Mexico's Attorney General Flip-Flops About Extraditing El Chapo Guzman Dolia Estevez - Forbes
go to original February 2, 2015

Painting by Angelica Pettingell

The U.S. government has formally requested the extradition of jailed Mexican drug lord Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, according to informed sources. The extradition request for Guzmán, who is currently in a maximum security prison in Mexico, was delivered last week to Mexico’s Foreign Ministry by the U.S. Embassy, the sources said.

As a matter of longstanding policy, the State Department does not comment on pending extradition requests or confirm or deny that a request might even exist. Eduardo del Rio, Director of Communications at the Mexican Foreign Ministry, did not respond to an e-mail seeking comment. Reached by phone last week, Salvador Musalem, a spokesperson for the same agency, told me he would get back to me but hasn’t.

The request by the Obama Administration was expected by the Mexican government. Mexico’s controversial Attorney General Jesús Murillo Karam said twice in the past weeks that it was imminent. Initially, Murillo suggested he might consider granting it. El Chapo is wanted in a handful of U.S. Courts on multiple criminal charges of drug trafficking, racketeering, money laundering, kidnapping, conspiracy to commit homicide and homicide.

But last week, Murillo backtracked. This time he argued that keeping Guzmán in Mexico was an issue of “national sovereignty,” according to the AP. “El Chapo must stay here (in Mexico) to complete his sentence and then I will extradite him. So about 300 or 400 years later — it will be a while.” The longest jail sentences in Mexico are 50 years. An individual can be sentenced multiple maximum terms, adding up to hundreds of years.

Murillo’s assertion that Guzmán must first serve his sentence in Mexico contradicts U.S. and Mexican laws.

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