Sinaloa Cartel: Difference between revisions

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Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo, who co-founded the [[Guadalajara Cartel]] between 1978 and 1980, from then on; controlled much of Mexico's drug-trafficking corridors along the United States border throughout the 1980s, only to be rivaled by the [[Gulf Cartel]] which controlled some of eastern Mexico's drug trade.<ref name="Shannon, Elaine 1988">Shannon, Elaine (1988). Desperados: Latin drug lords, U.S. lawmen, and the war America can't win. New York: Viking. {{ISBN|978-0-670-81026-0}}.</ref><ref name=NYTimes>{{cite news | first=Larry | last=Rohter | title=In Mexico, Drug Roots Run Deep | date=April 16, 1989 | url=https://www.nytimes.com/1989/04/16/world/in-mexico-drug-roots-run-deep.html?pagewanted=1 | work=The New York Times | access-date=2010-09-21 | archive-date=26 June 2018 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180626194024/https://www.nytimes.com/1989/04/16/world/in-mexico-drug-roots-run-deep.html?pagewanted=1 | url-status=live }}</ref> Félix Gallardo divided up his "Federation" by 1987, just two years after the capture and murder of [[Drug Enforcement Administration|DEA]] agent [[Enrique Camarena Salazar]] when the threat from American law enforcement became much more pressing. This division of the organization in the late 1980s led to the cartel essentially being made up of several smaller cartels who controlled their own territories and trafficking corridors with their own bosses. This would make it less likely the whole organization would be brought down all at once. One of these cartels (called plazas at the time) was Sinaloa, with the city of [[Culiacán]] acting as its headquarters.<ref name="Beith 2010">{{cite book |last1=Beith |first1=Malcolm |title=The Last Narco: Inside the Hunt for El Chapo, the World's Most Wanted Drug Lord |date=2010 |publisher=Grove Press |location=New York |isbn=978-0-8021-1952-0 |page=47 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=t4c4nwEACAAJ |access-date=15 May 2023 |language=en |chapter=The Godfather |archive-date=26 July 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230726170054/https://books.google.com/books?id=t4c4nwEACAAJ |url-status=live }} [https://archive.org/details/lastnarcoinsideh00beit Alt URL]</ref> In the late 1980s, the United States [[Drug Enforcement Administration]] (DEA) believed the Sinaloa Cartel was the largest drug trafficking organization operating in Mexico.<ref name="CACourt">{{cite web |date=7 December 2007 |title=United States of America v. Felipe de Jesus Corona Verbera |publisher=United States Court of Appeals |page=3 |url=http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/coa/newopinions.nsf/CC8D42315C276B93882573AA004FEBC4/$file/0610538.pdf?openelement |archive-url=http://webarchive.loc.gov/all/20150307194106/http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/coa/newopinions.nsf/CC8D42315C276B93882573AA004FEBC4/$file/0610538.pdf?openelement |url-status=dead |archive-date=7 March 2015 |access-date=11 April 2008 }}</ref>
 
Gallardo was eventually arrested in 1989 and, while incarcerated, he remained one of Mexico's major traffickers, maintaining contact with his organization via mobile phone until he was transferred to a new maximum security prison in the early 1990s. At that point his nephews, the Arellano Félix brothers, left and further solidified the organization which came to be known as the [[Tijuana Cartel]], while the Sinaloa Cartel continued to be run by former lieutenants [[Héctor Luis Palma Salazar]], [[IsmaelJuan ZambadaJose GarcíaEsparragoza]] and Joaquín Guzmán Loera.<ref name="Shannon, Elaine 1988"/><ref name=NYTimes/>{{sfn|Edmonds-Poli|Shirk|2009|p=262}}<ref name="Beith 2010"/>
 
===''El Mayo'' and the Tijuana Cartel war===
During this time, Sinaloa was considered to be at a major disadvantage since they were forced to move much of their drug product through the [[Tijuana]] corridor, which often put them directly into conflict with the Arellanos. This eventually led to [[Ramón Arellano Félix]] killing two of Guzmán's associates thus leading to a full-fledged war between the two organizations. It was around this period in the early 1990s when Guzmán gavebrought more control of the cartel toin freelance trafficker [[Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada|Ismael Zambada García]] (a.k.a. ''El Mayo'') particularly due to his exceptional ability to work with and coordinate with other traffickers. Throughout much of the 1990s, Ismael Zambada was also the only responsible person for the cartel's mass growth and expansion while Guzmán and Palma were incarcerated. Before co-founding the Sinaloa Cartel, Ismael Zambada García was a farmer, [[freelancer]] and small-time drug trafficker who would sell mere kilograms of marijuana and heroin before eventually becoming acquainted with Mexico's more elite trafficking circles.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Ávalos |first1=Héctor Silva |title=Ismael Zambada García, alias 'El Mayo' |url=https://insightcrime.org/mexico-organized-crime-news/ismael-zambada-garcia-el-mayo/ |website=InSight Crime |access-date=17 May 2023 |date=27 March 2017 |archive-date=29 May 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230529024731/https://insightcrime.org/mexico-organized-crime-news/ismael-zambada-garcia-el-mayo/ |url-status=live }}</ref> By the mid-1990s, according to one court opinion, the Sinaloa organization was believed to be the size of the [[Medellín Cartel]] during its prime.<ref name="CACourt" />
 
Zambada also helped [[Amado Carrillo Fuentes]] expand the [[Juárez Cartel]] in the state of Chihuahua and helped incorporate some of the remnants of the Juárez Cartel into the Sinaloa Cartel after Carrillo's death in 1997.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Shamsian |first=Jacob |title=Here's the story behind 'El Mayo' Zambada, the man El Chapo says was the real boss behind the Sinaloa Cartel |url=https://www.insider.com/el-mayo-zambada-sinaloa-cartel-boss-el-chapo-real-kingpin-2018-11 |access-date=2023-06-28 |website=Insider |language=en-US |archive-date=8 August 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240808020508/https://www.businessinsider.com/el-mayo-zambada-sinaloa-cartel-boss-el-chapo-real-kingpin-2018-11#he-consolidated-power-in-the-1990s-2 |url-status=live }}</ref> The Sinaloa Cartel was therefore believed to be linked to the Juárez Cartel in a strategic alliance following the partnership of their rivals, the Gulf Cartel and Tijuana Cartel.<ref name="Understanding" /><ref name="CACourt" /><ref name="ALine">{{cite web|last=McCaul |first=Michael T.|date=9 January 2008 |title=A Line in the Sand: Confronting the Threat at the Southwest Border |publisher=Majority Staff of the House Committee on Homeland Security |pages=12, 13 |url=http://www.house.gov/mccaul/pdf/Investigaions-Border-Report.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080328072915/http://www.house.gov/mccaul/pdf/Investigaions-Border-Report.pdf |archive-date=28 March 2008 }}</ref> Following the discovery of a tunnel system used to smuggle drugs across the [[United States–Mexico border|Mexican/US border]], the group has been associated with such means of trafficking.<ref name="Jaoquin" /><ref name="Chan5">{{cite news|url=http://www.newschannel5.tv/2008/3/28/988823/Sinaloa-Cartel-Leader-Possibly-Dead |title=Sinaloa Cartel Leader Possibly Dead |date=28 March 2008 |publisher=Newschannel 5 KRGV |access-date=11 April 2008 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080928043630/http://www.newschannel5.tv/2008/3/28/988823/Sinaloa-Cartel-Leader-Possibly-Dead |archive-date=28 September 2008 }}</ref> The war between the Sinaloa and Tijuana cartels was supposedly at its worst from 1992 to the year 2000 with family members of some of the cartel's leaders living in fear or "everyday like it was their last", as stated by Zambada's wife at the time. However, Zambada also used this conflict to his advantage since the Mexican government began to crackdown primarily on the Tijuana Cartel, ''Mayo'' used this weakening of his rivals as an opportunity for Sinaloa to step up in the trafficking world. By around the year 2000, Zambada became recognized as one of the biggest and most powerful [[drug lord]]s in Mexico, having built strong distribution networks from Colombia to the United States. ''Mayo's'' traditional major distribution hubs were allegedly in Chicago, Phoenix, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Denver. ''El Mayo'' was also reportedly the one who sent a private helicopter for ''El Chapo'' after he escaped Puente Grande prison in 2001.<ref>{{cite news |last1=DeGregory |first1=Priscilla |last2=Eustachewich |first2=Lia |title=Testimony reveals secrets of El Chapo's wild prison break |url=https://nypost.com/2018/11/15/testimony-reveals-secrets-of-el-chapos-wild-prison-break/ |access-date=17 May 2023 |work=New York Post |date=15 November 2018 |archive-date=17 May 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230517052314/https://nypost.com/2018/11/15/testimony-reveals-secrets-of-el-chapos-wild-prison-break/ |url-status=live }}</ref> The Sinaloa Cartel was partially splintered in 2008 when the [[Beltrán-Leyva Cartel|Beltrán-Leyva brothers]] broke apart from the cartel.<ref name="LastNarco"/>