Some of the Mexican former drug lord, Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman’s kids were involved in the same business as drug traffickers.
El Chapo (born Joaquín Archivaldo Guzmán Loera) has a history of drug trafficking. The Mexican former drug lord is considered to have been one of the most powerful drug traffickers in the world. He was the leader within the Sinaloa Cartel, an international crime syndicate.
El Chapo is currently serving life in prison in the U.S. after he was convicted in 2019 of 10 counts of drug trafficking, firearms charges, and engaging in a continuing criminal enterprise, CNN reports.
Whenever El Chapo’s name is mentioned, many are in an inquisition about his children and their mothers. One thing in common is, almost all of his kids have had legal issues with some serving years in prison just like their father. Violence erupted in the Mexican state of Sinaloa after Mexican authorities arrested Ovidio Guzmán-López, one of the sons of notorious drug lord El Chapo. So, how many children does El Chapo have?
Source: Rashid Umar Abbasi
Who are El Chapo’s kids?
Guzmán was born and raised in Badiraguato municipality, an impoverished and remote area of Sinaloa state in northwestern Mexico that was the birthplace of many notorious drug traffickers. His parents were Emilio Guzmán Bustillos, and María Consuelo Loera Pérez. He began his criminal career in the 1980s as a member of the Guadalajara drug cartel, headed by Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo.
Guzmán rapidly rose through the ranks of the organization. When it disbanded in the late 1980s, he became a leader in the Sinaloa cartel. Under his guidance, the Sinaloa cartel developed creative smuggling techniques and strategies, including building air-conditioned tunnels under the Mexico-U.S. border, hiding drugs in chili pepper cans and fire extinguishers, and catapulting drugs over the border. His organization produced and smuggled various kinds of illicit drugs, including marijuana, heroin, cocaine, and methamphetamine.
Source: AP
Former drug lord El Chapo has 13 children in total with different women. NY Post reports that El Chapo is still married to his first wife, Alejandrina Salazar, who apparently is his only spouse. Salazar was a social worker who married El Chapo in 1977 and shared five children with him. The outlets report that El Chapo was not divorced from his first wife when he bribed a priest to conduct a ceremony with his fourth wife.
Guzmán’s fourth wife is former beauty queen Emma Coronel Aispuro. Ms. Coronel Aispuro married El Chapo in 2007 on her 18th birthday. In 2021, she was arrested in the United States and accused of being a participant in his drug empire. Later that year she pleaded guilty to several charges and was sentenced to three years in prison. Guzman and El Chapo had two children – twin daughter named Emali Guadalupe Guzmán Coronel, and María Joaquina Guzmán Coronel. They were born in the US, and the girls are half-sisters to the eight other children El Chapo has from previous marriages.
Who are El Chapo’s sons in the cartel?
El Chapo’s son, Ovidio Guzmán-López, is a key figure in the Sinaloa drug cartel that his father once ran.
Guzmán-López, 32, is one of El Chapo’s 13 children. His mother is El Chapo’s third wife, Griselda López Pérez. Referred to as “El Ratón” (“The Mouse”), Lopez reportedly took over as the head of the Sinaloa Cartel after his father was arrested.
Recently, Ovidio Guzmán-López was arrested by the Mexican state of Sinaloa authorities. Violence ensued and was concentrated in and around Culiacan, the capital of Sinaloa, home of the powerful drug cartel. Al Jazeera reports that 29 people were dead in the operation to get him arrested.
Mexican authorities previously arrested Guzmán-López in 2019, and gun battles broke out in the city of Culiacan then as well. To stem the violence, Guzmán-López was released from custody.
Guzmán-López isn’t the only one to follow in the footsteps of his dear old dad. Four of El Chapo’s sons, known as Los Chapitos, are reportedly handling the family drug business. The Los Chapitos are Ovidio, his brother Joaquin Jr., and half-brothers Jesús Alfredo Guzmán Salazar and Ivan Archivaldo Guzmán Salazar.
Guzmán-López and Joaquín Jr. inherited their drug trafficking careers from their older brother Édgar who was killed in a 2008 ambush, reports the State Department.
Jesús Alfredo is under indictment in Chicago for drug trafficking and conspiracy. A U.S. grand jury in California indicted Ivan Archivaldo on charges of conspiracy to distribute and import narcotics.
Some of El Chapo’s wives have also been involved in the family business. His fourth wife, Emma Coronel Aispuro, was sentenced in 2021 to three years in prison for helping her husband.
El Chapo’s sons run a large meth operation.
The State Department has accused Guzmán-López and Joaquin Jr. of investing large amounts of cash into purchasing marijuana in Mexico, cocaine in Columbia, and ephedrine in Argentina to use in the production of methamphetamine. The brothers oversee 11 methamphetamine labs in Sinaloa, which produce about 3,000–5,000 pounds of meth per month. The drugs are sold to distributors in the U.S. and Canada.
Guzmán-López is also accused of ordering the murders of informants, a drug trafficker, and even a popular Mexican singer who refused to sing at his wedding, the State Department says.
