El Chapo: The Keys To His Defense

2024 Author: Steven Freeman | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 08:15

One of the great unknowns before the start this week of the trial of Joaquín el Chapo Guzmán was how his lawyers were going to face the defense of a client who told everyone that he was one of the greatest drug traffickers in history and had a reputation only surpassed by Pablo Escobar.

The answer was given at the opening of the trial by the main defense lawyer, Jeffrey Lichtman, with an explosive plea in which, among other things, he went so far as to accuse the Mexican President, Enrique Peña Nieto, and his predecessor, Felipe Calderón, of having received "Hundreds of millions" of drug traffickers.

Both immediately rejected the accusations and the judge in the case, Brian Cogan, admonished Lichtman for going "too far" with claims that he will not be able to prove later during the trial.

So far, these have been the main points of the defense lawyers' arguments.

The myth

Probably since Pablo Escobar, no other drug trafficker has enjoyed more renown than El Chapo Guzmán, who the US authorities came to classify as “the number one public enemy” and was described in the press as the most powerful drug trafficker on the planet.

"It is false, it is not true," said Lichtman, for whom the Mexican and US authorities helped feed the "myth of El Chapo" to swell his figure with obscure purposes.

In fact, according to the lawyer, Guzmán is a peasant with a minimal education who cultivated marijuana and who never amassed the fortune that is supposed to him, as when Forbes magazine included him in the list of the richest in the world.

"El Chapo was broke and had to ask for money," said the lawyer. "The truth is, I didn't control anything."

Lichtman acknowledged that his same client contributed to enlarging his public figure with actions such as the interview he gave to Kate del Castillo and Sean Penn in the mountains of Sinaloa, in which he boasted of being the largest trafficker in the world. "He liked popularity, being known."

As for the actions of the US authorities, he accused his agents of having been “dirty” in this case and inflating the importance of the accused to score somewhat in the fight against drug trafficking. "There is a version [of the case] that the governments of Mexico and the United States do not want them to hear," he told the jury.

"Finding Chapo Guzmán guilty would be the greatest trophy this prosecution could ever take," he stressed.

Supporters of this argument that the figure of El Chapo has been overstated highlight that in the two years he has been in prison, neither the flow of drugs to the United States has been affected, nor the Sinaloa cartel, which he is accused of leading. stopped working.

The scapegoat

For the defense, the reason why the Mexican authorities allegedly contributed to El Chapo's "mythology" was his need to protect the real head of the Sinaloa cartel, Ismael el Mayo Zambada, according to Lichtman.

The septuagenarian drug dealer, who remains in search and capture, has lived "calm" while El Chapo was relentlessly persecuted by the authorities, who captured him three times and had him shot at many others, he said.

The lawyer pointed out that El Chapo has been a "scapegoat" for the Mexican Government since the assassination of Cardinal Juan Jesús Posadas Ocampo at the Guadalajara airport in 1993, which generated a huge scandal.

He added that the authorities and the late narco Ramón Arellano Félix conspired to attribute the assassination to his client, who for that persecution fled to Guatemala, where he was arrested and spent several years in the shade.

"Why did the Mexican government need a scapegoat? Because he made a lot of money with the Sinaloa cartel, "he said. "The Government of Mexico has been and is completely corrupt."

Lichtman assured that the power and impunity of the Mayo Zambada were so great that he could even order the Mexican Army whom to eliminate. "The truth is that [El Chapo] did not send anything, who was in command was Mayo Zambada."

Compromised testimonials

A crucial element of the case that the federal prosecution is presenting to the jury is the testimony of former collaborators and partners of the defendant who is currently in prison and have agreed to collaborate with the authorities.

The first to sit in the witness chair was Jesús el Rey Zambada, brother of Mayo Zambada and who has been in prison since his arrest in Mexico City 10 years ago. He is expected to be followed, among others, by Vicente Zambada, the son of Mayo, and Dámaso López Núñez, the official who helped escape from prison in 2001 and went to work with him.

Lichtamn wasted no time in questioning the credibility of these witnesses in his speech. "[They are people] who have lied daily since they learned to walk," said the lawyer, who called them "murderers and liars."

Among other things, he assured that among these convicted drug traffickers there are those who have ordered the murder of prosecutors, the bribery of presidents like that of Honduras, and are capable of doing business even with those who have killed their friends. "They are that kind of scum," he said. "They give chills."

"There are dozens of criminal organizations in Mexico, Colombia or Ecuador, but these cooperating [witnesses] only have to testify against one man: Mr. Guzmán," he added.