One of the most powerful criminal groups in the world, the bloody history of the Sinaloa Cartel

The Sinaloa cartel was established in Mexico in the late 1980s and is one of the most powerful criminal groups in the world, raking in billions of dollars a year from drug trafficking in the US and around the globe.

Infamous cartel boss Guzman, popularly known as "El Chapo," was arrested in Guatemala in 1993 on murder and drug charges, and extradited to Mexico. But he escaped from a Mexican prison in 2001, reportedly bribing prison guards to get him out. He was arrested again in 2014, but escaped again, through a tunnel.

Guzman was arrested a third time in 2016 and then extradited to the United States.

In 2018, Mexican authorities arrested the son of the infamous boss "El Chapo" and in a major trial, he was sentenced in Brooklyn to life imprisonment. Guzman was found guilty of 10 federal criminal charges, which included ongoing criminal activity, conspiracy to launder narcotics proceeds, international distribution of cocaine and marijuana, and use of firearms.

During the trial, Guzman's lawyers argued that Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada Garcia was the real kingpin of the cartel who bribed the Mexican government to remain free and run the criminal organization. After a string of charges against him, Zambada was charged in February with manufacturing and distributing fentanyl, the extremely powerful synthetic that has killed tens of thousands of Americans in an overdose epidemic.

"Fentanyl was unheard of when Zambada founded the Sinaloa Cartel more than three decades ago, and today it is responsible for immeasurable harm," said Breon Peace, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York. Since 1989, Zambada has imported and distributed massive quantities of narcotics, generating billions of dollars in profits, according to the indictment.

Federal prosecutors said Guzman employed many people to import and store narcotics, and hired hitmen to carry out kidnappings and murders in Mexico as a form of revenge against rivals who threatened the cartel.

Zambada's son, Vicente Zambada Niebla, admitted during testimony at Guzmán's 2018 trial that he had ordered the killings and kidnappings and was sentenced to 15 years in 2019 by a federal judge in Chicago. He began cooperating with the US government in 2011 and helped them target members of the Sinaloa cartel and a rival gang. He had known "El Chapo" since he was 15 years old and testified at his trial in 2018, although he often referred to him as "mi compadre" or "my friend" and during his testimony said that the drug lord was the godfather of his youngest son.

"El Mayo" Zambada was also indicted by a US federal grand jury in April 2012 in Texas, along with other suspected Sinaloa leaders and 22 people associated with the cartel, including Guzman. They are accused of murder, drug trafficking, money laundering and organized crime.

The 2012 indictment in West Texas detailed two acts of violence that federal prosecutors said were committed by members of the cartel. One took place during a 2010 wedding ceremony in Ciudad Juarez, when an American citizen and two members of his family were kidnapped because of their ties to the rival Juarez cartel.

The target was the son-in-law and a Columbus resident whose body was found beaten and strangled. Police found the bodies of the groom, his brother and uncle three days after the wedding in a truck, the indictment states.