Ovid Guzmán López, son of “El Chapo”, is found guilty in the event of drug trafficking in the United States

Chicago – A son of the famous Mexican capo Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán declared himself guilty of drug trafficking on Friday in the United States. He is the first of El Chapo’s children to achieve a guilt.

The prosecutors claim that Ovide Guzmán López and his brother, Joaquín Guzmán López, led a faction of the cartel of Sinaloa. They are known locally as the “chapitos” and the federal authorities in 2023 described the operation as a massive effort to send “incredible” fentanyl quantities to the United States.

Ovid Guzmán López has declared himself guilty of drug trafficking, money laundering and firearms linked to his leadership role in the cartel. He agreed to postpone his sentence for a later date in court.

As part of guilt, Guzmán López admitted to having supervised the production and traffic of large quantities of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, marijuana and fentanyl in the United States, nourishing a crisis which contributed to tens of thousands of deaths by the overdose annually. The terms of the agreement, including the recommendations of sentences or cooperation agreements, have not been revealed at the moment.

Speculation on an agreement has increased for months, while behind the scenes negotiations progressed discreetly and slowly.

The hearing was initially scheduled for Wednesday, but was postponed on Friday by the federal judge of the Sharon Coleman district without explanation. Hearings have often been delayed or reprogrammed.

The father of Ovidio Guzmán López, Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, is currently fulfilling a perpetuity conviction after being sentenced in 2019 for his role as former Cartel of Sinaloa, having tampered with cocaine mountains and other drugs in the United States for 25 years. The brothers would have assumed the former role of their father as leaders of the Sinaloa cartel.

Ovidio Guzmán López was arrested by the Mexican authorities in early 2023 and extradited to the United States. Initially, he declared himself innocent, but in recent months he has underlined his intention to change his declaration.

Joaquín Guzmán López and another of the cartel leaders for several years, Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, was arrested in July 2024 in Texas after arriving on a private plane. The two men declared themselves innocent of multiple positions. His capture sparked a wave of violence in the state of Sinaloa, in northern Mexico, while two factions of the Sinaloa cartel clashed.

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The journalist of Associated Press Megan Janetsky contributed to this office in Mexico City.
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This story was translated from English by an AP publisher with the help of a generative artificial intelligence tool.