Drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman has been extradited from Mexico to the United States, according to a statement by the Mexican Foreign Ministry. The head of the Sinaloa cartel is being flown to New York at this very minute. He was being held in a high-security prison in Ciudad Juarez, on the Texas border.
BREAKING: Senior US official says "El Chapo" already in US custody and is being flown to New York.
— The Associated Press (@AP) January 19, 2017
Allegedly, Mexican authorities planned to turn Guzman over to the U.S. before Friday’s inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump.
Guzman and other cartel leaders were indicted in 2009 in US District Court in Brooklyn, New York, on charges of conspiring to import more than 264,000 pounds of cocaine into the United States between 1990 and 2005.
Guzman also faces charges in Arizona, California, Texas, Illinois, New York, Florida, and New Hampshire.
The Sinaloa cartel head has been fighting his extradition to the U.S. for over a year.
Not coincidentally, the news of El Chapo’s extradition came at the exact same time as Trump’s welcome celebration.
Obama getting in that one last shot.
[CNN]