Extradited drug lord ‘El Chapo’ arrives in US
Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, one of the world’s most notorious drug kingpins, is finally headed for a court date the United States sought for two decades while he made brazen prison escapes and spent years on the run in Mexico.
Extradited on Thursday to face US drug trafficking and other charges, Mexico’s most wanted man was expected to appear in a federal court in New York on Friday, the same day Donald Trump is inaugurated as president.
The Drug Enforcement Administration flew Guzman to New York from Ciudad Juarez on Thursday.
The US has been trying to get Guzman in a US court since he was first indicted in Southern California int he early 1990s. Now in his late 50s, he faces the possibility of life in a US prison under indictments in six jurisdictions around the United States, including New York, San Diego, Chicago and Miami.
He’s expected to be prosecuted in Brooklyn, where an indictment accuses him of overseeing a massive trafficking operation that sent billions of dollars in profits back to Mexico. It says Guzman and other members of the Sinaloa cartel, one of the world’s largest drug-trafficking organizations, employed hit men who carried out murders, kidnappings and acts of torture.
Guzman, the cartel’s convicted boss, had been held most recently at a prison near Ciudad Juarez, a border town across from El Paso, Texas. He was recaptured a year ago after escaping from a maximum security prison for a second time, an episode that was highly embarrassing for President Enrique Pena Nieto’s government.
Mexican officials were seen as eager to hand him off to the US. But Guzman’s lawyers fought his extradition, and attorney Andres Granados accused the government of carrying it out on Thursday to distract from nationwide gasoline protests.
“It was illegal. They didn’t even notify us,” Granados said. “It’s totally political.”
Mexico’s Foreign Relations Department said a court had ruled against Guzman’s appeal and found that his extradition would be constitutional.
The extradition came at a charged political moment in the US, on the eve of Trump’s inauguration. As a candidate, Trump criticized Mexico for sending the US“criminal sand rapists” and vowed to build a wall at the Mexican border and have Mexico pay for it.