The Cleveland Daily Banner Sunday, January 10, 2016 | Page 14

14—Cleveland Daily Banner—Sunday, January 10, 2016

www.clevelandbanner.com

AP source: Mexico willing to extradite recaptured drug lord
MEXICO CITY (AP) — Mexico is
willing to extradite drug lord
Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman to
the United States, a federal law
enforcement
official
said
Saturday. It’s a sharp reversal
from the official position after his
last capture in 2014.
“Mexico is ready. There are
plans to cooperate with the U.S.,”
said the official, who spoke on
condition anonymity because he
wasn’t authorized to comment.
But he cautioned that there
could be a lengthy wait before
U.S. prosecutors can get their
hands on Guzman, the mostwanted trafficker who was recaptured Friday after six months on
the run: “You have to go through
the judicial process, and the
defense has its elements too.”
Top officials in the party of
President Enrique Pena Nieto
also floated the idea of extradition, which they had flatly ruled
out before Guzman’s embarrassing escape from Mexico’s top
maximum security prison on
July 11.
“He has a lot of outstanding
debts to pay in Mexico, but if it’s
necessary, he can pay them in
other places,” said Manlio Fabio
Beltrones, president of Pena
Nieto’s
Institutional
Revolutionary Party.
But even if Mexican officials
agree, Guzman’s attorney Juan
Pablo Badillo told the Milenio
newspaper that the defense
already has filed six motions to
challenge extradition requests.
“They can challenge the judge,
challenge the probable cause,
challenge the procedure,” said
Juan Masini, former U.S.
Department of Justice attache at
the U.S. Embassy in Mexico.
“That’s why it can take a long
time. They won’t challenge everything at once ... they can drip,
drip, milk it that way.”
Guzman, a legendary figure in
Mexico who went from a farmer’s
son to the world’s top drug lord,
was apprehended after a
shootout between gunmen and
Mexican marines at the home in
Los Mochis, a seaside city in
Guzman’s home state of Sinaloa.
The operation resulted from six
months of investigation by
Mexican forces, who located
Guzman in a rural part of
Durango state in October but
decided not to shoot because he

AP photos

Above: JoAquin "el chAPo" GuzmAn is made to face the press as he is escorted to a helicopter in handcuffs by Mexican soldiers and marines at a federal hangar in Mexico City, Mexico on Friday.
Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto announced that Guzman had been recaptured six months after
escaping from a maximum security prison. Right: Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman is
loaded into a marine helicopter at a federal hangar in Mexico City on Friday. The world's most wanted
drug lord was recaptured by Mexican marines Fridaysix months after he fled through a tunnel from a
maximum secuirty prison in an escape that deeply embarrassed the government and strained ties with
the United States.
was with two women and a child,
said Mexican Attorney General
Arely Gomez.
After that he took a lower profile and limited his communication until he decided to move to
Los Mochis in December.
Following his capture, the
head of the powerful, international Sinaloa Cartel was brought to
Mexico City’s airport, frogmarched to a helicopter before
news media, and flown back to
the same prison he’d fled.
There were immediately calls
for h is quick extradition, just as
there were after the February
2014 capture of Guzman, who
faces drug-trafficking charges in
several U.S. states. At the time,
Mexico’s government insisted it
could handle the man who had
already broken out of one maximum-security prison, saying he
must pay his debt to Mexican
society first.
Then Guzman escaped a second time on July 11 under the
noses of guards and prison officials at Mexico’s most secure
lock-up, slipping out an elaborate
tunnel that showed the country’s
depth of corruption while thor-

oughly embarrassing the administration of President Enrique
Pena Nieto.
In celebrating Guzman’s latest
capture,
Mexican
officials
showed none of their bravado of
two years ago, though they made
clear that the intelligence building and investigation were carried out entirely by Mexican
forces. They did not mention
extradition.
“They have to extradite him,”
said Alejandro Hope, a security
analyst in Mexico. “It’s almost a
forced move.”
Gomez said that one of
Guzman’s key tunnel builders led
officials to the neighborhood in
Los Mochis, where authorities
had been watching for a month.
The team noticed a lot of activity
at the house Wednesday and the
arrival of a car early Thursday
morning. Authorities were able to
determine that Guzman was
inside the house, she said.
The marines were met with
gunfire as they closed in. Five
suspects were killed and six others arrested. One marine was
injured.
“You could hear intense gun-

fire and a helicopter; it was
fierce,” said a neighbor, adding
that the battle raged for three
hours, starting at 4 a.m. She
refused to be quoted by name in
fear for her own safety.
Gomez said Guzman and his
security chief, “El Cholo” Ivan
Gastelum, were able to flee via
storm drains and escape through
a manhole cover to the street,
where they commandeered getaway cars. Marines climbed into
the drains in pursuit. They closed
in on the two men based on
reports of stolen vehicles and they
were arrested on the highway.
In 2014, Guzman evaded capture by fleeing through a network
of interconnected tunnels in the
drainage system under Culiacan,
the Sinaloa state capital.
“The arrest of today is very
important for the government of
Mexico. It shows that the public
can have confidence in its institutions,” Pena Nieto said in a
public address. “Mexicans can
count on a government decided
and determined to build a better
country.”
What happens now is more
crucial for Guzman, whose cartel

smuggles multi-ton shipments of
cocaine and marijuana as well as
manufacturing and transporting
methamphetamines and heroin,
mostly to the U.S.
The United States filed
requests for Guzman’s extradition last June 25, just days
before he escaped from prison. In
September, a judge issued a second provisional arrest warrant on
U.S. charges of organized crime,
money laundering, drug trafficking and homicide, among others.
But Guzman’s lawyers already
had filed appeals and received
injunctions that could delay the
extradition process for months or
even years.
“The arrest is a significant
achievement in our shared fight
against transnational organized
crime, violence, and drug trafficking,” the Drug Enforcement
Administration said in a statement.
After his first capture in
Guatemala in June 1993,
Guzman was sentenced to 20
years in prison. He reportedly
made his 2001 escape from the
maximum security prison in a

laundry cart, though some have
discounted that version.
His second escape last year
was even more audacious. He fled
down a hole in his shower stall in
plain view of guards into a milelong tunnel dug from a property
outside the prison. The tunnel
had ventilation, lights and a
motorbike on rails. Construction
noise as a digger broke through
from the tunnel to his cell was
obvious inside the prison, according a video of Guzman in his cell
just before he escaped.
Mexican officials say dreams of
Hollywood helped them track
down and capture the world’s
most notorious drug trafficker.
Apparently Guzman, while on
the run, thought his story was
worthy of a movie. Part of the reason authorities tracked him
down was because he wanted to
film a biopic, Gomez told the
press at the airport ceremony
where the prisoner was shown off
to the press.
“For that he established communication with actresses and
producers, which became a new
line of investigation,” she said.

Canada PM condemns pepper spraying
of Syrian refugees in Vancouver
VANCOUVER, British Columbia
(AP) — Canadian Prime Minister
Justin Trudeau is condemning the
pepper spraying of a group of
Syrian refugees in Vancouver,
which police are treating as a hate
crime.
Police said the incident happened Friday night when people
had gathered outside the Muslim
Association of Canada Center during a “welcome night” for newly
arrived Syrian refugees. A man
wearing a white hoodie apparently
AP photo rode by on a bicycle and sprayed
French President FrAncois hollAnde, 2nd from right, and mayor of Montrouge, Jean-Loup 15 to 30 people, police said.
“This isn’t who we are — and
Metton, right, lay a wreath of flowers honoring the late policewoman Clarissa Jean-Philippe who died in
doesn’t reflect the warm welcome

last year's January attacks in Montrouge south of Paris on Saturday. Hollande is honoring 17 victims
killed in Islamic extremist attacks on satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, a kosher market and police a
year ago this week, unveiling plaques around Paris marking violence that ushered in a tumultuous year.

Canadians have offered,” Trudeau
posted on Twitter on Saturday.
Nawal Addo, a 16-year-old of
Syrian background who grew up in
Canada, said she was standing
outside with some refugees who
were waiting for a bus when everyone began to cough and feel their
eyes burning.
“We saw people coming out from
the building and they were in
worse condition than us,” she said.
“Their eyes were really puffed up.
They weren’t able to open their
eyes.”
She said it appeared the fumes
had gotten inside the entrance,
where it affected people more pow-

erfully in the enclosed space. Some
were children, including a gi rl who
was about 2, Addo said.
Some people were vomiting and
a few had to be taken away by
ambulance, including the toddler,
she said.
Addo said she didn’t see the
man on the bicycle. “There was
only one witness, and he didn’t
even see his face,” she said.
Vancouver Police Sgt. Randy
Fincham said no one has been
arrested.
Canada’s government has committed to welcoming 25,000 Syrian
refugees by the end of next month.
Thousands have already arrived.

French premier, Jewish leaders mark
anniversary of attack on kosher market
PARIS (AP) — France’s prime
minister lamented the growing
number of departures of French
Jews for Israel, as he and Jewish
leaders honored four people
gunned down in a kosher market
a year ago by an attacker claiming
ties to the Islamic State group.
Saturday evening’s ceremony
was part of a weekend of efforts to
ease religious tensions and mark
the anniversary of the attacks on
the market and the satirical
newspaper Charlie Hebdo. Times
remain tense for France’s large
Jewish and Muslim communities
after a year marked by Islamic
extremist violence that left more
than 150 people dead.
Mosques all over France are
opening up to the public this
weekend to ease anti-Muslim
sentiment and highlight the differences between jihadism and
moderate Islam.
Prime Minister Manuel Valls
joined families of victims and
survivors to mark the anniversary of the Jan. 9, 2015 shooting
and hostage-taking at the
Hypercacher market in eastern
Paris, which ended with attacker
Amedy Coulibaly slain by police.
“France would not be France”
without its Jews, Valls said. He
called it intolerable “to see French
Jews leave their country, in larger
and larger numbers, because
they no longer feel safe” or at

home.
“For these enemies who attack
their compatriots, who tear apart
the contract that unites us, there
can be no worthy explanation,”
he said, acknowledging the
“immense anguish” of the Jewish
community.
More French Jews emigrated to
Israel last year than ever before,
according to figures from the
Jewish Agency — some because
of security concerns after last
year’s market siege.
Concerns about anti-Semitism
in France had already been high,
and 2014 also saw a record number of French Jews emigrate to
Israel.
The mood was somber at
Saturday’s ceremony, as members of the French Jewish community urged government efforts
against extremism.
“These kinds of events are happening again and again and
again,” said Parisian Rachel
Benecmous. “Every time we are
weakened when these events are
repeated, so it’s difficult. We are
weakened and traumatized, but
... we organize ourselves so that
terrorism will not win and affect
our morale.”
France’s main Muslim body
organized a mosque open-door
initiative this weekend, including
tea and pastries, to reduce tensions. Attacks on Nov. 13 in Paris

led police to conduct over a dozen
raids on Muslim places of worship and close several over fears
they were radicalizing members.
French President Francois
Hollande paid homage Saturday
to a female police officer, Clarissa
Jean-Philippe, who was killed by
Coulibaly in the Parisian suburb
of Montrouge on Jan. 8.
Hollande unveiled a memorial
plaque and stood solemnly amid
a rousing rendition of the
Marseillaise, followed by spontaneous gospel music.
“I am not bitter,” said the victim’s mother, Marie-Louise JeanPhilippe. She told French media
that the “beautiful ceremony”
warmed her heart.

Egypt upholds prison sentence
for former autocrat Mubarak
CAIRO (AP) — An Egyptian
court on Saturday upheld a
three-year prison sentence for
graft that was already served by
former President Hosni Mubarak
and his two sons, who are out of
prison and will not have to serve
additional time.
Mubarak and his sons, onetime heir apparent Gamal and
wealthy businessman Alaa, who
were also implicated in the case,
spent over four years in custody.
The ruling gave them credit for
time served.

2016

Deadline:
MONDAY, JAN. 18th
Publication:
SUNDAY, JAN. 24th
Call 423-472-5041 Now
To Place Your Ad!