by an intense crackdown by the Mexican government, but the Sinaloa gang emerged largely unscathed.
Methamphetamine Production
Following the fall of the Amezcua brothers – founders of the Colima Cartel – in 1999 on methamphetamine trafficking charges, there was a demand across Mexico for leadership to coordinate methamphetamine shipments north. Guzmán saw an opportunity and seized it. Guzmán and Ismael Zambada García (“El Mayo”) easily arranged the shipment of precursors, taking advantage of their previous contacts on Mexico’s Pacific coast. Importantly, for the first time the Colombians did not have to be paid; they simply added methamphetamine to the cocaine shipments. This fact meant that no additional money was needed for planes, pilots, boats and bribes; they used the existing infrastructure to pipeline the new product.
Until now, the Sinaloa Cartel had been a joint venture between Guzmán and Ismael Zambada García; the methamphetamine trade would belong solely to Guzmán. He cultivated his own ties with China, Thailand and India to import necessary precursor chemicals. In the mountains of the states of Sinaloa, Durango, Jalisco, Michoacán and Nayarit, Guzmán built large methamphetamine laboratories and rapidly expanded his organization.
His nomadic existence allowed him to maintain contacts throughout the country. He was now active in 17 of the 31 Mexican states. As his business grew, he put his trusted friend Ignacio Coronel Villarreal in charge of methamphetamine production; this way Guzmán could remain the boss of bosses. Coronel Villarreal proved so reliable in the Guzmán business that he became known as the “Crystal King”.
First escape and second arrest
First escape: 2001
While still in prison in Mexico, Guzmán was indicted in San Diego on US charges of money laundering and importing tons of cocaine into California, along with his Sinaloa lawyer Humberto Loya -Castro, or Licenciado Perez (“Lawyer Perez”), who was charged with bribing Mexican officials on behalf of Sinaloa and ensuring the release of arrested cartel members from custody. After a ruling by Mexico’s Supreme Court made extradition between Mexico and the United States easier, Guzmán bribed guards to help him escape. On January 19, 2001, Francisco “El Chito” Camberos Rivera, a prison guard, opened Guzmán’s electronically operated cell door, and Guzmán stepped into a laundry cart that maintenance worker Javier Camberos rolled through several doors and eventually out the front door. He was then transported in the trunk of a car driven out of town by Camberos. At a gas station, Camberos went inside, but when he returned, Guzmán had gone off on foot into the night. Officials say 78 people are involved in his escape plan. Camberos is in prison for helping the escape.
Police say Guzmán carefully crafted his escape plan and exerted influence over almost everyone in the prison, including the prison’s director, who is now in prison for helping in the escape. One prison guard who came forward to report the situation in the prison disappeared seven years later and was probably killed on Guzmán’s orders. Guzmán reportedly had prison guards on his payroll, smuggled contraband into the prison and received preferential treatment from staff. In addition to prison staff accomplices, police in Jalisco were paid to ensure he had at least 24 hours to leave the state and avoid the military manhunt. The story told to the guards who had been bribed not to search the laundry cart was that Guzmán was smuggling gold out of the prison, supposedly taken from the rocks in the prisoner’s workshop. The escape is said to have cost Guzmán $2.5 million.
Quest: 2001–2014: Mexican Cartel Wars
Since his escape from prison in 2001, Guzmán wanted to control Ciudad Juárez border crossings, which were controlled by the Carrillo Fuentes family of the Juárez Cartel. Despite a high level of distrust between the two organizations, the Sinaloa and Juárez cartels had a working agreement at the time. Guzmán convened a meeting in Monterrey with Ismael Zambada García (“El Mayo”), Juan José Esparragoza Moreno (“El Azul”) and Arturo Beltrán Leyva. During this meeting they discussed the murder of Rodolfo Carrillo Fuentes, who was in charge of the Juárez Cartel at the time. On September 11, 2004, Rodolfo, his wife and two young children visited a shopping center in Culiacán. While leaving the mall, accompanied by police commander Pedro Pérez López, the family was ambushed by members of Los Negros, assassins of the Sinaloa Cartel. Rodolfo and his wife were murdered; the police officer survived.
The city was no longer controlled solely by the Carrillo Fuentes family. Instead, the city found itself as the front line in Mexico’s drug war and would see homicide rates skyrocket as rival cartels fought for control. With this act, Guzmán was the first to break the non-aggression pact agreed to by the major cartels, sparking the battle between cartels over drug routes that has claimed more than 60,000 lives since December 2006.
When Mexican President Felipe Calderón took office in December 2006, he announced a crackdown on cartels by the Mexican military to stem the rising violence. After four years, the additional efforts had not slowed the flow of drugs and killings associated with the drug war. Of the 53,000 arrests made in 2010, only 1,000 involved Sinaloa Cartel associates, leading to suspicions that Calderón deliberately allowed Sinaloa to win the drug war, an accusation Calderón denied in advertisements in Mexican newspapers, pointing to his the government’s assassination of Sinaloa’s top deputy, “Nacho” Coronel, as evidence. Sinaloa’s rival cartels saw their leaders killed and syndicates dismantled in the crackdown, but the Sinaloa gang remained relatively unaffected, taking over the rival gangs’ territories, including the coveted Ciudad Juárez-El Paso corridor, in the aftermath of the power shifts.
Conflict with the Beltrán Leyva Cartel
A Newsweek investigation reveals that one of Guzmán’s techniques to maintain his dominance among the cartels was providing information to the DEA and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement that led to the arrests of his enemies in the Juárez Cartel, in addition to information that led to the arrests of some of Sinaloa’s top leaders. Some speculated that the arrests were part of a deal Guzmán made with Calderón and the DEA in which he deliberately turned over some of his alleged Sinaloa colleagues to US agents in exchange for immunity from prosecution, while perpetuating the idea. that Calderón’s government heavily pursued his organization during the cartel crackdown.
This became a key factor influencing the rift between the Sinaloa Cartel and the Beltrán Leyva brothers, five brothers who served as Guzmán’s top lieutenants and worked primarily for the cartel in the northern region of Sinaloa. Sinaloa attorney Loya-Castro, who like Guzmán had been wanted in the United States on federal charges since 1993, voluntarily approached the DEA in 1998 to offer them information, eventually signing paperwork as a formal informant in 2005, and his De US charges were dismissed in 2008. Loya-Castro’s leaks to the DEA led to the dismantling of the Tijuana Cartel, as well as the arrest by the Mexican military of Guzmán’s lieutenant and the Beltrán Leyva Organization’s top commander, Alfredo Beltrán Leyva. (also known as El Mochomo, or “Desert Ant”), in Culiacán in January 2008, with Guzmán allegedly abandoning El Mochomo for various reasons. Guzmán had expressed concerns about Alfredo Beltrán’s lifestyle and high-profile actions for some time before his arrest. After El Mochomo’s arrest, authorities said he was in charge of two hit squads, money laundering, drug trafficking and bribing officials.
That high-profile arrest was followed by the arrest of eleven members of the Beltrán Leyva hit squad in Mexico City, with police noting that the arrests were the first evidence that Sinaloa had expanded into the capital. US Ambassador to Mexico Tony Garza called the arrests a “major victory” in the drug war. While Alfredo was in custody, his brother Arturo Beltrán Leyva took over as the brothers’ top commander, but was killed the following year in a firefight with Mexican Marines.
It is not known whether Guzmán was responsible for the arrest of Alfredo Beltrán. However, the Beltrán Leyvas and their allies suspected he was behind it, and after Alfredo Beltrán’s arrest, a formal “war” was declared. Only a few hours after the report, an attempt was made on the life of cartel head Zambada’s son Vicente Zambada Niebla (El Vincentillo). Dozens of murders followed in retaliation for that attempt. The Beltrán Leyva brothers ordered the murder of Guzmán’s son, Édgar Guzmán López, on May 8, 2008 in Culiacán, prompting massive retaliation from Guzmán. They were also conflicted over the loyalty of the Flores brothers, Margarito and Pedro, leaders of a large, highly lucrative Chicago cell responsible for distributing more than two tons of cocaine per month. The Mexican military claims that Guzmán and the Beltrán Leyva brothers disagreed over Guzmán’s relationship with the Valencia brothers in Michoacán.
After the murder of Guzmán’s son Édgar, violence increased. From May 8 to the end of the month, more than 116 people were murdered in Culiacán, including 26 police officers. In June 2008, more than 128 people were killed; in July 143 were killed. An additional deployment of 2,000 troops to the area could not stop the gang war. The wave of violence spread to other cities such as Guamúchil, Guasave and Mazatlán.
However, the Beltrán Leyva brothers were themselves involved in some double case. Arturo and Alfredo had met with leading members of Los Zetas in Cuernavaca, where they agreed to form an alliance to fill the power vacuum. They wouldn’t necessarily go after the main strongholds like the Sinaloa and Gulf Cartel; instead, they would seek control of southern states such as Guerrero (where the Beltrán Leyvas already had a major stake), Oaxaca, Yucatán and Quintana Roo. They made their way to the center of the country, where no group was in control. The Beltrán Leyva organization allied itself with the Gulf Cartel and its assassination squad Los Zetas against Sinaloa.
The split was officially recognized by the US government on May 30, 2008. On that day, she recognized the Beltrán Leyva brothers as leaders of their own cartel. President George W. Bush has designated Marcos Arturo Beltrán Leyva and the Beltrán Leyva Organization as subject to sanctions under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act (“Kingpin Act”), which prohibits people and companies in the U.S. from doing business with them and freezes their US assets.
Initial manhunt
Guzmán was known among drug lords for his longevity and evading authorities, aided by alleged bribes to federal, state and local Mexican officials. Despite progress made in capturing others in the aftermath of Guzmán’s escape, including a handful of his top logistics and security men, the massive military and federal police manhunt failed to capture Guzmán for years. In the years between his escape and capture, he was Mexico’s most wanted man. His elusiveness in law enforcement made him a near-legendary figure in Mexican drug folklore; Stories circulated that Guzmán would sometimes walk into restaurants, his bodyguards would confiscate people’s cellphones, he would eat his meal, and then leave after paying everyone’s bill. Rumors circulated that Guzmán was seen in various parts of Mexico and abroad. For more than thirteen years, Mexican security forces coordinated many operations to recapture him, but their efforts were largely in vain as Guzmán appeared to be one step ahead of his captors.
Although his whereabouts were unknown, authorities believed he was likely hiding in the “Golden Triangle” (Spanish: Triángulo Dorado), an area that includes parts of Sinaloa, Durango, and Chihuahua in the Sierra Madre region. The region is a major producer of marijuana and opium poppies in Mexico and its remoteness from urban areas makes it an attractive area for the production of synthetic drugs in clandestine laboratories and because of the mountains that provide potential hideouts. Guzmán reportedly commanded a sophisticated security circle of at least 300 informants and gunmen with manpower equivalent to that of a head of state. His inner circle would help him move through several isolated farms in the mountainous region to avoid capture. He commonly eluded law enforcement using armored cars, aircraft, and all-terrain vehicles, and was known to employ advanced communications gadgets and counterintelligence practices. Because many of these locations in the Golden Triangle are only accessible by unpaved single-track roads, locals easily noticed the arrival of law enforcement officers or outsiders. Their distrust of non-residents and antipathy toward the government, along with a combination of bribery and intimidation, helped keep locals loyal to Guzmán and the Sinaloa Cartel in the area. According to law enforcement intelligence, an attempt to launch an attack to capture Guzmán by air would have had similar results; his security circle is said to have alerted him to the presence of a plane 10 minutes away from Guzmán’s location, giving him ample time to escape the scene and avoid arrest. In addition, his gunmen reportedly carried surface-to-air missiles that could shoot down aircraft in the area.
Second arrest: 2014
Although Guzmán had hidden in remote areas of the Sierra Madre Mountains for a long time without being captured, arrested members of his security team told the military that he had ventured to Culiacán and the resort town of Mazatlán. A week before he was caught, Guzmán and Zambada reportedly attended a family reunion in Sinaloa. On February 16, 2014, the Mexican military followed the bodyguards’ tips to Guzmán’s ex-wife’s house, but they had trouble ramming the steel-reinforced front door, allowing Guzmán to escape through a system of secret tunnels connecting six houses with connected together. eventually south to Mazatlán. He planned to stay in Mazatlán for a few days to see his twin daughters before retreating to the mountains.
On February 22, 2014, around 6:40 a.m., Mexican authorities arrested Guzmán at a hotel in a beach area on Mazatlán Malecon, following a Mexican Navy operation, with joint intelligence from the DEA and the U.S. Marshals Service. A few days before his capture, Mexican authorities had raided several properties owned by Sinaloa Cartel members close to Guzmán throughout the state of Sinaloa. The operation that led to his capture began at 3:45 a.m., when ten Mexican Navy pickup trucks carrying more than 65 Marines made their way to the resort. Guzmán hid in the Miramar Apartments, located at No. 608 on Avenida del Mar. Mexican and U.S. federal agents had indications that the drug lord had been at that location for at least two days and that he was staying there. on the fourth floor of the condominium, in room 401. When Mexican authorities arrived on the scene, they quickly subdued Carlos Manuel Hoo Ramírez, one of Guzmán’s bodyguards, before quietly ascending the elevators and stairs to the fourth floor. Once they got to Guzmán’s front door, they broke into the apartment and stormed the two rooms. In one of the rooms, Guzmán was in bed with his wife (former beauty queen Emma Coronel Aispuro). Their two daughters are said to have been in the condominium during the arrest. Guzmán tried to physically resist arrest, but he did not try to grab a gun he had close to him. Amid the altercation with the Marines, the drug lord was hit four times. At 6:40 a.m. he was arrested, taken to the ground floor and walked to the condominium parking lot, where the first photos of his arrest were taken. His identity was confirmed through a fingerprint examination immediately after his capture. He was then flown to Mexico City for formal identification. According to the Mexican government, no shots were fired during the operation.
Guzmán was presented before cameras at a press conference at Mexico City International Airport that afternoon and then transferred to the Federal Social Readaptation Center No. 1, a maximum security prison in Almoloya de Juárez, State of Mexico, in a Federal Police Black Hawk helicopter. The helicopter was escorted by two Navy helicopters and one from the Mexican Air Force. Surveillance within the correctional facility and surrounding areas was increased by a large contingent of law enforcement officers.
Reactions
Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto confirmed the arrest via Twitter and congratulated the Secretariat of National Defense (SEDENA), the Secretariat of the Navy (SEMAR), the Office of the Attorney General (PGR), the Federal Police and the Centro de Investigación y Seguridad Nacional. (CISEN) for the capture of Guzmán. In the United States, Attorney General Eric Holder said Guzmán had caused “the death and destruction of millions of lives around the world” and called the arrest “a milestone and a victory for the citizens of both Mexico and the United States.” Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos called Peña Nieto and congratulated him on Guzmán’s arrest, emphasizing its importance in international efforts against drug trafficking. Colombian Defense Minister Juan Carlos Pinzón congratulated Mexico on Guzmán’s arrest, stating that his capture “contributes to eradicating this crime (drug trafficking) in the region”. Guatemalan President Otto Pérez Molina congratulated the Mexican government on the arrest. Costa Rican President Laura Chinchilla also congratulated the Mexican government on the arrest on Twitter. The French government expressed its congratulations on February 24 and supported the Mexican security forces in their fight against organized crime. News of Guzmán’s arrest made headlines in many media outlets in the US, Latin America and Europe. On Twitter, Mexico and Guzmán’s arrest were trending topics for most of February 22, 2014.
Bob Nardoza, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District Court for the Eastern District of New York, announced that U.S. authorities intend to seek Guzmán’s extradition for several cases pending against him in New York and other jurisdictions of the United States.
Indictment and imprisonment
Guzmán was imprisoned on the same day of his capture on February 22, 2014, at the Federal Social Readaptation Center No. 1, Area #20, Corridor #1. The area where he lived was very limited; the cells have no windows, prisoners are not allowed to communicate with each other or contact their relatives. His cell was close to those of José Jorge Balderas (alias “El JJ”), a former lieutenant of the Beltrán Leyva cartel, and Jaime González Durán (alias “El Hummer”), a former leader of the Los Zetas drug cartel. Miguel Ángel Guzmán Loera, one of his brothers, was in one of the other units. Guzmán was alone in his cell and had one bed, one shower and one toilet. His lawyer was Óscar Quirarte. Guzmán was allowed to receive visits from members of his family every nine days from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM (if approved by a judge), and was legally entitled to receive MXN$638 (approximately US$48) each month to purchase products for buy personal hygiene. He lived less than 23 hours in solitary confinement with one hour of exposure to the open air. During his court hearings he was only allowed to speak to people (the prison guards who secured his cell were not allowed to speak to him). Unlike the other prisoners, Guzmán was prohibited from participating in sporting or cultural activities. These terms were court approved and could only be changed if a federal judge decided to change them.
On February 24, the Mexican government formally charged Guzmán with drug trafficking, a process that delayed his possible extradition to the US. The decision to initially file only one charge against him showed that the Mexican government was preparing more formal charges against Guzmán. and possibly including the charges he faced before his 2001 prison escape. The kingpin also faced charges in at least seven US jurisdictions, and US officials applied for his extradition. Guzmán initially received an order preventing immediate extradition to the United States. On February 25, a Mexican federal judge initiated the trial on drug-related and organized crime charges. On March 4, 2014, a Mexican federal court issued a formal indictment against Guzmán for his involvement in organized crime.
On March 5, 2014, a Mexico City federal court rejected Guzmán’s order against extradition to the US on the grounds that US officials had not formally requested his extradition to Mexico. The court said that if the US files a request in the future, Guzmán could request a new order. [168] The court had until April 9, 2014 to issue a formal statement on the rejection of the order, and Guzmán’s lawyers could appeal the court’s decision in the meantime. The same day the warrant was dismissed, another federal court issued formal charges against Guzmán, totaling five different Mexican federal courts where he was wanted on drug trafficking and organized crime charges. The court explained that although Guzmán is charged in different courts, he cannot be convicted twice for the same crime as that would violate Article 23 of Mexico’s Constitution.
On April 17, 2014, Mexico’s Attorney General Jesús Murillo Karam said that Mexico had no intention of extraditing Guzmán to the US even if a formal request were made. He said he wanted Guzmán to be charged in Mexico and disagreed with how the U.S. budget cuts deal with extradited Mexican criminals by reducing their sentences (as in the case of Vicente Zambada Niebla) in exchange for information.
On July 16, 2014, Guzmán reportedly helped organize a five-day prison hunger strike in collaboration with inmate and former drug lord Edgar Valdez Villarreal (alias “La Barbie”). More than 1,000 prisoners reportedly took part in the protest, complaining about the prison’s poor hygiene, food and medical treatment. The Mexican government confirmed that the strike had taken place and that the prisoners’ demands had been met, but denied that Guzmán or Valdez Villarreal were involved given their status as prisoners in solitary confinement.
On September 25, 2014, Guzmán and his former business partner Zambada were indicted in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York in Brooklyn. According to court documents, they both conspired to kill Mexican law enforcement officers, government officials and members of the Mexican Armed Forces. Among those killed on Guzmán’s orders were Roberto Velasco Bravo (2008), the head of Mexico’s Organized Crime Investigation Department; Rafael Ramírez Jaime (2008), the head of the arrest division of the Attorney General’s office; Rodolfo Carrillo Fuentes (2004), former leader of the Juárez Cartel, among other criminals from the Tijuana, Los Zetas, Beltrán Leyva and Juárez crime syndicates. The court alleged that Guzmán used professional killers to carry out “hundreds of violent acts, including murders, assaults, kidnappings, murders and torture.” Furthermore, it was alleged that he oversaw a drug trafficking empire that transported multi-ton shipments of narcotics from South America, through Central America and Mexico, and then to the US, and that his network was facilitated by corrupt law enforcement officials. and government officials. It also alleged that Guzmán, along with several other high-ranking drug lords, laundered more than $14 billion in drug proceeds.
On November 11, 2014, a federal court in Sinaloa granted Guzmán a warrant on gun possession charges after the judge determined that the arrest was not carried out in the manner reported by the Mexican Navy. According to law enforcement, the Navy arrested Guzmán after receiving an anonymous tip about an armed individual at the hotel where he was staying. However, no evidence was provided for the anonymous tip. The judge also ruled that the investigation leading to his arrest had not been presented to the court. He determined that the law enforcement authorities’ version of the arrest contained several irregularities, as the Navy did not have a raid warrant when they entered the premises and arrested Guzmán (while he was not the subject of the anonymous tip in the first place).
On January 20, 2015, Guzmán requested a new court order to prevent his extradition to the US through his lawyer Andrés Granados Flores. 14, 16, 17, 18 and 20 of the Constitution of Mexico would be violated. His defense decision was made after Attorney General Murillo Karam said at a news conference that the US was pushing to formally request his extradition. The PGR and the Mexican Secretariat of Foreign Affairs stated that Guzmán had been under provisional arrest for extradition purposes by the US government since February 17, 2001, but that the formal procedure to secure the extradition was not realized because investigators considered the request outdated used to be. and believed it would have been difficult to gather potential witnesses. Murillo Karam said the Mexican government would process the request when they deemed it appropriate. He requested a second injunction on January 26 to prevent his extradition. Mexico City federal judge Fabricio Villegas asked federal authorities to confirm within 24 hours whether an extradition request against Guzmán was pending. [187] At a press conference the next day, Murillo Karam said he expected a request from Washington, but said they would not extradite him until he was indicted and completed his sentence in Mexico. If all charges are added together, Guzmán could receive a sentence of between 300 and 400 years.
Second escape and third arrest: Second escape: 2015
On July 11, 2015, Guzmán escaped from Federal Center for Social Readjustment No. 1. Guzmán was last seen by security cameras at 8:52 PM near the shower area in his cell. The shower room was the only part of his cell not visible by the security camera. After the guards did not see him on surveillance video for twenty-five minutes, the staff started looking for him. When they reached his cell, Guzmán was gone. It was discovered that he had escaped through a tunnel leading from the shower room to a housing site 1 mile away in a Santa Juanita neighborhood. The tunnel was 10 meters deep underground, and Guzmán used a ladder to climb to the bottom. The tunnel was 1.7 m high and 75 cm wide. It was equipped with artificial lighting, air ducts and high-quality building materials. In addition, a motorcycle was found in the tunnel, which authorities believe was used to transport materials and possibly Guzmán himself.
Second manhunt: 2015–2016
Guzmán’s escape led to a large-scale manhunt. According to Mexican National Security Commissioner Monte Alejandro Rubido García, the manhunt was immediately launched in the area by setting up several checkpoints and aerial searches by helicopter. The entire prison was locked down and no one was allowed to enter or leave. The search was then expanded to other federal entities: Mexico City, State of Mexico, Morelos, Puebla, Guerrero, Michoacán, Querétaro, Hidalgo and Tlaxcala. However, most of the military officers involved in the search were sent to the State of Mexico. The Mexican government has also issued an international warning to prevent Guzmán from fleeing the country through airports, border controls or ports. Interpol and other security organizations were alerted to the possibility of his escape to another country. Flights at Toluca International Airport were canceled, while soldiers occupied parts of Mexico City International Airport. Of the 120 employees who worked at the prison that night, eighteen who worked near Guzmán’s cell were initially held for questioning. By noon, a total of 31 people had been called in for questioning. The prison’s director, Valentín Cárdenas Lerma, was among those arrested.
When news of the escape broke, President Peña Nieto was on his way to a state visit in France, along with a number of top officials from his cabinet and many others. The Minister of the Interior Miguel Ángel Osorio Chong, who was already waiting for them in France, returned to Mexico after learning of Guzmán’s escape from prison. Peña Nieto returned to Mexico on July 17. At a news conference, Peña Nieto said he was shocked by Guzmán’s escape and promised that the government would conduct an intensive investigation to see if officials had participated in the prison break. Furthermore, he claimed that Guzmán’s escape was an “insult” to the Mexican government, and that they would spare no resources to recapture him. However, Peña Nieto was heavily criticized for the incident, and the media pointed out that this incident was one of the most embarrassing episodes of the administration. Critics stated that Guzmán’s escape highlighted the high level of corruption within the government and questioned the government’s ability to combat the country’s organized crime groups.
On July 13, 2015, Osorio Chong met with cabinet members specializing in security and law enforcement intelligence to discuss Guzmán’s escape, and scheduled a press conference that day. The purpose of the meeting and conference was to analyze the actions taken by the government to recapture him. Among them were Rubido García, Arely Gómez González, the Attorney General of Mexico and Eugenio Imaz Gispert, head of the Center for Research and National Security. At the press conference, the government placed an MXN bounty of $60 million (approximately US$3.8 million) for information leading to Guzmán’s arrest.
A number of officials were charged; Of these, three were police officers working in the Intelligence Department, and another two were employed by CISEN.
Colombian assistance
Mexican government officials appealed to three retired Colombian police generals for help in resolving issues related to Guzmán, according to a report dated August 1, 2015. Among them is Rosso José Serrano, a decorated officer and one of the masterminds behind the dismantling of the Cali Cartel and the Medellín Cartel and Luis Enrique Montenegro, key player in the arrests of Miguel and Gilberto Rodríguez Orejuela. They proposed specific Colombian strategies, such as the creation of special search units (“Bloques de Búsqueda” or search blocks), specialized investigative and intelligence units, such as DIJIN (Directorate for Criminal Investigations and Interpol) and DIPOL (Directorate for Police Intelligence) and new laws on money laundering and asset forfeiture. After Guzmán’s third capture, it was revealed that the government of Colombia had sent a team of twelve officials to assist Mexican authorities in tracking down Guzmán.
Kate del Castillo meeting
Mexican actress Kate del Castillo was first contacted by Guzmán’s lawyers in 2014, after she published an open letter to Guzmán in 2012 expressing her condolences and asking him to “act in love” in instead of in drugs; Guzmán contacted del Castillo again after his escape in 2015, and is said to have tried to collaborate with her in making a film about his life. American actor Sean Penn heard about Ms. del Castillo’s connection through a mutual acquaintance and asked if he could come in for an interview.
On October 2, del Castillo and Penn visited Guzmán at his mountain hideout for seven hours, with Penn interviewing the fugitive for Rolling Stone magazine. Guzmán, who had never previously acknowledged his drug dealing to a journalist, told Penn that he had a “fleet of narco-submarines, planes, trucks and boats” and that he supplied “more heroin, methamphetamine, cocaine and marijuana than anyone else.” different in the world”.
Guzmán had a close call in early October 2015, just days after meeting with Penn and Kate del Castillo. An unnamed Mexican official confirmed that the meeting helped authorities locate Guzmán, with cellphone intercepts and information from U.S. authorities leading Mexican Marines to a ranch near Tamazula, Durango, in the Sierra Madre Mountains . in western Mexico. The attack on the ranch was met with heavy gunfire and Guzmán was able to flee. Mexico’s attorney general stated that “El Chapo ran away through a gully and, although he was found by helicopter, he was with two women and a girl and the decision was made not to shoot.” It was later revealed that the two women were Guzmán’s personal chefs, who had traveled with him to multiple safe houses. At one point, Guzmán reportedly carried a child in his arms “obscuring himself as a target.”
Third arrest: 2016
According to the Mexican Navy’s official report, civilians reported that there were “armed people” in a house in the coastal town of Los Mochis in northern Sinaloa, which was then put under surveillance for a month. Monitored communications showed the house was being prepared for the arrival of “Grandma” or “Auntie,” which authorities suspected was code for a potential high-priority target. After the gunmen returned to the house, placed a large order for tacos at a nearby restaurant and collected the order after midnight in a white van, the home was raided in the early hours of January 8, 2016, during Operation Black Swan, by 17 Marines from the Special Forces of the Mexican Navy with support from the Mexican Army and Federal Police – but Guzmán and a lieutenant escaped through a secret tunnel, emerging 1.5 km away and stealing a vehicle at gunpoint.
A statewide alert was issued for the stolen vehicle, and federal police located and intercepted it about 12 miles (20 km) south of Los Mochis, near the town of Juan José Ríos. Guzmán tried to bribe the officers with offers of cash, property and job offers. When the officers refused, Guzmán told them “you’re all going to die.” The four police officers sent photos of Guzmán to their superiors, who received a tip that forty assassins were on their way to free Guzmán. To prevent this counterattack by cartel members, the police officers were told to take their prisoners to a motel on the outskirts of town to wait for reinforcements, and later hand the prisoners over to the Marines. They were then taken to Los Mochis Airport for transport to Mexico City, where Guzmán was presented to the press at Mexico City Airport and then flown by naval helicopter to the same maximum security prison from which he escaped in July 2015.
During the raid, five gunmen were killed, six others arrested and one Marine injured. The Mexican Navy said they found two armored personnel carriers, eight assault rifles including two Barrett M82 sniper rifles, two M16 rifles with grenade launchers and a loaded rocket-propelled grenade launcher.
Reactions
Interior Minister Miguel Ángel Osorio Chong was hosting a reunion with Mexican ambassadors and consuls when he received a message from the president about Guzmán’s capture. Moments later he returned with Minister of National Defense Salvador Cienfuegos Zepeda, Minister of Navy Vidal Francisco Soberón Sanz and Minister of Foreign Affairs Claudia Ruiz Massieu. Osorio Chong then announced the capture to the diplomats by reading the president’s tweet, resulting in applause and chants of Viva México, Viva el Presidente Peña and Viva las Fuerzas Armadas (Long live Mexico, long live President Peña, long live our army). forces). This was followed by a spontaneous rendition of the national anthem by the audience.
Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos congratulated Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto on Guzmán’s capture. Santos stated that “the capture of Guzmán is a success, a big blow against organized crime and drug trafficking,” adding that “this person (Guzmán), like all criminals, will finally find what he deserves in the eyes of justice, and we celebrate that the Mexican authorities have recaptured this criminal.” Loretta Lynch, Attorney General of the United States, praised Mexican authorities “who have worked tirelessly in recent months to bring Guzmán to justice.”
Arrest of Emma Coronel Aispuro
Emma Coronel Aispuro, 31, wife of Joaquín Guzmán, was arrested at Dulles International Airport on February 22, 2021, accused of helping her husband run his cartel and planning his escape from the prison in 2015. Coronel was charged with conspiracy to distribute cocaine and methamphetamine. , heroin and marijuana in the U.S. She has not been charged with any crimes in Mexico, although her father, Inés Coronel Barreras , and her brother, Édgar Coronel, were arrested on drug charges and charges of aiding Guzman’s first prison escape. Inés Coronel was arrested in 2013 and sentenced to ten years and three months in prison in 2017. Édgar Coronel Aispuru was arrested in 2015 and is imprisoned in Aguaruto Prison, Sinaloa.
In 2019, Emma Coronel launched a clothing line and appeared on American reality television.
Extradition and prosecution by the United States
Mexico formally launched a renewed extradition process to the United States two days after Guzmán was recaptured on January 8, 2016 following his second prison escape. Guzmán’s lawyers have drafted “numerous and creative orders” to prevent extradition. Vicente Antonio Bermúdez Zacarías was a federal judge involved in Guzmán’s extradition proceedings, and he was murdered on October 17, 2016 while jogging near Mexico City.
Guzmán was wanted in Chicago, San Diego, New York City, New Hampshire, Miami, and Texas, in addition to charges in at least seven different U.S. federal courts. Charges in the United States include drug trafficking with intent to distribute, conspiracy, organized crime against health, money laundering, murder, illegal possession of firearms, kidnapping and murder in Chicago, Miami, New York and other cities. A crucial requirement for extradition was that the US must guarantee that it would not sentence Guzmán to death if he were found guilty of murder charges.
On January 19, 2017, Guzmán was extradited to the US to face charges and transferred to the custody of HSI and DEA agents. He was housed in the maximum security wing of the Metropolitan Correctional Center, New York, located in Manhattan. He pleaded not guilty to a 17-count indictment in the United States District Court in New York on January 20. U.S. District Judge Brian Cogan scheduled his trial for November 5, 2018, when jury selection began. Prosecutors said juror anonymity and an armed escort were necessary even while Guzmán is in isolation because of his history of killing jurors and witnesses. The judge agreed to keep the jurors anonymous and to have Guzmán transported to and from the courthouse by U.S. Marshals and isolated from the public while he was in the courthouse. Opening arguments began on Tuesday, November 13, and closing arguments took place on January 31, 2019. [265] Guzmán was found guilty of all charges on February 12, 2019 and sentenced on July 17, 2019 to life in prison plus 30 years and ordered to forfeit more than $12.6 billion. He was incarcerated at ADX Florence, the most secure US supermax prison, under federal registry number 89914-053.
Personal and family criminal activities
Guzmán’s family is deeply involved in drug trafficking. Several members of his family, including his brother, one of his sons and a cousin, were murdered by Sinaloa’s archrival cartels, Los Zetas and the Beltrán Leyva Organization.
In 1977, Guzmán married Alejandrina María Salazar Hernández in a small ceremony in the town of Jesús María, Sinaloa. The couple had four children: César, Ivan Archivaldo, Jesús Alfredo [es] and Alejandrina Gisselle. He set them up in a farm in Jesús María.
When he was thirty years old, El Chapo fell in love with a bank clerk, Estela Peña from Nayarit, whom he kidnapped and with whom he had sexual relations. They later married.
In the mid-1980s, Guzmán married again to Griselda López Pérez, with whom he had four more children: Édgar, Joaquín Jr., Ovidio and Griselda Guadalupe.
Guzmán’s sons followed him into the drug trade, and his third wife, López Pérez, was arrested in Culiacán in 2010.
In November 2007, Guzmán married an 18-year-old American beauty queen, Emma Coronel Aispuro, the daughter of one of his top deputies, Inés Coronel Barreras (a man), in Canelas, Durango. In August 2011, she gave birth to twins, Maria Joaquina and Emali Guadalupe, at Los Angeles County Hospital in California. Emma Coronel Aispuro pleaded guilty to charges in the US on June 6, 2021, admitting that she helped her husband run his multibillion-dollar criminal empire.
On May 1, 2013, Guzmán’s father-in-law, Inés Coronel Barreras, was captured by Mexican authorities in Agua Prieta, Sonora, without any gunfire being exchanged. U.S. authorities believe Coronel Barreras was a “key figure” of the Sinaloa cartel, which grew and smuggled marijuana through the Arizona border region.
On February 15, 2005, Guzmán’s son Iván Archivaldo, known as “El Chapito,” was arrested in Guadalajara on money laundering charges. He was sentenced to five years in prison, but was released in April 2008, after a Mexican federal judge, Jesús Guadalupe Luna, ruled that there was no evidence that his money came from drugs, other than that he was the son of a drug lord. Luna and another judge were later suspended on suspicion of unspecified irregularities in their decisions, including Luna’s decision to release “El Chapito.”
Guzmán’s son Édgar Guzmán López died after an ambush in 2008 in the parking lot of a shopping center in Culiacán, Sinaloa. Police then found more than 500 AK-47 bullet casings at the scene. Guzmán’s brother Arturo, known as “El Pollo”, was murdered in prison in 2004.
Another of Guzmán’s sons, Jesús Alfredo Guzmán Salazar, known as “El Gordo” (“The Fat One”), then 23 years old, was suspected of being a member of the cartel and was indicted in 2009 on federal drug trafficking charges with Guzmán, by the U.S. District Court for Northern Illinois, which oversees Chicago. Authorities described Guzmán Salazar as a growing force within his father’s organization and directly responsible for Sinaloa’s U.S.-Mexico drug trade and for managing his billionaire father’s growing list of properties. Guzmán Salazar and his mother, Guzmán’s ex-wife María Alejandrina Salazar Hernández, were both described as key figures in the Sinaloa cartel and added to the United States financial sanctions list under the Kingpin Act on June 7, 2012.
The U.S. Treasury Department, in its sanction against her, described Salazar as Guzmán’s wife and described Guzmán as her husband. The month before, the U.S. Treasury Department had announced sanctions against Guzmán’s sons Iván Guzmán Salazar and Ovidio Guzmán López under the Kingpin Act. Guzmán’s second wife, Griselda López Pérez, was also sanctioned by the US under the Kingpin Act and described as Guzmán’s wife.
Jesús Guzmán Salazar was reportedly detained by Mexican marines during an early morning raid in the western state of Jalisco on June 21, 2012. Months later, however, Mexico’s attorney general’s office announced that the Marines had arrested the wrong man. and that the captured man was actually Félix Beltrán León, who said he was a used car dealer, and not the drug lord’s son. U.S. and Mexican authorities blamed each other for providing the incorrect information that led to the arrest.
In 2012, Alejandrina Gisselle Guzmán Salazar, a 31-year-old pregnant doctor and Mexican citizen from Guadalajara, allegedly claimed she was Guzmán’s daughter when she crossed the US border into San Diego. She was arrested on fraud charges for entering the country on a fake visa. Unnamed officials said the woman was the daughter of María Alejandrina Salazar Hernández but did not appear to be a major figure in the cartel. She planned to meet the father of her child in Los Angeles and give birth in the United States.
On the night of June 17, 2012, Obied Cano Zepeda, a cousin of Guzmán, was shot by unknown assailants in his home in the state capital of Culiacán while organizing a Father’s Day celebration. The gunmen, who were reportedly carrying AK-47 rifles, also killed two other guests and left another seriously injured.
Obied was a brother of Luis Alberto Cano Zepeda (alias “El Blanco”), another cousin of Guzmán who worked as a pilot drug transporter for the Sinaloa Cartel. The latter was arrested by the Mexican army in August 2006. InSight Crime notes that Obied’s assassination may have been a retaliatory attack by Los Zetas for Guzmán’s incursions into their territory, or a brutal campaign that heralded Los Zetas’ attack. presence in Sinaloa.
Even after Guzman’s arrest, the Sinaloa Cartel remained (in 2018) the top drug distributor in the US among Mexican cartels, according to the US Drug Enforcement Administration.