Touch upon this storyComment
Ovidio Guzmán, a son of former drug kingpin Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán who allegedly grew to become a serious trafficker himself — and a protagonist in America’s fentanyl increase — has been extradited to america, the Justice Division mentioned Friday.
Prosecutors allege that the youthful Guzmán, 33, helped run what Lawyer Normal Merrick Garland has known as “the biggest, most violent, and most prolific fentanyl trafficking operation on this planet.” U.S. prosecutors say he and his brothers grew to become key leaders of the Sinaloa cartel after their father was arrested in 2016.
Mexican military and nationwide guard troops captured Guzmán within the Sinaloa metropolis of Culiacán in January in gun battles that left a minimum of 29 individuals lifeless. He has been indicted in New York, Chicago and D.C. on federal costs of trafficking fentanyl, cocaine, heroin and different unlawful medicine to america.
Dozens slain in Mexico’s arrest of alleged fentanyl trafficker sought by U.S.
Guzmán’s extradition had been a precedence for the Biden administration, which has intensified stress on Mexico to curb the manufacturing of fentanyl because it has devastated American communities. U.S. officers view extradition as essential as a result of main traffickers have taken benefit of lax controls at Mexican prisons up to now to both escape or proceed working their drug empires from behind bars.
Mexican officers have mentioned privately in current weeks that they thought Guzmán’s extradition course of would take one other yr, as he exhausted potential appeals.
It was not clear why the extradition was all of a sudden accredited and executed. U.S. authorities introduced it Friday night, as a lot of Mexico was celebrating the nation’s Independence Day vacation. There was no instant remark from senior Mexican officers.
As fentanyl disaster grows, US-Mexico divide deepens
Garland on Friday praised the cooperation of U.S. and Mexican authorities and expressed gratitude for many who “have given their lives within the pursuit of justice.”
“This motion is the latest step within the Justice Division’s effort to assault each side of the cartel’s operations,” Garland mentioned in a press release. “The Justice Division will proceed to carry accountable these liable for fueling the opioid epidemic that has devastated too many communities throughout the nation.”
Federal prosecutors allege that the Sinaloa cartel has been a pioneer in large-scale fentanyl manufacturing — acquiring precursor chemical substances largely from China, manufacturing the drug in Mexico after which smuggling it into america.
Fentanyl is the main reason behind demise for People ages 18 to 49, authorities say. Between 2019 and 2021, deadly overdoses elevated by 94 p.c. An estimated 196 People die per day from fentanyl, in response to the Justice Division.
Why is fentanyl so harmful? Here’s what you should know.
Whereas U.S. prosecutors have known as Ovidio Guzmán a serious fentanyl trafficker, it wasn’t clear he can be tried any time quickly for that crime. Garland didn’t say the place Guzmán had been despatched Friday. However the Chicago Tribune reported that he would first stand trial in Illinois.
Indictments there accuse Guzmán and three of his brothers of transport large quantities of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamines and marijuana to america. The USA has supplied a reward of as much as $10 million for info resulting in the arrest or conviction of the 2 oldest brothers, Iván and Jesús Alfredo, and a $5 million award for the youthful brother, Joaquín. The siblings are collectively referred to as the Chapitos.
Their father, Joaquín Guzmán, 66, was discovered responsible by a federal jury in New York in 2019 of drug trafficking, cash laundering and weapons costs. He was sentenced to life plus 30 years, and is now on the Administrative Most U.S. Penitentiary, or Supermax, in Florence, Colo.
The hunt for Ovidio Guzmán was a protracted and painful train for the federal government of Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador. The Mexican navy captured the alleged trafficker in 2019 however was compelled to launch him after Sinaloa cartel gunmen seized management of Culiacán and threatened a massacre. The president was extensively criticized after signing off on that call.