Peña Nieto Accused Of Receiving Millions From Drug Traffickers

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

In a day loaded with serious accusations, few made more impression at the opening of the trial of Joaquín el Chapo Guzmán than that launched by the chief lawyer of the capo, Jeffrey Lichtman, who assured that the current President of Mexico, Enrique Peña Nieto, and his predecessor have received "hundreds of millions" of dollars from the drug trafficker.

The dart was launched by the lawyer during the defense's initial argument, in which he described his client as “a scapegoat” that the Mexican authorities have used to hide the true lord of the drug trafficker in Mexico, Ismael el Mayo Zambada.

"The current president of Mexico [ Enrique Peña Nieto] and the previous [ Felipe Calderón] have received hundreds of millions of dollars in May," said Lichtman, who repeated the serious accusation in case it had not been heard the first time.

In this sense, he warned that the Mexican Government, with the complicity of Washington, has created "the myth of El Chapo" to divert attention from its ties to the lucrative business of drug trafficking.

"The Government of Mexico has been and continues to be completely corrupt," said the lawyer. "Why did the Mexican government need a scapegoat? Because they did a lot of business with the Sinaloa cartel."

A spokesman for Los Pinos flatly rejected the lawyer's claim, according to Reuters. "That is false," he said.

Lichtman's accusations are part of the kingpin's defense strategy to question the label that he was the almighty owner of a narco empire that assassinated and corrupted without limits with the aim of enriching himself by sending tons and tons of cocaine U. S.

"[El Chapo] is not even the largest drug lord in Mexico," he said, putting the focus back on Mayo Zambada.

The 70-year-old capo remains free in Mexico trying to maintain control of the cartel after the extradition of Chapo and his son Vicente Zambada, who has just pleaded guilty to drug trafficking in a federal court in Chicago.

Precisely Vicente and his uncle Jesús el Rey Zambada are expected to be one of the many repentant drug traffickers that the prosecution will provide as cooperating witnesses in the Chapo trial.

In his plea, the prosecution drew a very different reality and assured that during the four months of trial they will prove that El Chapo was the true leader of the cartel.