Mexico's 'El Chapo' was 'hands-on' boss of narcotics empire

New York (dpa) – Mexican drug boss Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman started a "bloody war" to protect his "vast narcotics trafficking empire," prosecutors said as they opened their case against him on Tuesday.

The 61-year-old is facing 11 criminal charges from the US government, including drug trafficking, conspiracy and running a criminal organization.

The head of the Sinaloa cartel appeared stoic as he sat in court wearing a dark blue suit, with an interpreter translating into Spanish for him. His wife, beauty queen Emma Coronel, was in the court too.

Hundreds of people were involved in the drug operation Guzman ran for more than 25 years, but he was a "hands-on" leader, prosecutor Adam Fels told the Eastern District Court in Brooklyn.

Guzman ordered hitmen to kill those who got in the way of his business but also pulled the trigger himself, Fels said.

The government seized enough cocaine from the cartel to give every US citizen - more than 300 million people - a line of cocaine, Fels said.

Guzman allegedly made billions of dollars through drug smuggling and other illegal businesses.

Prosecutors are also seeking to link Guzman to the deaths of thousands of people allegedly murdered by the cartel and for smuggling thousands of tons of drugs into the US.

Defence attorney Jeffrey Lichtman said Guzman was painted as "the biggest drug dealer in the history of the world" but that was "not true."

Guzman enjoyed the publicity attached to the "mythical El Chapo figure" but in reality he "controlled nothing" and escaped from prison to avoid being assassinated, Lichtman said.

The defence lawyer said Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada – Guzman’s former partner and co-founder of the Sinaloa cartel – was actually the top boss.

Lichtman also criticized the Mexican government, saying Mayo had paid hundreds of millions of dollars of bribes to the country’s current and former presidents to make sure they didn’t interfere in the business.

He also criticized the US government for bringing former associates of Guzman "who will make your skin crawl" into the country to testify against him as witnesses.

If found guilty, Guzman could be handed a life sentence. US prosecutors ruled out seeking the death penalty for Guzman as a condition of his extradition from Mexico.

He has been in solitary confinement in a high-security Manhattan prison for almost two years, since Mexican authorities arrested him in his home state of Sinaloa in January 2016.

At the time of his arrest, he had been on the run for seven months, following a spectacular jailbreak through a tunnel that accomplices had dug to his cell.

The start of the opening statements was delayed to replace two jurors, one who wrote a letter to the judge saying she was too anxious to participate.

Another said he was self-employed and couldn't bear the loss of income for the duration of the trial, which is expected to last several months.

Judge Brian Cogan has ruled that all jurors remain anonymous to ensure their safety during the trial.

Published by dpa International (November 14, 2018)