OAN’s Abril Elfi
3:15 PM – Saturday, September 16, 2023
México extradited Cartel Leader Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzmán’s son, Ovidio Guzmán López, to the United States.
On Friday, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement that Ovidio was extradited to face drug trafficking, money laundering and other charges.
The son of the cartel leader is suspected of overseeing significant fentanyl production and trafficking operations from China to Mexico and then into the U.S.
“This action is the most recent step in the Justice Department’s effort to attack every aspect of the cartel’s operations,” Garland said.
Ovidio had been taken into custody in Sinaloa city, Culiacán on January 5th of this year.
Following his arrest, violence in the city rose with alleged cartel members setting cars on fire and carjacking residents of the city.
Previously in 2019 the government had tried to capture Ovidio, commonly known as “the mouse,” but ended up canceling the operation after his cartel allies unleashed a wave of violence in the city.
According to the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California, the cartel member was then indicted in April of this year on federal allegations of large-scale drug trafficking, money laundering, and violent offenses related to his father’s arrest and extradition in 2017.
Along with Ovidio, his three brothers were also indicted but were not in custody at the time.
He was then charged by the prosecutor’s office of trafficking and manufacturing drugs, including cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamines. When the arrest was announced, Garland referred to the group he was part of that was led by his father as the “largest, most violent, and most prolific fentanyl trafficking operation in the world.”
Prosecutors also claim he, along with his brothers, bribed officials and committed murder, kidnapping, and other violent crimes against law enforcement, competing drug traffickers, and cartel members.
His father was convicted in 2019 and is currently serving a life term in a maximum security prison in Colorado. However, his mother was released from prison on Wednesday after spending less than two years for assisting in the management of El Chapo’s multibillion-dollar narcotics business.
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