How US captured one of Mexico’s biggest drug lords

It appeared like a narrative ripped from a narco thriller: One of many largest drug lords in Mexico was lured onto an airplane, flown throughout the border and offered to U.S. federal brokers by the son of his former associate in crime. As unbelievable as it could appear, that’s precisely what seems to have occurred Thursday night, when a Beechcraft King Air turboprop landed at a small municipal airport outdoors El Paso, Texas, and off stepped one of the needed males in Mexico: Ismael Zambada García, a founding father of the infamous Sinaloa drug cartel. Zambada García, often called El Mayo, had for many years evaded seize by each Mexican and U.S. officers, dwelling a lifetime of luxurious simplicity within the mountains of Sinaloa — regardless of the $15 million U.S. bounty on his head. However ultimately, U.S. officers stated, he was betrayed by an unlikely foe: a son of his closest legal ally, Joaquín Guzmán Loera, the notorious drug lord often called El Chapo, who’s now serving a life sentence in a U.S. federal jail.

El Chapo’s son, Joaquín Guzmán López, tricked Zambada García into boarding the airplane, the U.S. officers stated, telling him they have been going to take a look at actual property in northern Mexico. The older man had no concept that he was truly en path to Texas, the place he could be delivered into the fingers of U.S. brokers who had lengthy been on his tail.

The dramatic cross-border flight got here after years of quiet contact between Guzmán López and a small staff of U.S. legislation enforcement officers within the FBI and Homeland Safety Division who had doggedly been chasing him, his three brothers and Zambada García within the wake of Guzmán Loera’s landmark conviction on drug conspiracy expenses 5 years in the past. It stays unclear at this level how a lot the legislation enforcement officers formed or directed the occasions that unfolded Thursday, however they have been conscious that Zambada García was on the airplane because it neared the U.S. border, based on two folks aware of the matter. And ultimately, no matter what function they performed, the U.S. brokers obtained what they needed: They apprehended a massively vital legal goal that had eluded seize and that they’d lengthy doubted Mexican officers might — or would — get for them.

Virtually instantly, the 2 arrests unleashed a torrent of questions in Mexico, the place the federal government stated that it performed no function and that it was unaware something had taken place till the U.S. Embassy referred to as with the information that Zambada García and Guzmán López have been in custody.

Grilled by reporters Friday morning, Mexico’s secretary of safety, Rosa Icela Rodríguez, stated the federal government didn’t know whether or not the arrest was a part of a take care of U.S. prosecutors.

“It is a part of the investigations, whether or not it was a seize or a give up,” Rodríguez stated. “That is a part of what the U.S. authorities should clarify.”

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador stated his administration anticipated the U.S. authorities to offer a “full report” on how the detentions passed off — together with whether or not there was a earlier settlement with Zambada García or Guzmán López.

“There isn’t any mistrust,” he added. “What we have now all the time requested for is respect.”

There was no formal extradition request for Zambada García, who has been underneath indictment in america for greater than 20 years, with overlapping drug conspiracy expenses in a number of states. And though U.S. officers have been unable to catch him inside Mexico, even with the assistance of elite troops from the Mexican navy, there have been a number of close to misses in recent times.

By duping Zambada García onto the airplane, Guzmán López gave america the bounty it had lengthy been after. And, in doing so, he could have additionally elevated his personal probabilities of getting a positive deal for himself and the brother he’s closest to, Ovidio Guzmán López, who was already in U.S. federal custody.

Zambada García waived a private look Friday at a listening to in U.S. District Court docket in El Paso, getting into a plea of not responsible to drug conspiracy expenses by means of a lawyer. He was held in custody pending a detention listening to scheduled for Wednesday.

Guzmán López is predicted to seem Tuesday for his personal preliminary listening to in U.S. District Court docket in Chicago.

U.S. legislation enforcement brokers have maintained a quiet again channel with Guzmán López for a while, one which elevated considerably in frequency after Ovidio was extradited to face trial in Chicago final September, based on three folks aware of his scenario.

Though it stays unclear how a lot impact that outreach had on his determination to trick Zambada García, delivering a prize corresponding to El Mayo to U.S. prosecutors might solely assist his probabilities of getting pleasant phrases in any future plea deal.

U.S. officers had additionally been quietly negotiating on and off for a minimum of three years with Zambada García about his personal potential give up, though these talks finally went nowhere.

On Friday, Rodríguez urged that authorities believed a non-public Cessna airplane carried the 2 crime bosses in a foreign country, publicly figuring out the pilot as an American citizen named Larry Curtis Parker.

She stated the airplane took off about 8 a.m. on Thursday. However a U.S. official aware of the information of the case stated the airplane that flew the 2 males out of Hermosillo was a Beechcraft that had left the airport at about 2 p.m.

Reached by telephone Friday afternoon, a person who recognized himself as Parker stated Mexican officers have been flawed in naming him because the pilot who had flown the 2 males over the border. Parker acknowledged that he flew a small Cessna and stated he noticed a Beechcraft parked close to his personal airplane on the Hermosillo airport Thursday.

He stated he had nothing to do with cartel figures. “I am only a clean-cut, hardworking American,” Parker stated.

An official with Mexico’s safety ministry who was not approved to talk publicly stated an investigation would decide whether or not there was any mistake in figuring out the pilot.

The arrest of Zambada García — lengthy thought of a godfather in his nation’s underworld and certainly one of its shrewdest remaining capos — resounded throughout Mexico as one of many largest blows to organized crime in recent times.

“That is the one arrest that may actually shake up the Mexican market,” stated Vanda Felbab-Brown, a senior fellow on the Brookings Establishment and an professional on international drug coverage, saying it might provoke “an incredible quantity of violence and instability throughout the Americas.”

If Zambada García was certainly betrayed, “there’s going to be struggle inside Sinaloa,” stated Eduardo Guerrero, a safety analyst based mostly in Mexico Metropolis, producing brutal waves of violence within the coming weeks. A weakened Sinaloa cartel, he stated, might additionally immediate the rival Jalisco New Technology cartel to push into new territory.

On Friday, a minimum of 200 members of the Mexican Particular Forces have been deployed to Culiacán, the cartel’s stronghold in Sinaloa, to beef up safety, the Mexican navy stated in an announcement.

The arrest might even have political implications, some U.S. officers stated, significantly if Zambada García decides to cooperate with U.S. authorities and disclose what he is aware of about corruption in his nation.

The Sinaloa cartel has been battered over the previous a number of months by a wave of arrests concentrating on the higher echelon of the group.

In Might, Néstor Isidro Pérez Salas, who authorities imagine is a prime murderer for the 4 Guzmán brothers, was extradited to New York on drug conspiracy expenses, a part of a sprawling indictment that accuses El Chapo’s sons of being among the many world’s most prolific smugglers of fentanyl. One other suspected Sinaloa murderer, Jorge Iván Gastélum Ávila, was extradited final yr to face trial in Washington.

However consultants stated the arrests have been unlikely to make a dent within the flows of fentanyl and different medication throughout the border.

“It isn’t a deadly blow,” stated Valentin Pereda, a professor of criminology on the College of Montreal. “All people in Sinaloa mourned the arrest of El Chapo. However on the similar time, the group survived and continued rising.”

“It might take months of actually intensive warfare” inside the cartel for the world to detect a change in fentanyl trafficking dynamics, Felbab-Brown added. “We’re distant from that second.”

This text initially appeared in The New York Instances.