A strong Mexican drug cartel chief who eluded authorities for many years was duped into flying into the U.S., the place he was arrested alongside a son of Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, based on a U.S. regulation enforcement official accustomed to the matter.
Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada acquired on an airplane to the U.S. believing he was going some place else, mentioned the official, who spoke on the situation on anonymity as a result of they weren’t licensed to debate the matter. The official didn’t present further particulars, together with who persuaded Zambada to get on the aircraft or the place precisely he thought he was going.
Upon arriving within the El Paso space, Zambada and Joaquín Guzmán López, a son of infamous drug kingpin “El Chapo,” who was sentenced to life in a U.S. jail in 2019, had been instantly taken into custody by U.S. authorities, officers mentioned.
Zambada appeared in federal court docket in El Paso Friday morning and has entered a plea of not responsible to slew of drug trafficking fees, court docket data present. A lawyer listed for Zambada didn’t instantly reply to an electronic mail in search of remark Friday.
Zambada, one of the crucial highly effective drug lords on this planet, has been a key goal for the U.S. authorities for years in its bid to take down leaders of the Sinaloa cartel that’s chargeable for trafficking big sums of medication throughout the border. U.S. authorities had supplied a reward of as much as $15 million for info resulting in his seize.
Zambada’s arrest “strikes on the coronary heart of the cartel that’s accountable for almost all of medication, together with fentanyl and methamphetamine, killing Individuals from coast to coast,” mentioned U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration chief Anne Milgram.
“Fentanyl is the deadliest drug risk our nation has ever confronted, and the Justice Division won’t relaxation till each single cartel chief, member, and affiliate chargeable for poisoning our communities is held accountable,” Lawyer Basic Merrick Garland mentioned in an announcement Thursday night.
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador mentioned Friday that Mexico was nonetheless awaiting particulars concerning the arrests and was not concerned within the operation. He hailed the arrests, although he steered others may step in to fill the vacuum. That’s why his administration has targeted on addressing the basis causes of drug use and the related violence, he mentioned.
Mexican Safety Secretary Rosa Icela Rodríguez mentioned the aircraft took off with solely the pilot from the airport in Hermosillo, Mexico. The flight monitoring service Flight Conscious confirmed the aircraft stopped transmitting its altitude and velocity for about half-hour whereas it was over the mountains of northern Mexico earlier than resuming its course to the U.S. border.
“It’s a incontrovertible fact that one individual went out from right here, three folks arrived there,” she mentioned.
Zambada is charged in numerous U.S. circumstances, together with in New York and California. Prosecutors introduced a brand new indictment in opposition to him in New York in February, describing him because the “principal chief of the prison enterprise chargeable for importing monumental portions of narcotics into the US.”
One of many longest-surviving capos in Mexico, Zambada was thought of the cartel’s strategist, extra concerned in day-to-day operations than his flashier and better-known boss, “El Chapo.”
Zambada is an old style capo in an period of youthful kingpins recognized for his or her flamboyant life of club-hopping and brutal ways of beheading, dismembering and even skinning their rivals. Whereas Zambada has fought those that challenged him, he’s recognized for concentrating on the enterprise facet of trafficking and avoiding grotesque cartel violence that will draw consideration.
In an April 2010 interview with the Mexican journal Proceso, he acknowledged that he lived in concern of going to jail and would ponder suicide fairly than be captured.
“I’m fearful of being incarcerated,” Zambada mentioned. “I’d prefer to suppose that, sure, I might kill myself.”
The interview was shocking for a kingpin recognized for protecting his head down, however he gave strict directions on the place and when the encounter would happen, and the article gave no trace of his whereabouts.
Zambada seemingly gained the loyalty of locals in his house state of Sinaloa and neighboring Durango via his largess, sponsoring native farmers and distributing cash and beer in his birthplace of El Alamo.
Though little is thought about Zambada’s formative years, he’s believed to have gotten his begin as an enforcer within the Nineteen Seventies. By the early Nineties, he was a significant participant within the Juarez cartel, transporting tons of cocaine and marijuana.
Zambada began gaining the belief of Colombian traffickers, allegiances that helped him come out on prime within the cartel world of ever-shifting alliances. Finally he grew to become so highly effective that he broke off from the Juarez cartel, however nonetheless managed to maintain sturdy ties with the gang and averted a turf battle. He additionally developed a partnership with “El Chapo” Guzman that will take him to the highest of the Sinaloa Cartel.
Zambada’s detention follows some necessary arrests of different Sinaloa cartel figures, together with one in every of his sons and one other son of “El Chapo” Guzmán, Ovidio Guzmán López.
Ovidio Guzmán López was arrested and extradited to the U.S. final yr. He pleaded not responsible to drug trafficking fees in Chicago in September. The Bureau of Prisons inmate locator confirmed Ovidio Guzmán López was launched Tuesday, however Rodríguez mentioned U.S. authorities knowledgeable Mexico he was not freed however simply had his custody modified.
In 2021, Zambada’s son pleaded responsible in federal court docket in San Diego to being a pacesetter within the Sinaloa cartel.
In recent times, Guzman’s sons have led a faction of the cartel often known as the little Chapos, or “Chapitos,” that has been recognized as a essential exporter of fentanyl to the U.S. market. Their safety chief was arrested by Mexican authorities in November.
