Mexican drug lord Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzman found guilty at US trial, faces life sentence
- El Chapo’s conviction on all 10 counts came after a lurid trial revealed his brutal rise to become the world’s most infamous cartel boss
- Jurors heard about El Chapo’s reputed billionaire lifestyle, the killing of rivals and sex with underage girls
The world’s most infamous drug cartel boss, Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who rose from poverty in rural Mexico to run a global empire and amass billions of dollars, was found guilty in a US court on Tuesday of drug trafficking.
Jurors in federal court in Brooklyn found Guzman, 61, guilty on all 10 counts. He now faces a possible sentence of life in prison.
Guzman, one of the major figures in Mexican drug wars that have roiled the country since 2006, was extradited to the United States for trial in 2017 after he was arrested in Mexico the year before.
Though other high-ranking cartel figures had been extradited previously, Guzman was the first to go to trial instead of pleading guilty.
The trial, which featured testimony from more than 50 witnesses, offered the public an unprecedented look at the inner workings of the Sinaloa Cartel, named for the state in northwestern Mexico where Guzman was born in a poor mountain village.