The cofounder of Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel on Friday pleaded not guilty to US drug charges after being flown to Texas in a scheme allegedly orchestrated by another top leader of the notorious trafficking ring.
Ismael Zambada Garcia, known as “El Mayo,” cofounder of the cartel, and Joaquin Guzman Lopez, a son of its other cofounder, were taken into custody in El Paso, Texas, on Thursday, US officials said.
Zambada, 76, who faces charges of drug trafficking, money laundering and conspiracy to commit murder, appeared in federal court in El Paso, where a judge read the charges and informed Zambada of his rights.
Photo: AFP
Zambada, who is being held without bond, has entered a plea of not guilty to slew of drug trafficking charges, court records show.
He is to appear in court again on Wednesday next week.
Frank Perez, a lawyer listed for Zambada, said in a message that his client “did not come to the US voluntarily.”
The Mexican authorities said they were not involved in the operation, which Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador described as “an important advance in the fight against drug trafficking.”
Lopez Obrador said he expected a “complete report” from the US on how the men were taken into custody.
“There must be transparency,” he said.
Mexican Secretary of Security and Civilian Protection Rosa Icela Rodriguez said the plane took off with only the pilot from an airport in Hermosillo, Mexico.
Tracking service FlightAware showed the plane stopped transmitting its altitude and speed for about 30 minutes while it was over the mountains of northern Mexico before resuming its course to the US border.
“It is a fact that one person went out from here, three people arrived there,” she said.
US media quoted law enforcement sources as saying that the arrests were the result of a sting operation in which Zambada was unwittingly lured across the border by Guzman Lopez, who is in his mid to late 30s and faces US charges of trafficking cocaine, heroin and other drugs.
Guzman Lopez is one of Sinaloa cofounder Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman four sons, who are collectively known as Los Chapitos, or “The Little Chapos.”
Los Chapitos were engaged in an “internal battle” against Zambada, their father’s former partner, a US Drug Enforcement Administration report released in May said.
CNN, citing a US law enforcement official, said the US authorities exploited the “rift” in the cartel to capture Zambada.
The official said that Zambada boarded a plane with Guzman Lopez for a flight that he believed was intended to inspect property in Mexico near the US border.
Instead, the plane landed in El Paso, where the men were arrested.
NBC News said that Guzman Lopez might have decided to surrender and was “under the impression he would receive more favorable treatment if he brought with him another major cartel figure.”
The situation was calm on Friday in Sinaloa’s state capital, Culiacan, where furious gunmen went on a rampage last year after the arrest and extradition to the US of Ovidio Guzman Lopez, another son of El Chapo, who was convicted of drug charges in New York in 2019 and is serving a life sentence in a maximum security prison.
The Mexican Secretariat of National Defense on Friday sent 200 members of the special forces to the cartel heartland to reinforce security.
Experts said that Zambada’s arrest would usher in a new wave of violence in Mexico even as he could potentially provide loads of information for US prosecutors.
Zambada, who had eluded authorities for decades and had never set foot in prison, was known for being an astute operator, skilled at corrupting officials and having an ability to negotiate with everyone, including rivals.
Removing him from the criminal landscape could set off an internal war for control of the cartel that has a global reach and open the door to the more violent inclinations of a younger generation of Sinaloa traffickers, experts said.
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