Tag Archives: Guzman

El Chapo’s son led dramatic rescue of his half brother in Mexico battle

El Chapo’s son led dramatic rescue of his half brother in Mexico battle
By Anthony Esposito and Ana Isabel Martinez

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Ivan Archivaldo Guzman, the leader of Los Chapitos wing of the Sinaloa Cartel, was behind the assault on security forces that prompted the release of his half-brother from a house in the city of Culiacan last week, a top Mexican official said.

The men’s father is Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, Mexico’s most infamous drug kingpin, who himself slipped away from authorities on multiple occasions before being sentenced to life imprisonment in the United States this year.

Younger brother Ovidio Guzman was briefly captured by Mexican security forces on Oct. 17 in an upscale neighborhood of Culiacan, until hundreds of heavily-armed Sinaloa Cartel gunmen forced his release.

The botched raid has called into question Mexico’s security strategy and put pressure on President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who has insisted that the release was necessary to protect the lives of civilians and security personnel.

Questions have circulated about the role of the older Guzman brother in launching the fierce counterattack led by gunmen in armored vehicles armed with mounted weapons that left parts of the city smoldering.

Late on Thursday, Security Minister Alfonso Durazo said Ivan Archivaldo had played a key part.

“He was one of those leading the mobilization of various criminal elements in Culiacan,” Durazo said, while denying reports that the elder brother had also been briefly captured.

“Ivan Archivaldo was not at the home that was taken over by (security) personnel who participated in this operation,” he said.

A senior security official told Reuters that Ovidio was found in the house with his partner, their two daughters, and two guards. The official asked not to be named because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

The Sinaloa Cartel, along with the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, are Mexico’s largest and most powerful drug trafficking organizations.

Since El Chapo left the scene, his partner Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada has taken on a coordinating “godfather” role overseeing several factions in the organization, an official at the U.S. Justice Department told Reuters.

Four brothers, led by Ivan Archivaldo, form one group collectively known as Los Chapitos, or “little Chapos.” El Chapo’s brother heads another unit, and veteran trafficker Rafael Caro-Quintero leads another, the official said. In a 2018 interview with a Mexican magazine, Caro-Quintero denied he was still a drug trafficker.

(Reporting by Anthony Esposito; Additional reporting by Ana Isabel Martinez; Editing by Daniel Wallis)

Mexico sends in elite troops to patrol city after cartel battle

Mexico sends in elite troops to patrol city after cartel battle
By David Alire Garcia

CULIACAN, Mexico (Reuters) – Mexico sent in special forces troops on Monday to patrol a northern city in the wake of a cartel assault that freed Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman’s son in a hail of bullets, and also won a U.S. promise to help stop gun-smuggling at their shared border.

More than 400 soldiers turned up in Culiacan over the weekend after gunmen from the Sinaloa cartel briefly took control of the city and forced security forces to free the drug lord’s son from a botched arrest attempt last week.

“We are going to protect the citizens, that is our mission,” said General Carlos Ramon Carrillo de Villar, who oversaw formations of soldiers marching at a media event. “We are fighting insecurity.”

The convoys of army trucks with mounted machine guns rumbling through Culiacan’s streets were meant to instill confidence. However, a national poll on Monday showed two thirds of respondents believe drug lords and mobsters are more powerful than the government after the gunbattles last week that forced an army retreat.

Sinaloa public safety director Cristobal Castaneda told news anchor Joaquin Lopez Doriga that 13 people were killed during the disturbances that ran late into Thursday night.

President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has insisted the decision to release Ovidio Guzman was the only way to save lives after cartel henchmen erected roadblocks, torched trucks and opened fire with heavy, military-style weapons.

After a telephone call with U.S. President Donald Trump over the weekend, Mexican Cabinet ministers met U.S. Ambassador Christopher Landau to ask for help stemming the flow of weapons bought legally in the United States and sold to cartels south of the border.

“We both agreed to move quickly to share information and deliver specific results,” the U.S. Embassy in Mexico said on Twitter, calling it Operation Frozen. “The commitment made by Mexico and the United States will strengthen capacities to address and reduce one of the causes of violence.”

The Mexican government said earlier in a statement the United States had promised efforts to clamp down on the illegal trade, which is believed to be the source of most firearms in the hands of Mexican criminals.

“Arms trafficking is a significant problem and one the United States is addressing with renewed focus in Mexico,” a State Department official said in response to a question from Reuters.

ILLEGAL WEAPONS

Videos of the attacks in Culiacan last week showed cartel soldiers firing armor-piercing .50 caliber rifles and at least one truck mounted with a heavy machine gun – weaponry that is not available by legal means in Mexico.

Lopez Obrador has faced heavy criticism for the handling of the raid, which critics say looked like a capitulation to criminals and risked encouraging cartels to use more force to resist arrests.

The president has defended his policy of trying to dial down clashes with drug cartels to reduce murder rates.

Many people could have been killed had security forces attempted to hold Guzman against the cartel foot soldiers, Lopez Obrador told a regular news conference.

“Not just the criminals, who are also human beings, the soldiers, who we must protect,” he said, “but (also) civilians.”

“I always have great belief in the wisdom of the people, and I know that the majority of Mexicans supported the government’s decision,” the veteran leftist said.

Homicide data released on Sunday offered some hope for the strategy, showing murders fell in September for the third straight month.

Mexican authorities opened some 2,403 murder investigations, in the month, a decline of 7% from the same month in 2018 and the lowest monthly total since April, according to government figures. The months of July through September were the three most violent in 2018.

Even so, the number of murders remains on track to surpass last year’s record total of 29,000.

One poll released on Monday showed opinion was split over the operation in Culiacan. A survey by newspaper Reforma said 49% disagreed with the release of the younger Guzman after his brief arrest by military police versus 45% who backed it.

A separate survey by polling firm GCE put the numbers at 54%-34% against letting him go. Both surveyed 400 people.

The GCE poll showed 63.5% of respondents believed drug traffickers were more powerful than the government.

More than three-quarters in the GCE poll believed the release of Guzman would encourage gangs to continue their operations, while nearly seven out of 10 in the Reforma survey said organized crime was strengthened by what had happened.

(For a graphic on ‘Murders in Mexico’ click https://tmsnrt.rs/2qqSqoW)

(For a graphic on ‘Bungled arrest’ click https://tmsnrt.rs/32sdppv)

(Additional reporting by David Graham; Editing by Frank Jack Daniel, Tom Brown and Paul Tait)

‘El Chapo’ trial reveals drug lord’s love life, business dealings

Accused Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman and his wife Emma Coronel Aispuro looks on in this courtroom sketch, during closing arguments at his trial in Brooklyn federal court in New York City, U.S., January 31, 2019. REUTERS/Jane Rosenberg

By Brendan Pierson and Daina Beth Solomon

(Reuters) – On a typical day, Mexican drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman would wake at noon and make calls while strolling under the trees in the mountains of his native Sinaloa state, where he was in hiding, a witness recently testified at the kingpin’s trial.

The infamous gangster’s personal life and business dealings have gone on public display since mid-November at a courthouse in New York, where Guzman faces 10 criminal counts and a possible life sentence.

The jury will begin deliberations on Monday, after attorneys for the prosecution and defense gave closing statements this week.

U.S. prosecutors, who say Guzman amassed a $14 billion fortune through bribery, murder and drug smuggling, supported their case by calling to the stand Guzman’s former associates, including one who says she was his lover and another whose brother was among his top allies, as well as law enforcement officers.

“Do not let him escape responsibility,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrea Goldbarg told jurors on Wednesday, standing at a table displaying AK-47 rifles and bricks of cocaine as evidence.

Defense lawyers claim the 61-year-old Guzman, whose nickname means “Shorty,” was set up as a scapegoat. They attacked the credibility of witnesses, many of whom have extensive criminal histories.

Here are some of the most colorful tales from recent weeks in the courtroom:

HIS OWN WORDS

** Guzman’s voice was “sing-songy” with a “nasally undertone,” said FBI agent Steven Marston. In one recorded call, Guzman tells an associate, “Don’t be so harsh… take it easy with the police.” The partner responds: “You taught us to be a wolf.”

** Text messages between Guzman and his wife, Emma Coronel, often turned to family matters. “Our Kiki is fearless,” Guzman wrote in one, referring to one of their daughters. “I’m going to give her an AK-47 so she can hang with me.”

** After Coronel said she saw a suspicious car, Guzman wrote to her, “You go ahead and lead a normal life. That’s it.” Later he reminds her: “Make sure you delete everything after we’re done chatting.”

** In one of the trial’s final days, Guzman told the judge he would not testify in his own defense. The same day, he grinned broadly at audience member Alejandro Edda, the Mexican actor who plays Guzman in the Netflix television drama “Narcos.”

LOVERS AND BUSINESS

** Multiple “wives” visited Guzman when he was hiding in Sinaloa, said Alex Cifuentes, a former close partner.

** Lucero Sanchez Lopez, a former Mexican lawmaker, told jurors she once had a romantic relationship with Guzman, who sent her to buy and ship marijuana. “I didn’t want for him to mistrust me because I thought he could also hurt me,” she said. “I was confused about my own feelings over him. Sometimes I loved him and sometimes I didn’t.”

** Agustina Cabanillas, a partner of Guzman who called him “love,” set up drug deals by passing information between Guzman and others. In one message, Cabinillas called Guzman a “jerk” who was trying to spy on her. “Guess what? I’m smarter than him,” she wrote.

HIGH LEVELS OF CORRUPTION

** Guzman’s Sinaloa Cartel paid bribes, some in the millions of dollars, to Mexican officials at every level, said Jesus Zambada, the brother of Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, who worked alongside El Chapo and is still at large.

** Beneficiaries included a high-ranking police official who fed Guzman information on police activities “every day,” said Miguel Angel Martinez, a former cartel manager.

** Guzman once paid $100 million to former President Enrique Pena Nieto, Cifuentes said. Pena Nieto has denied taking any bribes.

** When imprisoned in Mexico in 2016, Guzman bribed a national prison official $2 million to be transferred to a different facility, but the move was unsuccessful.

MURDER

** After a rival cartel member declined to shake Guzman’s hand, he ordered the man killed, fueling a war between the cartels, Zambada said.

** When assassins reporting to Guzman killed a police official who worked for a rival, Zambada said, they lured him out of his house by pretending they had hit his son with a car.

** Guzman ordered Cifuentes to kill the cartel’s communications expert after learning he was cooperating with the FBI. But Cifuentes said he was unable to carry out the hit because he did not know the man’s last name.

** When Damazo Lopez Nunez, a top lieutenant to Guzman, told his boss that a Mexican mayor wanted them to “remove” a troublesome police officer, Guzman told him they should do her the favor because the mayor was a favorite for an upcoming state election, Lopez testified. He said Guzman told him to make the killing look like revenge from a gang member.

** Lopez also said Guzman’s sons killed a prominent reporter in Sinaloa because he published an article about cartel infighting against their wishes.

** One of Guzman’s former bodyguards, Isaias Valdez Rios, said he watched his boss personally kill three rival cartel members. Guzman shot one of them and ordered his underlings to bury the man while he was gasping for air. On another occasion, Guzman tortured two men for hours before shooting them each in the head and ordering their bodies tossed into a flaming pit.

SAFE HOUSES AND ESCAPES

** For a period of Guzman’s time as a fugitive in Sinaloa, in northern Mexico, his posse lived in “humble pine huts” with tinted windows, satellite televisions and washer-dryers, Cifuentes said. About 50 guards formed three rings around the homes to keep watch.

** Guzman escaped into a tunnel hidden beneath a bathtub when U.S. agents raided one of his homes in 2014, said Sanchez, his lover. She followed Guzman, who was completely naked, into the passage, feeling water trickle down her legs. “It was very dark and I was very scared,” she said.

** Guzman’s wife helped her husband tunnel out of a Mexican prison in 2015 by passing messages to his associates, Lopez testified. She unsuccessfully tried to help him duplicate the escape when he was captured the next year.

(Reporting by Brendan Pierson in New York; Additional reporting and writing by Daina Beth Solomon in Mexico City; Editing by Tom Brown and Dan Grebler)