Mexico to give away ‘El Chapo’ safe house in lottery
- A hole under a bathtub that the drug kingpin had escaped through has been covered up, and the surveillance cameras outside removed
- Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán fled the building in 2014 when it was surrounded by Mexican marines
The house former drug kingpin Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán fled in 2014 when Mexican marines had him surrounded underwent some changes recently as the Mexican government prepared to give it away in a national lottery.
The surveillance cameras that covered every angle of the modest home’s exterior were removed. And the hole under a bathtub that Guzmán had slipped through to reach a network of tunnels was covered with a concrete slab.
Associated Press was given access to the property in a quiet Culiacan neighbourhood ahead of the lottery. In recent weeks, Mexico’s Institute to Return Stolen Goods to the People, known by its initials as INDEP, gave it a fresh coat of white paint inside and out and tiled over the spot in the bathroom where the tub and tunnel entry point had been.
President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has been talking up the lottery of seized properties, but gave no mention to the history of this particular house. An expansive home in one of Mexico City’s swankiest neighbourhoods and a private box at the famed Azteca Stadium have garnered more attention.
INDEP’s website lists it only as “Casa en Culiacán”. It is about 2,800 square feet and located, perhaps appropriately, in a neighbourhood called Libertad, or “Freedom”. The government values the two-bedroom home at US$183,000.