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El Chapo trial: Mexican drug lord Joaquín Guzmán gets life in prison | El Chapo trial: Mexican drug lord Joaquín Guzmán gets life in prison |
(32 minutes later) | |
A US judge has sentenced Mexican drug kingpin Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán to life in prison plus 30 years. | A US judge has sentenced Mexican drug kingpin Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán to life in prison plus 30 years. |
Guzmán, 62, was found guilty of 10 charges, including drug trafficking and money laundering, by a federal court in New York in February. | Guzmán, 62, was found guilty of 10 charges, including drug trafficking and money laundering, by a federal court in New York in February. |
He escaped a Mexican jail through a tunnel in 2015, but was later arrested. He was extradited to the US in 2017. | |
He is a former head of the Sinaloa cartel, which officials say was the biggest supplier of drugs to the US. | He is a former head of the Sinaloa cartel, which officials say was the biggest supplier of drugs to the US. |
During the trial, witnesses said he had tortured his cartel's enemies. | During the trial, witnesses said he had tortured his cartel's enemies. |
Speaking through an interpreter just before Wednesday's sentencing, Guzmán said in the Brooklyn courtroom his confinement in the US had amounted to "psychological, emotional, mental torture 24 hours a day". | Speaking through an interpreter just before Wednesday's sentencing, Guzmán said in the Brooklyn courtroom his confinement in the US had amounted to "psychological, emotional, mental torture 24 hours a day". |
He also said he had received an unfair trial, accusing jurors of misconduct. | He also said he had received an unfair trial, accusing jurors of misconduct. |
The life sentence was the minimum Guzmán faced. The additional 30 years were for unlawful uses of firearms. | The life sentence was the minimum Guzmán faced. The additional 30 years were for unlawful uses of firearms. |
He was also ordered to pay $12.6bn (£10bn) in forfeiture. | |
Prosecutors said Guzmán would be serving his sentence behind "tonnes of steel", referring to a high-security prison in Colorado. | Prosecutors said Guzmán would be serving his sentence behind "tonnes of steel", referring to a high-security prison in Colorado. |
It was not immediately clear if Guzmán would appeal against the verdict. | It was not immediately clear if Guzmán would appeal against the verdict. |
Who is El Chapo? | |
"El Chapo" (or "Shorty") ran the cartel in northern Mexico. | |
In 2009, Guzmán entered Forbes' list of the world's richest men at number 701, with an estimated worth of $1bn. | |
He was accused of helping bring hundreds of tonnes of cocaine into the US and of conspiring to make and distribute heroin, methamphetamine and marijuana. | |
He was also said to have used hitmen to carry out hundreds of murders, assaults, kidnappings and acts of torture. | |
Key associates, including one former lieutenant, testified against Guzmán. | |
What was heard during the trial? | |
It provided shocking revelations about the drug lord's life. | |
Court papers accused him of having girls as young as 13 drugged before raping them. | |
Guzmán "called the youngest of the girls his 'vitamins' because he believed that sexual activity with young girls gave him 'life'", said Colombian drug trafficker Alex Cifuentes, a former associate. | |
Another witness described seeing Guzmán murder at least three men. | |
Former bodyguard Isaias Valdez Rios said Guzmán beat two people who had joined a rival cartel until they were "completely like rag dolls". He then shot them in the head and ordered their bodies be thrown on a fire. | |
In another incident, he had a member of the rival Arellano Felix cartel burned and imprisoned before taking him to a graveyard, shooting him and having him buried alive. | |
Guzmán is also alleged to have had his own cousin killed for lying about being out of town, and ordered a hit on the brother of another cartel leader because he did not shake his hand. | |
The court heard details of his 2015 escape from Mexico's maximum-security Altiplano prison. His sons bought a property near the prison and a GPS watch smuggled into the prison gave diggers his exact location. | |
At one point Guzmán complained that he could hear the digging from his cell. He escaped by riding a specially adapted small motorcycle through the tunnel. | |
He also used software on his phone to spy on his wife and mistresses, which allowed the FBI to present his text messages in court. | |
In one set of texts, he recounted to his wife how he had fled a villa during a raid by US and Mexican officials, before asking her to bring him new clothes, shoes and black moustache dye. | |
Why was this trial significant? | |
Guzmán is the highest profile Mexican drug cartel boss so far to stand trial in the US. | |
The drug war in Mexico - pitting the Mexican and US authorities against cartels smuggling drugs into the US and the cartels against each other - has killed about 100,000 people over more than a decade. | |
Guzmán achieved notoriety for twice escaping custody in Mexico as well as avoiding arrest on numerous other occasions. | |
Among some in his home state, he had the status of a folk hero, a popular subject of "narcocorridos" - musical tributes to drugs barons. | |
In 2016, he gave an interview to Hollywood actor Sean Penn in a Mexican jungle following his escape the previous year and boasted that he was the world's leading supplier of heroin, methamphetamine, cocaine and marijuana. | |
He was later recaptured in the north-western town of Los Mochis. During the raid he fled through a drain but was later caught by troops in a shootout. | |
The US indictment against him was a consolidation of charges from six federal jurisdictions across the country, including New York, Chicago and Miami. | |
Prosecutors pooled together evidence acquired over more than a decade, including from international partners such as Mexico and Colombia, to build their sweeping case. | |
The trial jurors were anonymous and were escorted to and from the courthouse in Brooklyn by armed marshals after prosecutors argued that Guzmán had a history of intimidating witnesses and even ordering their murders. |