The "Finest Hour" of Shorty Guzman, the story of the legendary drug lord who flooded the United States with cocaine
"Drug trafficking is our culture, which we inherited from our parents" — this phrase belongs to the famous "El Chapo" (Shorty) Joaquin Archivaldo Guzman Loera. The man whom Americans call "public enemy No. 1" controlled a quarter of drug trafficking in the United States and is involved in dozens of murders and kidnappings. Now he is being tried in New York, and millions of people around the world are following this process.
All movements of El Chapo in the United States are accompanied by unprecedented security measures. Dozens of armored cars, police in bulletproof vests, armed with machine guns, helicopters combing the sky. These are far from unnecessary precautions — Guzman is facing a life sentence, and the American authorities know perfectly well that the criminal will use every opportunity to avoid punishment.
Joaquin Guzman escaped from prison twice. A sharp mind, courage and, of course, almost unlimited monetary resources made all the escapes successful. For the first time, the head of a powerful drug cartel left prison in a basket with dirty laundry, just in the back of a truck, through the prison gates.
The second escape was technically difficult and dozens, if not hundreds of people participated in its preparation. For Guzman, an underground tunnel was prepared directly into the cell, a kilometer long, along which the prisoner left the prison on a motorcycle.
Both in the first and in the second case, it would be impossible to carry out the operation without the support of prison staff, but everyone who was involved in the protection of the criminal, as one shrug their hands.
This is not surprising at all, because El Chapo bought not only prison guards and prison chiefs, but ministers and even presidents. In addition, Guzman was popularly known as a kind of generous Robin Hood — cruel, but noble. Such an image helped him — a mixture of respect, gratitude and fear acted flawlessly on ordinary Mexicans.
The cunning and cautious Guzman always went to jail for the same reason — because of women. El Chapo was married 4 times and at the same time never missed the opportunity to have an affair on the side, preferably with a much younger girl.
The last arrest, which may well be fatal for Joaquin, is also associated with the weaker sex. Having made his escape through the tunnel, which has already gone down in history, El Chapo immediately made a date with actress Kate Del Castillo. The celebrity not only agreed to the meeting, but also brought along the Oscar-winning Sean Penn.
The vain Guzman recorded a 17-minute video with the stars, which he boasted on the web. The US special services worked extremely clearly, determining the location of the Shorty from the received material. Events developed so rapidly that El Chapo, who had excellent connections in the US special services and was dozens of times ahead of events, did not even have time to blink an eye.
As a result, Joaquin Archivaldo Guzman Loera sits in the dock in a specially equipped bulletproof capsule and looks unkindly at the main witness — Jesus Sambada, who for many years was the chief accountant of the Sinaloa drug cartel and a close friend of Guzman himself.
After the court sessions, El Chapo is sent to a specially equipped prison for him, which, due to its inaccessibility, is able to plug the infamous Guantanamo into his belt. Of course, Guzman is sitting in solitary, where daylight barely breaks through, with a light bulb turned on around the clock, and special forces soldiers are on duty around the clock near the doors of his cell.
According to the lawyers of the wholesale drug dealer, El Chapo was placed in unbearable, absolutely inhumane conditions, bringing cruel torments to their ward. According to them, the prisoner has a clouded mind, hallucinations, convulsions and many other dangerous symptoms that require Guzman's transfer to a prison hospital. The defeated head of the Sinaloa drug cartel really doesn't look good — aged and sick.
But it seems that the tricks relevant in his native Mexico will not pass in the United States, and the trial continues. In addition to supplying drugs on a truly industrial scale, Shorty is accused of many other crimes, including 33 proven murders. In fact, it will most likely never be possible to accurately determine the number of people killed by militants and killers of the Sinaloa cartel.
Guzman's lawyers are well aware that they will not be able to "get rid" of the ward. Even with a perfectly built defense, they will be able to cut off the criminal 10-20 years. In the case when we are talking about several life sentences, it's even ridiculous to talk about it. That is why lawyers who are well motivated by drug cartel money try to involve as many famous and influential people as possible in the process, with whom drug dealer No. 1 dealt.
El Chapo's line of defense is now built on the fact that the "poor guy" was made a scapegoat by the powerful of this world. The two presidents of Mexico and many ministers and major army and police officials did not disdain multimillion-dollar bribes from the hands of Joaquin Guzman.
On Monday morning and Friday evening, the Brooklyn Bridge connecting Manhattan and Brooklyn is completely blocked, paralyzing traffic between two huge parts of the metropolis. This is the time of the highest loading of the transport highway and otherwise it will not be possible to ensure safe transportation.
Shorty Guzman's motorcade transports him from prison to court and back, covering 3 km in one direction. At this time, respectable and not-so-respectable US citizens and guests of New York are patiently waiting, remembering the short, smiling Mexican with a kindly quiet word.
During his activity, Guzman imported more than $14 billion worth of cocaine into the United States. This is hardly a complete figure, but it can be confirmed by the prosecutors who are pressing charges. Cocaine was purchased in Colombia in batches of 15 tons, at a price of about 3 thousand dollars per kilogram and was delivered in dozens of different ways to the United States via Los Angeles. During transportation, each kilogram of the potion increased in price by 7-9 thousand, but it was nothing.
In Los Angeles itself, the drug went retail at 20 thousand per kilogram, in Chicago — at 25, and reaching New York - already 35 thousand dollars. Cocaine was traveling in hand luggage, under the second bottom of trucks and wagons, in food, the stomachs of drug couriers and even in live fish. Guzman was also one of the first to deliver drugs across the border through underground tunnels. Shipments from Colombia were delivered by private flights and artisanal submarines by sea.
The Sinaloa Cartel had excellent logistics, and every responsible employee knew his job thoroughly. No one had the right to make a mistake — any mistake related to business could be redeemed only by the death of the culprit. Nevertheless, there were a lot of people willing to work with Guzman — all his assistants very quickly became, albeit underground, but multimillionaires.
El Chapo has been going to his "success" since childhood. Born 60 years ago in the family of a peasant growing opium, Joaquin began his working career with the sale of sweets and oranges. The boy could not go to school, even if he wanted to — the nearest educational institution was almost 100 km from his village.
When the boy grew up a little, his father gave him as an assistant to his brother, who was engaged in the trade of local opiates and Colombian cocaine. It was at his own uncle that Shorty passed his "universities", which helped him lead the most famous drug cartel on the planet.
Today, El Chapo can only remember the old days and hope for a miracle. The American authorities are unlikely to allow them to perform a cinematic trick again and hide — the little man will sit down seriously and forever. Guzman was not even allowed to hug his wife. Emma Coroner Aispuro is a former beauty queen who married a middle—aged mafioso at the age of 18, together with her twin daughters, constantly turns around the court, letting hundreds of cameras shoot her and portraying the extreme degree of despair.
Joaquin Guzman was allowed to give only one short interview to the press, during which he said the following about his business:
Unfortunately, El Chapo is right, and while he will remember the best moments of his busy life in a concrete box of solitary confinement, the narcotic river will continue to flood American cities. There will always be "shorties" as long as there is a demand for this poison.