The wife of notorious drug kingpin El Chapo has been arrested in the United States on drug charges. Emma Coronel Aispuro, 31, was arrested Monday on charges relating to helping her husband Joaquin Guzman escape a Mexican prison in 2015 and for helping him to run his vast criminal empire.
Coronel, a California-born dual-citizen of the US and Mexico, was arrested at Washington Dulles International Airport. The Justice Department reports that Coronel is facing charges for participating in a conspiracy to distribute cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin and marijuana for importation into the U.S.
Guzman’s long-running cartel saga has captured headlines for the past several years, with the DEA and Sinaloa Cartel clashing in a major way over Guzman’s drug trade.
Sinaloa Cartel
The Sinaloa Cartel is one of the largest criminal organizations in the world. The cartel moves massive quantities of drugs across the US-Mexico border, getting it to suppliers in the US for street-level, illicit distribution. Many commentators have remarked that the astonishing violence of the cartel can be seen as a direct result of the failures of the US War on Drugs.
El Chapo was the head of the Sinaloa cartel for 30 years, with two high-profile prison escapes boosting his name to legendary status among criminal circles. After finally being arrested, again, in Mexico in 2016, he was extradited to the US in 2017 where he stood trial on numerous criminal counts. After his conviction in 2019, he was sentenced to life in prison in the US.
Family Business
Guzman’s family seems to have taken over the cartel in his absence. In October 2019, a huge gunfight broke out between the cartel and Mexican authorities when the former tried to arrest Ovidio Guzmán López, one of El Chapo’s sons. While Guzman was successfully arrested by Mexican authorities, this sent the cartel in a fury, killing military personnel and innocent bystanders in Culiacan until authorities released him.
Coronel is the latest of Guzman’s family members to be arrested in connection to the drug trade. She married Guzman in 2007, when she was only a teenager. Her father, Ines Coronel Barreras, was also a member of the cartel. Authorities believe that Coronel worked in tandem with her husband and his four sons to spring him from prison both times he managed to escape from Mexican authorities. However, her charges in the US are rolled up into conspiracy, likely to make the charges easier to stick.
