The wife of Mexican drug lord El Chapo has been told by a US judge that she could face life in prison and a $10 million USD (200 million Mexican pesos) fine for helping her husband run his multibillion-dollar cartel and plotting his prison break.
Emma Coronel Auspiro, 31, a former beauty queen who has two children with Joaquín Archivaldo Guzmán Loera, was arrested at the Dulles International Airport in Washington DC on Monday.
A judge in Washington DC ordered that Coronel, a dual US-Mexican national, remain in prison until her lawyers are able to present a bail package.
Prosecutor Anthony Nardozzi argued the US believes Coronel should remain jailed, claiming that she “worked closely with the command-and-control structure” of the Sinaloa drug cartel in Mexico.
Mr Nardozzi said Coronel had access to criminal associates, including other members of the cartel, and “financial means to generate a serious risk of flight.”
According to court documents, Coronel faces charges of participating in a conspiracy to distribute 5kg of cocaine, 500g of methamphetamine, 1kg of heroin and 1,000kg of marijuana for importation into the US.
Authorities said Coronel, who spoke to US Magistrate Judge Robin Meriweather on Tuesday through a Spanish interpreter, relayed messages to help Guzman – once Mexico’s most powerful drug lord, conduct drug trafficking from 2012 to early 2014 with the cartel, and continued delivering messages while visiting him in a Mexican prison following his February 2014 arrest.
They also said Coronel conspired in Guzman’s famous July 2015 escape from the Altiplano prison in Mexico through a mile-long tunnel dug from his cell, and began plotting another escape following his January 2016 capture by Mexican authorities.
Source: Telegraph UK