By EFE
Aug 11, 2024, 4:59 PM EDT
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has asked to wait for the version of Sinaloa Governor Rubén Rocha Moya’s statement on his alleged meeting with drug traffickers from the Sinaloa Cartel that resulted in the handover of Ismael ‘El Mayo’ Zambada to US authorities on July 25.
The co-founder of the Sinaloa Cartel, El Mayo, has made public a letter in which he reveals that he had been summoned to a town in Sinaloa, in northern Mexico, to help resolve a dispute between the governor of that state and former congressman Héctor Melesio Cuén.
“We have to wait for the governor (of Sinaloa) to give his version and for us to have all the elements (…) we have to act in a prudent, cautious manner,” López Obrador told the media during a tour of the border state of Baja California Sur, accompanied by the future president of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum.
He also expressed his support for Governor Rocha, from his party Movimiento de Regeneración Nacional (Morena), and said that on Monday, during his usual press conference, he could speak about this alleged meeting with more information.
In statements signed by El Mayo and shared with EFE by his lawyer, Frank Pérez, Zamaba revealed the details of the day he was brought to the United States and linked his “kidnapping” to the murder of former congressman Héctor Cuén Ojeda in Culiacán, Sinaloa.
López Obrador stressed that “what is important (in this case) is that there is peace, there is tranquility in Sinaloa, in the entire region and in the entire country.”
According to this statement, the co-founder of the Sinaloa Cartel would have been taken to the United States by an ambush orchestrated by El Chapo’s son, Joaquín Guzmán López, and one of the leaders of the ‘Los Chapitos’ cell of the Sinaloa Cartel, who surrendered voluntarily.
Guzmán López was transferred to Chicago, where he has already pleaded guilty to the drug trafficking charges against him, and El Mayo is expected to be sent to New York, where he is facing charges pending in the same federal court where El Chapo was sentenced to life in prison in 2019.
Zambada has already appeared twice for preliminary hearings before a federal court in El Paso, where he pleaded not guilty to the charges against him, including drug trafficking and money laundering.
Continue reading:
- What are the historical rivalries of the Sinaloa cartel and how does the capture of “El Mayo” and the son of El Chapo affect them?
- Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada will remain in custody without bail in the U.S.
- Son of “El Mayo” warned his father not to go to the meeting that led to his capture