US decide orders Ismael ‘El Mayo’ Zambada jailed pending trial on drug trafficking, homicide and different costs.
Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, a co-founder of Mexico’s Sinaloa drug cartel, has pleaded not responsible to drug trafficking, homicide and different costs in a New York courtroom, months after his dramatic arrest and switch into United States custody.
Zambada entered the plea to the 17 felony counts he faces, which additionally embrace cash laundering and weapons costs, at a listening to on Friday in Brooklyn, New York.
US Justice of the Peace Decide James Cho ordered that Zambada, 76, be jailed pending trial.
Prosecutor Francisco Navarro known as Zambada “one of the crucial, if not essentially the most, highly effective narcotics kingpins on this planet”.
“A United States jail cell is the one factor that may stop the defendant from committing additional crimes and guarantee his return to courtroom,” he advised the listening to.
Sought by regulation enforcement for greater than twenty years, Zambada has been in US custody since July 25, when he landed in a private plane at an airport exterior El Paso, Texas, in accordance with federal authorities.
He was within the firm of one other fugitive cartel chief, Joaquin Guzman Lopez, who’s the son of Mexican drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman.
Guzman Lopez is presently awaiting trial on a separate indictment in Chicago. He pleaded not guilty to drug trafficking and different costs in a federal courtroom in late July.
Questions have swirled round Zambada’s seize, which additionally spurred fears of more drug-related violence in Mexico and heightened tensions between the Mexican and US governments.
Final month, Zambada’s lawyer stated Guzman Lopez and 6 males in army uniforms “forcibly kidnapped” his shopper close to the Sinaloa state capital of Culiacan and flew him to the US in opposition to his will.
However the Guzman household lawyer has denied the kidnapping cost, as a substitute calling it a voluntary give up after prolonged negotiations.
Zambada additionally described his seize as an “abduction” in an announcement launched by his lawyer in mid-August. “I used to be ambushed,” he stated.
Consultants, nevertheless, say the way of his arrival within the US can have little bearing on his prison case.
If convicted on all costs, Zambada faces a minimal sentence of life in jail and could be eligible for the demise penalty.
He additionally pleaded not responsible to separate drug trafficking and different costs in Texas.
In a letter to the decide, US prosecutors known as him “one of many world’s most infamous and harmful drug traffickers”.
“The defendant maintained an arsenal of military-grade weapons to guard his individual, his medicine, and his empire,” they wrote.
“His closely armed personal safety forces had been used as his private bodyguards and as safety for drug shipments all through Mexico, Colombia, Ecuador, and past,” the letter continued.
“Furthermore, he maintained a steady of ‘sicarios,’ or hitmen, who carried out ugly assassinations and kidnappings geared toward sustaining self-discipline inside his group, defending in opposition to challenges from rivals, and silencing those that would cooperate with regulation enforcement.”
A surge in criminal violence, a lot of it linked to drug trafficking and gangs, has seen greater than 450,000 individuals murdered in Mexico since 2006.