Notorious Mexican drug cartel boss 'El Chapo' found guilty in United States trial
- by Virginia Carter
- in World Media
- — Feb 13, 2019
Mexico's most notorious drug lord, Joaquin (El Chapo) Guzman, was convicted Tuesday of running an industrial-scale smuggling operation after a three-month trial packed with Hollywood-style tales of grisly killings, political payoffs, cocaine hidden in jalapeno cans, jewel-encrusted guns and a naked escape with his girlfriend through a tunnel.
Jurors at the US trial of Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman are in their sixth day of deliberations.
The kingpin will be sentenced on a 10-count indictment (guilty on all 10 counts), for various charges, including running a continuing criminal enterprise, firearms possession, murder conspiracy, and the importation and distribution of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine and marijuana.
Mexican-born El Chapo, 61, showed no emotion as the verdicts were read out, but smiled at 29 year-old wife Emma Coronel Aispuro wife who put her hand on his heart.
He could face life behind bars in a maximum security US prison.
In the trial, which has lasted several months, prosecutors used more than 50 witnesses to detail Guzman's involvement in making billions of dollars distributing drugs in the U.S.
Unlike other people in a similar position, Guzman would not plead guilty and went for a public trial after being extradited to the US.
Guzman's lawyers did not deny the defendant's charges but argued that he was the victim of government witnesses who were worse than he was.
The jury of eight women and four men deliberated roughly 34 hours over 6 days.
After three months of testimony, jurors have reached a guilty verdict on all 10 counts.
Mexico has been mired for 12 years in a deadly military-led war against drug gangs.
The legend of Guzman was burnished by two dramatic escapes he made from Mexican prisons and by a "Robin Hood" image he cultivated among Sinaloa's poor. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador was elected past year after promising a change, suggesting a negotiated peace and amnesty for non-violent drug dealers, traffickers, and farmers.
One of the trial's most memorable pieces of evidence came from El Chapo's mistress Lucero Guadalupe Sanchez Lopez, who testified she was in bed in a safe house with an on-the-run Guzman in 2014 when Mexican marines started breaking down his door. However, he was caught in 2016 before he was extradited to the United States in 2017.
Guzman listened to a drumbeat of guilty verdicts on drug and conspiracy charges that could put the 61-year-old escape artist behind bars for decades in a maximum-security USA prison selected to thwart another one of the breakouts that made him a folk hero in his native country.
Guzmán, once listed on Forbes' Billionaires List, has always been a slippery and near-mythical figure.
