Mexican drug lord of Sinaloa Cartel and El Chapo’s son arrested in US
Illustrative photo (Getty Images)
Mexican drug lord Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada and the son of his former partner Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán were detained on July 25 in El Paso, Texas. It was a great success for the US authorities and could change the criminal landscape of Mexico, reports Reuters.
Zambada, one of the most influential drug traffickers in Mexican history, co-founded the Sinaloa Cartel with El Chapo, who was extradited to the United States in 2017 and is serving a life sentence. Zambada and Guzmán López, El Chapo's son, are accused in the United States of supplying large quantities of drugs, including fentanyl, which has become the leading cause of death among Americans aged 18 to 45.
Zambada and Guzmán López were arrested after landing on a private plane in El Paso. Zambada was lured to the United States by Guzmán López, according to three officials familiar with the operation.
US authorities have made drug lords key targets, often making plea bargains in exchange for information to catch other high-ranking cartel members.
In 2008, a bloody inter-cartel war erupted after the arrest of another Sinaloa leader. The family of this leader accused El Chapo of organizing the arrest together with the Mexican authorities, which led to a violent split within the cartel.
Guzmán López is one of El Chapo's four sons, known as Los Chapitos or the Little Chapos, who inherited the Sinaloa Cartel faction after his arrest. His brother, Ovidio Guzmán, was arrested last year and extradited to the United States.
The Sinaloa Cartel has become a priority target for US authorities, who accuse it of being the largest supplier of fentanyl to the United States.
Zambada and Guzmán López face numerous charges in the United States for leading the cartel's criminal operations, including their deadly fentanyl production and trafficking networks, according to US Attorney General Merrick Garland.
In 2019, 62-year-old Sinaloa drug cartel leader Joaquín Guzmán, known as El Chapo, was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole in the United States.
In 2021, El Chapo's wife, Emma Coronel Aispuro, was detained in the United States on suspicion of assisting her husband in running his multibillion-dollar cartel and organizing his escape from a Mexican prison in 2015.
