Frank Perez, the defense attorney of the Sinaloan drug lord Ismael Mario Zambada García, alias “El Mayo” -who is 76 years old- confirmed, on August 6, 2024, to the Spanish agency EFE, that the co-founder of the Sinaloa Cartel would be transferred from El Paso, Texas, to Brooklyn, where he would be tried by Judge Brian M. Cogan in the Federal Court for the Eastern District of New York.
“The date for the drug lord’s transfer to New York has not yet been finalized, but it is known that there is already a pending indictment against ‘El Mayo’ in the Eastern District of New York, the same one where his former partner Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán was sentenced to life in prison,” the aforementioned Spanish agency added.
Hours earlier, the newspaper The New York Times reported the information based on four sources and stated, in an article signed by reporter Alan Feuer, that the Sinaloan drug lord would be tried in the same Federal Court where his comrade, Joaquín Archivaldo Guzmán Loera, alias “El Chapo,” was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment on February 12, 2019, and July 17 of that same year, respectively.
The rotating New York reporter noted that “El Mayo” was first charged in the United States over two decades ago and faced other charges, not only in Brooklyn but also in El Paso, Chicago, Illinois, Washington D.C., and San Diego, California.
Sources told the NYT that the U.S. Department of Justice decided to send “El Mayo” to Brooklyn because they felt that the case there was strong and were concerned about the security issues involved in prosecuting the Sinaloan drug lord so close to the border with Mexico.
Additionally, according to sources who spoke to the newspaper, some of the prosecutors who oversaw the trial of “El Chapo” had agreed to return to prosecute the case of “El Mayo” and that the judge who oversaw Guzmán Loera’s case was well-versed in matters related to the case.
The aforementioned outlet detailed that the Federal Court for the Eastern District of New York also had a secure jail, the Metropolitan Correctional Center, New York (MCC New York), which was used to house “El Chapo,” which could reduce the security risks of trying “El Mayo.”
