When a distinguished politician within the Mexican state of Sinaloa was shot and killed there late final month, state authorities stated he was a sufferer of an tried automotive jacking. That did little to quell hypothesis within the media that the killing was someway associated to high-profile information the identical day: the arrests close to El Paso of two Sinaloa cartel leaders.
Now one of many drug lords, Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, claims the killing of Héctor Melesio Cuén Ojeda occurred throughout an ambush by fellow trafficker Joaquín Guzmán López to pressure Zambada onto a aircraft certain for the U.S.
“I’m conscious that the official model being advised by Sinaloa state authorities is that Héctor Cuen was shot within the night of July twenty fifth at a gasoline station by two males on a motorbike who needed to rob his pick-up truck,” Zambada stated in a press release launched Saturday by his lawyer. “That isn’t what occurred. He was killed on the identical time, and in the identical place, the place I used to be kidnapped.”
Zambada stays jailed in El Paso. His lawyer, Frank Perez, stated he launched the assertion “to set the report straight and counter the false narratives.”
Whereas early stories stated Zambada, 76, had been tricked into boarding the aircraft — one model had him anticipating to examine clandestine airstrips used for drug smuggling — Perez claims the 38-year-old Guzmán López lured the older cartel determine right into a lure by calling him to a gathering within the state capital of Culiacán “to assist resolve variations” between Cuén Ojeda and Sinaloa’s governor, Rubén Rocha Moya.
Cuén Ojeda, a former mayor of Culiacán, ran for governor in 2016 however misplaced and had additionally served as rector of the Autonomous College of Sinaloa. Zambada stated Cuén Ojeda’s dispute with Rocha was “over who ought to lead that establishment.”
Rocha didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark Saturday.
Zambada and Guzmán López have been taken into custody by U.S. federal brokers after touchdown in a small Beechcraft King Air aircraft at a personal airport in Santa Teresa, N.M., simply exterior El Paso.
Zambada has pleaded not responsible to federal expenses associated to his management position of the Sinaloa Cartel, a multibillion-dollar felony enterprise liable for smuggling illicit medicine across the globe. The cartel’s co-founder and longtime godfather identified for having police, army, and political figures in his pocket, he had by no means been jailed beforehand regardless of spending a long time as certainly one of America’s most needed fugitives.
The Justice Division is predicted to switch Zambada’s case to Brooklyn, the place he additionally faces expenses, to the identical court docket that hosted the trial of his longtime associate, Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, now serving a life sentence after a 2019 conviction.
El Chapo’s son, Joaquín Guzmán López, has pleaded not responsible to federal expenses in Chicago, the place he and his youthful brother, Ovidio Guzmán López, are accused of being co-leaders of a cartel faction often known as Los Chapitos identified for manufacturing and exporting illicit fentanyl. Their lawyer, Jeffrey Lichtman, didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark Saturday and has beforehand denied that the elder Guzmán López sibling had struck a deal to cooperate with U.S. authorities.
In his assertion, Zambada stated he went to a ranch and occasion middle referred to as Huertos del Pedregal simply exterior of Culiacán and arrived early for a gathering scheduled to start out at 11:00 a.m. He stated he additionally anticipated to see Iván Guzmán Salazar, an older half-brother of Guzmán López who stays a fugitive in Mexico and co-leads a Sinaloa cartel faction often known as Los Chapitos.
“I noticed numerous armed males carrying inexperienced army uniforms who I assumed have been gunmen for Joaquín Guzmán and his brothers,” Zambada stated.
Zambada stated he introduced his personal bodyguards, together with two recognized as José Rosario Heras López, a commander within the State Judicial Police of Sinaloa, and Rodolfo Chaidez, described as “a longtime member of my safety workforce.”
“Whereas strolling towards the assembly space, I noticed Héctor Cuen and certainly one of his aides. I greeted them briefly earlier than continuing inside to a room that had a desk full of fruit,” Zambada stated. “I noticed Joaquín Guzmán Lopez, whom I’ve identified since he was a younger boy, and he gestured for me to observe him. Trusting the character of the assembly and the folks concerned, I adopted with out hesitation. I used to be led into one other room which was darkish.”
Zambada continued: “As quickly as I set foot within that room, I used to be ambushed. A bunch of males assaulted me, knocked me to the bottom, and positioned a dark-colored hood over my head. They tied me up and handcuffed me, then compelled me into the mattress of a pickup truck.”
Zambada stated he was “subjected to bodily abuse, leading to vital accidents to my again, knee and wrists,” and pushed to a touchdown strip “about 20 or 25 minutes away, the place I used to be compelled onto a personal aircraft.”
He stated that when on board the airplane, Guzmán López eliminated the hood and “certain me with zip ties to the seat.”
Photographs taken by U.S. information media contained in the aircraft after it landed confirmed a bag from the Mexican gasoline station chain Oxxo containing zip ties, together with cookies and snacks apparently bought for the two-hour flight.
Zambada stated the 2 bodyguards who have been with him, together with the state police official, have been lacking for the reason that ambush. The assertion stated Cuén Ojeda was killed on the scene and that his physique was moved to a different location.
“The notion that I surrendered or cooperated voluntarily is totally and unequivocally false,” Zambada stated. “I used to be dropped at this nation forcibly and beneath duress, with out my consent and in opposition to my will.”
Mexican officers have stated the Guzmán López brothers reached an settlement to cooperate with U.S. authorities in hopes of receiving leniency of their instances, which might carry lengthy jail sentences.
A spokesperson for the Division of Justice didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark Saturday morning.
State authorities in Sinaloa have stated Cuén Ojeda was declared lifeless by medical doctors at a personal clinic in central Culiacán on the evening of July 25.
An post-mortem confirmed Cuén Ojeda died from the influence of 4 bullets, certainly one of which hit a significant artery on his proper leg.
Sinaloa Atty. Gen. Sara Bruna Quiñonez Estrada stated in a press release final week that police are investigating “all attainable causes” in Cuén Ojeda’s case and stated they’d not dominated out that the killing could have been linked to the Zambada case.
“The State Legal professional Normal’s Workplace doesn’t rule out any line of investigation … and continues to hold out all related investigative acts to make clear the info and produce these accountable to justice,” Bruna stated.
Zambada referred to as for “the reality to come back out” in regards to the occasions of July 25.
“I name on the governments of Mexico and the US to be clear and supply the reality about my abduction to the US and in regards to the deaths of Héctor Cuen, Rosario Heras, Rodolfo Chaidez, and anybody else who could have misplaced their life that day,” Zambada stated. “I additionally name on the folks of Sinaloa to make use of restraint and preserve peace in our state. Nothing could be solved by violence. We’ve been down that highway earlier than, and everybody loses.”
Fausto Ernesto Corrales Rodríguez, the person who introduced Cuén Ojeda to the Culiacán clinic, advised officers that the taking pictures had occured in a failed carjacking try at a gasoline station.
Corrales Rodríguez, who’s the son of one other distinguished Sinaloa politician, advised officers that he and Cuén Ojeda had been fueling up their car after spending the day on the outskirts of Culiacán, the place they’d deliberate to attend a gathering with a number of attorneys who, in the long run, didn’t present up. Corrales stated a gasoline station attendant was fueling his truck when two males on a motorbike approached and ordered Cuén Ojeda out of the car. He stated that after Cuén Ojeda refused to conform, the lads shot him and sped off.
Two gasoline station staff interviewed by journalists for Rio Doce, a neighborhood information website, stated that they didn’t see a motorbike strategy the car or see an altercation.
Ken Salazar, the U.S. ambassador to Mexico, launched a press release Friday in Spanish that stated Guzmán López surrendered to U.S. authorities voluntarily and that “the proof in the meanwhile signifies El Mayo was introduced in opposition to his will.”
Salazar stated no U.S. sources have been used within the “rendition” of Zambada: “It was not our aircraft, not our pilot, and never our folks.”
Salazar stated U.S. authorities didn’t obtain a flight plan for the aircraft prematurely, and that the aircraft took off someplace in Sinaloa, contradicting earlier statements from Mexican officers that stated the craft disembarked from Hermosillo within the neighboring state of Sonora.
A distinguished determine in Sinaloa, the place his management of the college earned him the affectionate nickname “El Maestro,” Cuén Ojeda pivoted from an educational profession to politics in 2010, later forming his personal get together. He additionally ran for senate and served as state secretary of well being till 2022.
A press release launched by Cuén Ojeda’s household remembered “his tireless dedication to work, his hand all the time outstretched to assist others and the massive coronary heart that he all the time had open to these round him.”
The household’s assertion made “a agency and respectful name” for the case to be investigated “freed from any hypothesis to supply the justice that his work and legacy have left us in his time on this life and that he rightly deserves.”
Former prosecutors have advised The Occasions that even when it’s true that Zambada was kidnapped and different crimes occurred as he was dropped at the US, it’s unlikely that the fees in opposition to him will probably be dismissed attributable to a violation of Mexico’s extradition treaty or for different procedural causes.
In 2019, the Mexican authorities compelled the return of Gen. Salvador Cienfuegos, a former protection secretary who was arrested on narco-corruption expenses by the Drug Enforcement Administration in 2019 whereas touring to the U.S. along with his household.
Mexico’s president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, was livid in regards to the basic’s arrest, arguing the nation’s sovereignty had been violated. The Justice Division in the end dropped all expenses and allowed Cienfuegos to return house. Mexican authorities later launched proof from the case and maintained the final was harmless.
Within the Zambada case, López Obrador has taken a a lot completely different posture. With a president-elect from his personal get together, Claudia Sheinbaum, poised to switch him earlier than the top of the yr, the lame duck president referred to as this week for Zambada and Guzmán López to disclose no matter they may find out about political corruption in Mexico to U.S. investigators.
“If they’ll inform how a lot help was given to authorities, if they’ll inform on who was defending them, all of that can assist quite a bit, and in addition their agreements with the U.S. companies… make all of it clear, that might assist quite a bit,” López Obrador stated at a information convention.
López Obrador and Sheinbaum have been scheduled to seem Saturday in Sinaloa on the opening of a hospital. The president and president-elect are from the identical political get together as Sinaloa’s governor.
Zambada, ought to he select to cooperate with U.S. authorities, might probably spill greater than 40 years of secrets and techniques about who he and his cartel have corrupted in Mexico over time. Twice throughout felony trials in the US, allegations have surfaced that the Sinaloa cartel made funds to an early and unsuccessful presidential marketing campaign by López Obrador in 2006. The president, who was elected when he ran once more in 2018, has vehemently denied any hyperlinks to drug traffickers.
One former U.S. official who labored in Mexico when the Cienfuegos affair unfolded stated if Zambada’s lawyer is hoping his shopper will get the identical therapy as the final, he’ll doubtless be disenchanted.
Tim Sloan, former head of the usBureau of Alcohol Tobacco Firearms and Explosives in Mexico, famous that López Obrador was as soon as photographed shaking fingers with El Chapo’s mom in Sinaloa, a gesture that did little to quiet hypothesis in regards to the president’s sympathies.
Pushing to return Zambada, Sloan stated, can be untenable: “It might be actually dangerous politically for Mexico to exit on a limb for this man who has been certainly one of America’s most needed for many years.”
Hamilton reported from San Francisco and Linthicum from Mexico Metropolis.