A Mexican drug kingpin arrested within the US final month will face trial in Brooklyn after a decide authorized prosecutors’ request to maneuver the case from Texas to the Large Apple.
Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, 76, co-founder of Mexico’s brutal Sinaloa drug cartel, was taken into custody July 25 alongside Joaquin Guzmán López, son of notorious jailed chief Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán.
Officers stated the pair had been lured onto a airplane believing they had been going to take a look at actual property in Mexico. As an alternative, the plane landed in El Paso, Texas, the place US Homeland Safety brokers had been ready to arrest the boys on costs associated to drug-trafficking linked to the lethal unfold of fentanyl and methamphetamine, the Justice Division stated.
“The previous man received tricked,” one legislation enforcement supply advised The Los Angeles Instances.
However Zambada disputes claims he was tricked, insisting he was ambushed at a gathering in Culiacan, Mexico and placed on the three-hour flight to the US.
“On the contrary, I used to be kidnapped and delivered to the US forcibly and in opposition to my will,” Zambada wrote in a letter from jail that was launched by his lawyer and obtained by CBS Information.
Zambada faces costs throughout a number of US jurisdictions, together with in Brooklyn federal courtroom, the place El Chapo was sentenced to life in jail in 2019 after being convicted of quite a few drug and conspiracy offenses.
The kingpin’s Brooklyn costs embody operating a seamless legal enterprise, homicide conspiracy, drug offenses and different crimes.
The decide’s order mandates Zambada be scheduled for an preliminary courtroom look “with out additional delay” however a date was not instantly recognized.
A spokesperson for the Japanese District of New York stated he had no touch upon the submitting.
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