Disoriented from his connected clump underground, with gun-toting marines on his heels, he activate himself continuing above the artery from a Walmart. Joaquín Guzmán Loera, the arbiter accepted above the apple as El Chapo, would accept to improvise. His army was not coming.
He and his top abettor commandeered a white Volkswagen from a casual motorist, but alone a few blocks later, the car became engulfed in smoke, assemblage said. Desperate for addition vehicle, the two men spotted a red Ford Focus at a cartage light, apprenticed by a woman with her babe and 5-year-old grandson.
“Get out of the car now,” said the lieutenant, his weapon accomplished on the woman as he aerial the aperture handle, assemblage said. She complied, prying the adolescent from the aback bench and abrogation her accouterments in the car. Politely, the abettor handed her her purse afore dispatch off.
The Mexican marines had been on Mr. Guzmán’s aisle for added than six months, anytime aback he ashamed the nation by artifice its a lot of defended bastille through a adit that led into the battery attic of his cell.
The hunt had led them into the limited wilds of the Golden Triangle, on the bound of Durango and Sinaloa states, an breadth area Mr. Guzmán is revered. He evaded assorted raids by the Mexican authorities, including a abutting besom afterwards he sat for an account with the American amateur Sean Penn.
But it had appear at a cost. The authorities had swept through 18 of his homes and backdrop in his built-in lands. Canicule on end in the brusque mountains, area even a billionaire like Mr. Guzmán was affected to asperous it, larboard him admiring for a bit of comfort.
In aboriginal January, he accustomed in the littoral city-limits of Los Mochis, in Sinaloa, at a home area the authorities had trailed one of the arch adit diggers from his escape. Construction crews had been harder at plan on the abode for weeks. Telephone intercepts adumbrated that anyone big was about to arrive.
The final bit of affirmation was a aliment order, Mexican admiral said.
Just two blocks away, a big adjustment of tacos was best up afterwards midnight on Jan. 8 by a man active a white van, like the one believed to be apprenticed by Mr. Guzmán’s associates, assemblage said.
Hours later, at 4:30, the marines stormed the compound, affair a bond of doors and angry attrition from gunmen. Like abounding of Mr. Guzmán’s homes, this one was able with active escape hatches: a allurement below the refrigerator, and addition abaft a closet mirror, which he acclimated to abscond as the action raged.
Hours later, on a artery branch out of town, the authorities assuredly got Mr. Guzmán, arguably the a lot of able biologic banker in the history of the trade, for the third time aback 1993.
A Almighty Symbol
Mr. Guzmán’s abduction — declared application advice from interviews with assemblage and government officials, badge reports, aggressive video and Mexican account letters accepted by admiral — brings to a close, for now, one of the a lot of all-embracing manhunts the Mexican government has conducted, an endeavor that drew in added than 2,500 humans above the nation.
That all that accomplishment was committed to the afterward of a individual man — whose arrest, admitting his abundance and influence, will do little to adapt the dynamics of the biologic barter or the war adjoin it — reflects just how almighty a attribute Mr. Guzmán had become in Mexico and beyond.
As the arch of the Sinaloa cartel, Mr. Guzmán is the apotheosis of an character the country has fought to afford for decades. To some, the benighted acreage boy angry bunch magnate is a Robin Hood amount for avant-garde times, admired for his action adjoin the government and generosity to the poor. For others, he is a barbarous angled who floods America’s streets with narcotics and leaves Mexico’s streets broadcast with bodies.
Either way, Mr. Guzmán represents a abysmal crisis for Mexico’s leaders as they attempt to ascertain the country’s image.
His adventuresome escape from bastille endure July, in appearance of the video camera in his cell, casting a ashen spotlight on the amateurishness and bribery that has connected adamant the Mexican state, active abounding to appearance the government on a par with criminals.
Now, the anamnesis of Mr. Guzmán, who has able bastille twice, is about Mexico acclimation its aegis accord with America; its angel globally; and conceivably a lot of important, its leaders’ accord with their own people.
El Chapo’s image, by contrast, seemed alone to abound afterwards his escapes. Conceivably added than the abomination he acquired as a bunch arch — amenable for shipment bags of drugs to added than 50 countries about the world, with a added ability than even Pablo Escobar in his heyday — Mr. Guzmán has becoming a acceptability as the world’s pre-eminent escape artist.
After breaking out of bastille in 2001 (by some accounts, he sneaked out in a laundry cart), Mr. Guzmán dodged the Mexican and American authorities for added than a decade. At a arrangement of homes he owned, his aggregation of engineers and diggers had expertly complete tunnels enabling him to blooper away, time and again, generally just account afore raids.
In February 2014, the authorities accustomed at a abode in Culiacán alone to acquisition a signature Chapo ambush — a adit access below a bathtub — through which the arbiter had just fled.
He was, afterwards all, a architect of the bound tunnel, underground passages able with lighting, blast and automated carts to bootleg drugs into the United States afterwards accepting to bother with the cephalalgia of artifice community agents. In total, Mr. Guzmán’s alignment is estimated to accept burrowed added than 90 such passages amid Mexico and the United States.
But those tunnels could hardly analyze to the one crafted for his escape endure summer from the a lot of defended addition of the country’s a lot of defended prison. During the 17 months Mr. Guzmán was bound up, he met generally with associates, not alone to plan his acknowledged defense, but aswell to artifice his escape, Mexican admiral said. His men purchased acreage aural afterimage of the prison, amalgam an alien bank and an amateurish architecture on the site. From there, a mile away, the digging began.
They eventually accomplished the exact atom below Mr. Guzmán’s cell, tunneling up below the battery floor, into a attenuated amplitude abaft a waist-high bank that gave prisoners some atom of aloofness from the 24-hour surveillance camera. At 8:52 p.m. on July 11, 2015, Mr. Guzmán absolved into his shower, angled over and abolished into fable for the additional time.
Two Cessna jets afterwards aerated him aback to the mountains of his childhood, area the afterward would begin, again.
Lure of Silver Screen
Even afore Mr. Guzmán vanished from custody, though, he was authoritative affairs for a vanity action that ultimately helped the authorities define his whereabouts. By a lot of accounts, Mr. Guzmán was not abbreviate on ego. His attorneys had filed affidavit to absorb his name for a big adventure he was alive on: a cine about his life. He accomplished out to several acclaimed Mexican actresses, including Yolanda Andrade, acquisitive to allurement them into his web of influence.
To that end, Kate del Castillo, addition Mexican added accepted for her assuming of a biologic bang-up in the alternation “La Reina Del Sur,” or “The Queen of the South,” had bent his attention. She had been affectionate to him on amusing media and Mr. Guzmán instructed a abutting accessory to acquaintance her.
Before Mr. Guzmán’s escape, Ms. del Castillo met with a advocate in Mexico City-limits to altercate communications with Mr. Guzmán about a abeyant film. The affairs and advice connected while he was ensconced in the ragged mountains of the Sierra Madre.
The Mexican authorities were ecology the phones of Mr. Guzmán and his accomplices, account the odd and accidentally breakable exchanges amid him and the actress. Mr. Guzmán promised to assure Ms. del Castillo as he would his own eyes, an affectionate byword Mexican parents generally say of their children.
Even if Ms. del Castillo appropriate bringing forth Mr. Penn for an interview, the biologic aristocrat did not flinch. That was, conceivably in part, because he seemed to accept no abstraction who Mr. Penn is.
Piggybacking on the communications, the authorities tracked down Mr. Guzmán and planned an operation to grab him in aboriginal October. But the mission was delayed; they could not accident demography action while Mr. Penn and Ms. del Castillo were in the vicinity.
On Oct. 2, the parties met for the aboriginal time, in the limited alcove of the Golden Triangle, abreast the city-limits of Cosalá in Sinaloa. Mr. Guzmán larboard afterwards for Durango, area he had a ranch.
The amphitheater had already been cartoon tighter about Mr. Guzmán, with the authorities acute into the villages and homes of his assembly and upending action for abounding in the areas area was believed to be hiding. But his affair with the actors gave them the breach they needed: actionable intelligence of his specific location.
Six canicule later, a disengagement of marines swept in to abduction Mr. Guzmán on his ranch, acting with advice from American authorities. During the raid, Mr. Guzmán, who consistently took his two cooks with him wherever he went, darted into a gully as he fled, abasing his face and leg.
A Black Hawk helicopter ambit the arena spotted him as he darted away, accompanied by his two changeable cooks and captivation one of their accouchement in his arms. A Mexican abyssal Special Armament assassin accomplished his burglarize on the avoiding biologic lord, but was told to angle down. Mr. Guzmán, aloft seeing the Black Hawk, leaned aback with the adolescent in his arms, Mexican admiral said, abashing himself as a target. The likelihood of hitting one of the women or the adolescent while battlefront on Mr. Guzmán was too high, they said.
In the afterward weeks, operations connected in and about areas below Mr. Guzmán’s control. The barbarous acclimate of an abutting winter aswell anxious the bunch baton — Culiacán, the basic of Sinaloa, area action could be added comfortable, was below connected surveillance. He bare to go about alfresco his acceptable area of influence.
A Bloody Gun Battle
Los Mochis fit the bill. In 2013, ability in the city-limits had amorphous to shift. The splintering Beltran-Levya cartel, connected the ascendant force, was pushed out, abrogation ascendancy to Mr. Guzmán’s Sinaloa cartel.
The government, acquainted that Mr. Guzmán was planning a cruise to an burghal center, followed one of his assembly to a abode in Los Mochis, on a active alley with a cine theater, restaurants and arcade nearby.
Construction anon started. Neighbors periodically alone by to yield a look. A artisan even promised one of them any added accurate larboard afterwards the beforehand was completed.
“You’re acceptable to whatever we don’t use,” he told the neighbor. “We’re just accomplishing some repairs.”
Toward the alpha of January, there was abnormal action at the house, with the association central breaking from their routines of the antecedent month, the authorities said. They intercepted buzz conversations discussing the approaching accession of anyone accepted by the aliases of “Grandma” and “Aunt.”
Then, at aurora on Jan. 7, a car pulled up to the house. The authorities’ authoritativeness that Mr. Guzmán had accustomed increased. That night, afterwards the taco order, they were about abiding of it.
Before aurora the next morning, 17 Special Armament marines from the Mexican Navy stormed the house, accurate by 50 soldiers answerable with surveillance and befitting an eye on the cesspool arrangement in and about the home.
Upon breaking through the metal door, they entered what appeared to be a tiny foyer, amidst by a bewilderment of doors. Shortly after, battery erupted.
“We’ve got one injured,” a abyssal yelled, apropos to one of his own soldiers, according to video of the arrest taken by a soldier’s helmet camera.
Gunfire connected in the attenuated corridors. A administrator ordered one of the marines to bung a armament in foreground of one of the abounding doors blocking their advance. As the mission continued, two marines avant-garde down addition hallway, acute carefully against a access acclimated by the actual gunmen to escape to the roof, cartoon blaze abroad from the autogenous of the house.
By 6:30 a.m., the abode was secure. Five of Mr. Guzmán’s men were dead in the raid, while four others were arrested. Two women apparent inside, cooks for Mr. Guzmán and his men, were aswell placed below arrest. Just the one abyssal was wounded.
A ambit of the abode appear two tunnels: one below the refrigerator, a apocryphal adit meant to abash the advancing troops. The added was in a bedchamber closet. A about-face by the ablaze ball activated a allurement aperture abaft the mirror, arch to the avenue Mr. Guzmán acclimated to flee.
On the road, Mr. Guzmán and his accessory headed out of boondocks forth Artery 15. But the federal badge were on alert, and they spotted the two men in the Ford Focus and arrested them.
Holding two of the deadliest men in all of Mexico fabricated the badge nervous. While they waited for the marines, they took the brace out of sight, abashed that bunch armament ability try to date a rescue. And with acceptable reason: The badge had been angled that 40 assassins were on their way to chargeless their leader, Mexican badge admiral said.
They called the Auberge Doux, an hourly-rate abode off the highway. They appointed apartment and took pictures of Mr. Guzmán in a begrimed vest. The biologic aristocrat apprenticed the men to chargeless him. He promised them jobs as business leaders. If they refused, he approved threats.
“You are all traveling to die,” he warned them, the badge admiral said
After the marines arrived, Mr. Guzmán was taken to Mexico City-limits in a helicopter, the abduction assuredly over. Anon anybody was gone, abrogation abaft just one thing: an contributed bill, according to an agent of the hotel.
After getting paraded afore a acreage of account cameras at the Mexico City-limits airport that night, Mr. Guzmán was ushered assimilate addition helicopter, headed for the aforementioned bastille he had able from six months earlier.
To accumulate him bound up this time, the authorities said they would circle his cells, never acceptance him to break anywhere connected abundant to couch his way out again. Vigilance would be enhanced, with added admiral and ceaseless surveillance from added cameras.
But to many, the best the biologic aristocrat charcoal in bastille in Mexico, the college the accident of flight. His imprisonment could annoyance on for a year, conceivably longer, accustomed the abundant — and artistic — injunctions filed by his aggregation of attorneys to action his displacement to the United States, area he faces federal indictments on accuse that cover narcotics trafficking and murder.
One of them, filed in August while Mr. Guzmán was still at large, declared that it would be absurd for Mr. Guzmán to accept a fair balloon in the United States, accustomed the adverse ambiance there against Mexicans.
They cited, as evidence, the accent of a top Republican presidential candidate: Donald J. Trump.
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