Drug kingpin’s wife ordered to stay in jail

WASHINGTON—A federal judge has ordered the wife of Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin (El Chapo) Guzman to remain temporarily jailed after she was arrested and accused of helping her husband run his multibilliondollar cartel and plotting his audacious escape from a Mexican prison in 2015.

Emma Coronel Aispuro, 31, appeared by video conference for an initial court appearance before a federal magistrate judge in Washington, D.C. The judge’s order came after Coronel’s attorney, Jeffrey Lichtman, said he would consent to her temporary detention after her arrest at Dulles International Airport in Virginia.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Robin Meriweather explained the charges to Coronel, who spoke to the judge through a Spanish interpreter. She said prosecutors had provided sufficient reason to keep Coronel behind bars for now and noted that her attorney had consented to the temporary detention.

Prosecutor Anthony Nardozzi said the U.S. government believed that Coronel should remain jailed, arguing that she “worked closely with the command-and-control structure” of the Sinaloa cartel, particularly with her husband. Nardozzi said she conspired to distribute large quantities of drugs, knowing that they would be illegally smuggled into the U.S.

If convicted, she could face more than 10 years in prison.

Her arrest was the latest twist in the saga involving Guzman, the longtime head of the Sinaloa drug cartel. Guzman, whose two dramatic prison escapes in Mexico fed into a legend that he and his family were all but untouchable, was extradited to the U.S. in 2017 and is serving life in prison.