US Seeks Extradition of Mexican Drug Lord El Chapo
U.S. prosecutors want drug-cartel kingpin Joaqun "El Chapo" Guzmn to face trial in the U.S. and are now seeking to extradite Mexico's most wanted man. The U.S. attorney's office in Brooklyn confirmed on Sunday it is requesting Guzmn's extradition on a variety of charges, along with a number of attorney's offices around the country. "We plan to seek his extradition," said Robert Nardoza, a spokesman for the attorney's office. Guzmn was captured in a predawn raid on Saturday by Mexican and U.S. authorities in the beach-resort town of Mazatln in northwestern Mexico, about 135 miles 217 km from Guzmn's suspected base in Culiacn. The drug lord allegedly led the powerful Sinaloa cartel, which was responsible for bloodbaths and pitched battles in Tijuana and Ciudad Jurez, eventually amassing 1 billion and making it onto Forbes' list of the world's most powerful people. Guzmn's drug empire stretched across North America and even extended into Europe and Australia, so it remains unclear where he will be tried. He is on the Drug Enforcement Administration's most wanted list and faces a number of federal indictments. "This guy, he ran a global enterprise, so he's big. He's as big as Pablo Escobar," Nardoza tells TIME. "He may wind up being charged in Mexico first. We don't know what the time line is and how exactly this is going to proceed  He's facing a lot of time in prison based on the charges we've brought against him." , Guzmn would face a wide range of drug trafficking and organized-crime charges in the U.S. An indictment acquired from the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York  where Guzmn allegedly carried out much of his criminal activity beginning in 1990  alleges that the drug lord is guilty of trafficking over 100,000 tons of cocaine in the U.S. Drug violence in Mexico has claimed the lives of nearly 80,000 people in the past seven years, especially along key smuggling routes in the northern and western regions where police, local politicians and journalists are regularly assassinated by the powerful drug cartels.