US Department of Justice Charges Members of El Chapo’s Sinaloa Cartel
The US Department of Justice has charged 28 individuals, including members of the notorious Sinaloa drug cartel, for their alleged involvement in the world’s largest and most violent fentanyl trafficking operation.
The charges cover every aspect of the Fentanyl supply chain, from Chinese chemical companies to brokers in Guatemala and weapons dealers in the United States.
Among those charged are four of El Chapo’s children, who are believed to have taken over the cartel’s operations after their father’s arrest.
The indictments include charges of fentanyl trafficking, weapons, and money laundering.
The charges were unsealed in the Southern District of New York, the Northern District of Illinois, and the District of Columbia.
Attorney General Merritt Garland has alleged that some of the cartel’s tactics are particularly brutal, including feeding some of their victims, dead and alive, to tigers belonging to the Chapitos, as El Chapo’s children are known.
The charges come as the American government is making progress on one end, but a power vacuum left by El Chapo’s arrest has made room for the rise of a new cartel, Cartel Jalisco Nueva generacion (CJNG), led by Naimcio Ruben Osogora Cervantes, known as El Mencho.
El Mencho’s cartel has earned a particularly brutal reputation.
To address the problem, the Biden administration has announced an increased operation with Mexico’s federal government to fight fentanyl and firearms trafficking.
The administration has also renewed its commitment to work closely with Mexico to combat the problem.
However, the Mexican government has raised the issue of American guns coming southbound and killing Mexicans.
Mexican officials have been meeting with the Biden administration to work out a deal to share more information on fentanyl and how money is being shared throughout the cartels.
The US has committed to doing more to track illegal gun trafficking headed southbound.
It remains to be seen how effective this cooperation will be, as three of the four Chapitos charged are still at large.
