Second generation Sinaloan traffickers such as Rafael Caro Quintero, Ernesto Fonseca Carrillo, Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo and Avilés Pérez' nephew Joaquín 'El Chapo' Guzmán[32] would claim they learned all they knew about 'narcotraficantes' while serving in the Avilés organization. According to Bloomberg he rakes in $11 billion a year for the Cartel. [20] It has repeatedly been said to be one of the strongest criminal organizations and the most powerful in Mexico since at least the late 2000s and early 2010s by various sources including the Los Angeles Times. It was discovered as Mexican and San Diego officials were discussing the creation of a cross-border airport between Tijuana and Otay Mesa which would have undermined the drug tunneling operations in the area (see History of the Cross Border Xpress). Gunmen killed the nephew of a Sinaloa cartel leader in the latest attack against relatives of people linked to the drug organization. [5][48], As of 2003, the Sinaloa Cartel became a multi-billion dollar international criminal empire, controlling at least 80% of the global drug trade, controlling over 90% of the worlds narcotics market, and over 90% of the global cocaine, heroin and methamphetamine markets, and was directly responsible for the growth of the cocaine and methamphetamine markets in Asia, Russia, Africa, Australia, and Oceania, controlling narcotics markets in over 170 countries within every continent except Antarctica. 1, a maximum-security prison in the State of Mexico, through a tunnel in his prison cell. Police agencies have long known that Mexican drug cartels help supply Europe’s nearly US$10 billion annual cocaine habit, but acknowledge they have little [30] He also pioneered the use of aircraft to smuggle drugs to the United States.[31]. On the contrary, based on seizure reports, the Sinaloa cartel appears to be the most active smuggler of cocaine. In particular, the report claimed the government was helping the Sinaloa Cartel to take control of the Juarez Valley area and destroy other cartels, especially the Juarez Cartel. [36], Recently, it is believed that the Tijuana Cartel, or at least a sizable majority of it, has been either absorbed or forced to ally with the Sinaloa Federation, in part due to a former high-ranking Tijuana member called Eduardo Teodoro Garcia Simental, alias "El Teo" or "Tres Letras" allying with the Federation.[115][116][117]. Wikimedia Commons Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada García remains at large to this day. In 2003 the FBI indicated him for a range of crimes, but he wasn't caught. [81] On 31 May 1993, Mexican federal agents searching for the gunmen found a partially completed 1,500 feet (460 m) tunnel adjacent to the Tijuana airport and crossing under the U.S.-Mexico border to a warehouse on Otay Mesa in San Diego. He was arrested by the Mexican Army on 18 March 2009 and extradited on 18 February 2010 to Chicago to face federal charges. For example, Mexico has recorded several of its bloodiest years since the arrest and extradition of Sinaloa cartel leader Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán in 2017. Currently, the "Federation's" main rival appears to be the fast-growing Jalisco New Generation Cartel, with most battles between the two groups occurring in the regions of Baja California and Zacatecas over territory for drug trafficking routes. [64][65], On 11 May 2008, Alfonso Gutiérrez Loera, cousin of Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán Loera, and 5 other drug traffickers were arrested after a shootout with Federal Police officers in Culiacan, Sinaloa. [21] The United States Intelligence Community considers the Sinaloa Cartel to be "the most powerful criminal organization in North America" (and possibly the entire Western Hemisphere). If So, Where? [67][68], In March 2009, the Mexican Government announced the deployment of 1,000 Federal Police officers and 5,000 Mexican Army soldiers to restore order in Ciudad Juárez, which has suffered the highest number of casualties in the country. This chart explains the the flow of power from leaders of the gang, to drug supplier connections all the way to gangs running the streets of L.A. selling the drugs and completing the hits or assassinations. This chart explains the the flow of power from leaders of the gang, to drug supplier connections all the way to gangs running the streets of L.A. selling the drugs and completing the hits or assassinations. [97] As with prior "super tunnels", it was equipped with an elevator and electric rail cars to efficiently ferry narcotics across the U.S.-Mexico border. Lors de l'année 2006, face à la violence et l'influence grandissante des cartels, le président mexicain de l'époque Vicente Fox décide de mener l'assaut et d'attaquer de front les acteurs du narco-trafic dans leurs fiefs au Mexique. In March 2015, BBC TV programme This World broadcast an episode entitled "Secrets of Mexico's Drug War"[109] which reported on the US government's Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives' Operation Fast and Furious which had allowed licensed firearms dealers to sell weapons to illegal buyers acting on behalf of Mexican drug cartel leaders, in particular the Sinaloa Cartel. [35][36] Guzman and Zambada became Mexico's top drug kingpins in 2003, after the arrest of their rival Osiel Cárdenas Guillén of the Gulf Cartel. “Collage” of Joaquin Guzman . Another close associate, Javier Torres Félix, was arrested and extradited to the U.S. in December 2006. One report quotes a former Juarez police commander who claimed the entire department was working for the Sinaloa Cartel and helping it to fight other groups. But during his trial in 2018, Guzmán’s attorneys claimed that he was the victim of a conspiracy by the cartel’s true leader — Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada García. The police informant added more names to the file. We have you covered... Zambada is accused of being a major stakeholder in the international trafficking of high class drugs. The latter due to the coast of Mexico from which it originated. The Sinaloa cartel's loss of partners in Mexico does not appear to have affected its ability to smuggle drugs from South America to the USA. ... Who is the leader (s) of the Sinaloa Cartel ? El Azul is one of the Sinaloa cartel’s remaining top leaders — after the capture of Joaquin Guzman Loera, alias “ El Chapo ,” in February — the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has been offering $5 million for his arrest since a 2004 indictment . Felix began generating buzz on social media in recent years for looking a lot like reality star Kim Kardashian. Top Mexican drug cartel captures or killings in recent years: — Feb. 27, 2015: Authorities say Servando "La Tuta" Gomez, one of the world's most … When Héctor Luis Palma Salazar (a.k.a. Secrets of Mexico's Drug War", "Lieutenant in Mexican drug cartel a wanted man", "Mexico arrests 'drug lord' Edgar Valdez", Tourists evacuated following shootout between Mexican army and drug hitmen, Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman-Loera on America's Most Wanted, Jose Espinoza—The "Leonardo da Vinci" of the Sinaloa Cartel—, Why Mexico's Sinaloa Cartel Loves Selling Drugs in Chicago, Cartel: The Coming Invasion of Mexico's Drug Wars, El Narco: Inside Mexico's Criminal Insurgency, Manhunt of Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán (2001–2014), https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Sinaloa_Cartel&oldid=994289152, Organized crime groups in the United States, Articles with dead external links from June 2016, Pages using infobox criminal organization with ethnicity or ethnic makeup parameters, Pages using infobox criminal organization with rivals parameter, Articles containing Spanish-language text, Articles containing potentially dated statements from 2017, All articles containing potentially dated statements, Articles with unsourced statements from December 2020, Articles with unsourced statements from November 2011, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, 8 November 1992 ( in reality 1991 )-ongoing, +20.000 between soldiers and hit men, +500, in total 636 deaths and thousands of injured, 1, The Sinaloa Cartel has in both recent and past times; most often been the primary, The organization has also become the subject of several documentaries, such as. Calls for his extradition to the United States started just hours after his arrest. Key cities along the corridor include the Mexicali plaza, San Luis Rio Colorado plaza, Sonoyta plaza, Nogales plaza, and the Agua Prieta plaza. Felix is rumored to have been the head of Los Antrax, the armed enforcement wing of Sinaloa cartel, The Telegraph added, citing local media. From there it is smuggled north to Mexico and later into the U.S.[44] Other shipments of cocaine are believed to originate in Colombia from Cali and Medellín drug-trafficking groups from which the Sinaloa Cartel handle transportation across the U.S. border to distribution cells in Arizona, California, Illinois, Texas, New York, and Washington state. Zambada will feature in an episode of the upcoming Netflix series, World's Most Wanted (dropping August 5). ... Who is the leader (s) of the Sinaloa Cartel ? Mexico Arrests Sinaloa Cartel Leader Published: Wednesday, 03 May 2017 18:57; Written by Vanja Lakic Twitter. [citation needed] Another source in the story was the U.S. trial of Manuel Fierro-Mendez, an ex-Juarez police captain who admitted to working for the Sinaloa Cartel. Each investment, split evenly with Colombian suppliers, could yield tens of millions of dollars in profit, he said. Have They Been Here In The US? Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, who eventually founded the Guadalajara Cartel, was arrested in 1989 and, while incarcerated, he remained one of Mexico's major traffickers, maintaining contact with his organization via mobile phone until he was transferred to a new maximum security prison in the 1990s. [75] In addition to maintaining its anti-Zetas alliance with the Gulf cartel, Sinaloa in 2011 affiliated itself with the Knights Templar in Michoacán, and to counter Los Zetas in Jalisco state, Sinaloa affiliated itself with the Jalisco New Generation Cartel. [49] At this time the organization was laundering money at global scale, mainly through British bank HSBC. As shown by image 2 Ejido Tampico, from 1970 to 2000, the occupied land at the Tijuana airport remained relatively undeveloped. Guzmán resumed his command of the Sinaloa Cartel, but on 8 January 2016, Guzmán was captured again during a raid on a home in the city of Los Mochis, in Guzmán's home state of Sinaloa. ", "Mexico's Sinaloa gang grows empire, defies crackdown", "U.S. Intelligence Says Sinaloa Cartel Has Won Battle for Ciudad Juarez Drug Routes", "Unraveling Mexico's Sinaloa drug cartel", "U.S. charges 10 accused Mexican drug cartel leaders", "Where 7 Mexican drug cartels are active within the U.S.", "Mexican traffickers making New York a hub for lucrative – and deadly – fentanyl", https://www.insightcrime.org/news/analysis/jalisco-cartel-dominate-mexico/, https://themazatlanpost.com/2020/03/30/after-months-of-internal-war-el-mayo-zambada-lost-control-of-the-sinaloa-cartel-to-the-children-of-el-chapo/, "Reconceptualizing the Illegal Narcotics Trade and Its Effect on the Colombian and the Mexican State", "Mexican Drug Cartels: Government Progress and Growing Violence", Major Mexican Drug Trafficker's Assets in U.S. The Sinaloa Cartel are the main antagonists of 2018 film The Mule, starring Clint Eastwood. El Licenciado reportedly assumed leadership of El Chapo’s faction of the Sinaloa Cartel while Guzmán was in prison between 2014 and 2015. El Chapo), has used the Jalisco New Generation Cartel as its armed wing to fight off Los Zetas in Guzmán's turf and to carry out incursions to other territories like Nuevo Laredo and Veracruz in the past. While El Chapo is widely described as the cartel’s leader, that notion obscures the fact that Sinaloa operates more like a federation with multiple leaders who form something analogous to a board of directors. [36], In retaliation, the Tijuana Cartel attempted to set up Guzmán at Guadalajara airport on 24 May 1993. On 11 July 2015 "El Chapo" escaped from a maximum security prison, which is his second successful jailbreak from a maximum security facility in 14 years. But after El Chapo was extradited to the U.S. in January 2017, a war erupted between El Licenciado and El Chapo’s sons. [36] The dead included Roman Catholic Cardinal Juan Jesús Posadas Ocampo. I’ve covered Mexico’s drug violence for 18 years, written two books about the subject, and seen many extraordinary episodes. It relies on eight "plaza" bosses, leaders of a specific geographic region along the corridor, to coordinate, direct, and support the flow of narcotics north into the United States. After the crumbling of the Guadalajara Cartel in the 1980s, those involved in the crime network split into two groups. Archivaldo “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera was for years the leader of the Sinaloa Cartel, and his main partner and even co-leader was Zambada, his compadre as well. Mexican authorities want a Sinaloa cartel leader’s son extradited, but he’s already cooperating with U.S. law enforcement. Guzmán has two close associates, Ismael Zambada García and Ignacio Coronel Villareal. The Sinaloa Cartel, once led by Joaquín Guzmán Loera (a.k.a. Les chefs du cartel de Sinaloa, Joaquin Guzman, Ismael Zambada et Juan Jose Esparagoza Morreno, menèrent de front des assauts contre l'armée et la marine mexicaine au Sinaloa e… Guzmán also faces federal indictment in several locations including San Diego, New York, and Texas, among other places. [60], The Sinaloa Cartel has operations in the Philippines as a trans-shipment point for drugs smuggled into the United States. As seen on image 1 Drug tunnel corridors the close proximity of the former Ejido Tampico to the Tijuana airport and U.S.-Mexico border made it an ideal staging area for smuggling operations into the United States. At least 15 people were executed in Culiacán, Mexico, on Wednesday amid a civil war in the Sinaloa drug cartel between the sons of ex-leader El Chapo and the group's co-founder. In 1999, the Tijuana airport was privatized and became part of a 12 airport network known as Grupo Aeroportuario del Pacífico (Pacific Airport Group). Inside the Sinaloa Cartel’s Move Toward Europe | MojaNews ... Search Looking for a new Netflix series to binge or the best movies to watch on Amazon Prime? [110] The BBC also reported on Vicente Zambada Niebla's claims of immunity from prosecution under a deal between the Mexican and US governments and his claims that the Sinaloa Cartel's leaders had provided US federal agents with information about rival Mexican drug gangs. [88][89], Similar to the "Taj Mahal" of drug tunnels discovered on Otay Mesa in 1993,[82] the 2006 drug "super tunnel" was traced back to the Sinaloa Cartel. A federal judge in Mexico has issued an arrest warrant for the son of a former Sinaloa cartel boss accused of ordering the murder of a legendary Mexican journalist, but the quest for justice in the high-profile killing remains far from over. If So, Where? Due to his old age and the fact he has diabetes, his days leading the Cartel are numbered. Mexico arrests ‘Gulf drug cartel leader’ Man said to be Jorge Eduardo Costilla Sanchez, one of Mexico’s most-wanted drug lords, arrested and presented to public. He is considered to be the first generation of major Mexican drug smugglers of marijuana who marked the birth of large-scale Mexican drug trafficking. The shipments were mostly bought from the Sinaloa Cartel and at times from the Beltrán-Leyva Cartel, and it is assumed that both cartels threatened the Flores crew with violence if they bought from other rival drug organizations. The Sinaloa Cartel has a presence in at least 22 of the 31 Mexican states, with important centers in Mexico City, Tepic, Toluca, Zacatecas, Guadalajara, and most of the state of Sinaloa. Such information ensured Loya-Castro was immune from prosecution while also keeping the DEA concentrated on Sinaloa's rivals and away from their leadership. 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