The Rise and Fall of El Chapo (2016) - full transcript
[dramatic orchestral music]
- This guy's a stone-cold
killer.
- He makes Pablo Escobar look
like a choir boy in comparison.
male narrator: He's been called
"The Last Godfather."
- He's the world's most powerful
and vicious narco-trafficker.
narrator: Billionaire.
Drug lord.
Master of escape.
- He is like a cat.
He has many lives.
narrator: From
the mountains of Mexico
to cities all across the U.S.--
[gunshots fire]
This is the amazing story
of the world's most
notorious narco,
called by many
"public enemy number one."
Joaquin Guzman Loera.
"El Chapo."
[intense electronic music]
[lighter flicks]
[orchestral drone music]
If you've ever smoked a joint,
if you've ever had anyone
offer you drugs at a party,
odds are you're more connected
to El Chapo
than you ever realized.
¶ ¶
From small-town America
to the major urban centers,
Chapo's Sinaloa cartel
distributes most of the drugs
brought into the United States.
- He is probably responsible
for 70% to 80%
of all the illegal drugs
that we see,
certainly in the Midwest,
and around the country.
¶ ¶
[dramatic rock music]
narrator: But after four
decades in the business,
El Chapo's more
than just a drug smuggler.
- He is a folk hero.
He's created this mystique
that people are just
mesmerized with.
- Chapo Guzman is like
a major criminal CEO.
On one side he's like
a paramilitary leader,
and on the other he becomes
like a rock star.
- Here's a man who's worth
over $1 billion.
He's got a beauty-queen wife
who's 32 years younger
than he is.
- Women get the likeness
of El Chapo Guzman
painted on their nails.
Young men get tattoos
of El Chapo Guzman.
- Sometimes it can be hard
to see where the reality starts
and the myth stops.
[gunshots firing]
We're never gonna know
exactly how many people
were killed in his name,
but his legend
has grown and surpassed
that of all
the other traffickers.
[eerie chamber music]
narrator: So
how did a poor fruit seller
with a third-grade education
become a legend?
¶ ¶
For many Americans,
his story starts
with a vanishing act.
July 2015.
Altiplano.
Mexico's supermax prison.
- It's the most maximum-secure
penitentiary in Mexico.
narrator:
It's just before 9:00 p.m.,
and Joaquin Guzman Loera,
El Chapo,
paces under the surveillance
cameras in his cell.
- Chapo Guzman
was the highest-risk prisoner
that they had there.
narrator: The TV blares.
The prison guards
seem distracted.
[indistinct prison chatter]
And suddenly, he's gone.
¶ ¶
25 minutes later,
guards find an empty cell.
[men speaking Spanish]
narrator:
All that's left is a hole.
20 inches square.
Some 30 feet below,
a modified motorcycle on rails
awaits as a getaway
through a tunnel
almost one mile long.
- He's been called
the most dangerous
cartel leader in the world,
and he just staged a
spectacular escape from prison.
- This is the first time
I've heard in modern day
that somebody literally tunneled
through dirt to escape
from prison.
- What's most impressive is how
well this tunnel is built.
There are steel beams.
There's wood.
Electricity.
This is a generator to run
all the lights, we're told.
narrator: As for Chapo,
he's long gone.
¶ ¶
[intense orchestral music]
Mexico is stunned.
It's the most brazen prison
break in the country's history,
embarrassing a police force,
a government,
an entire nation.
- It's extremely frustrating.
You know, this is a blow
to the good guys
on both sides of the border.
- [speaking Spanish]
- The Mexican government
seemed incapable of keeping
the most high-profile criminal
in the nation behind bars.
That really shook
the government.
¶ ¶
[upbeat ranchera music]
narrator: Soon,
ballads about El Chapo
hit the airwaves,
from Mexico to the U.S.
[men singing in Spanish]
¶ ¶
narrator: And a national figure
becomes an international icon
as the legend
of the narco Houdini
explodes into the media
worldwide.
- He's able to escape some
of the most seriously hardened
prisons in Mexico
in these miraculous escapes.
That is something mythical.
all: Chapo! Chapo!
narrator: From Sonora
to Southern California,
El Chapo's brand goes global
and businesses cash in.
- [speaking Spanish]
- This one, this model here,
is the one that is most popular.
It's selling a lot.
A lot.
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: On July 12th, 2015,
a search begins.
An international manhunt
led by Mexican, U.S.,
even Colombian forces.
- As a former U.S.
Drug Enforcement official
put it bluntly today,
"If Guzman isn't caught
within 48 hours,
we may never find him again."
female reporter:
Flights have been suspended
at local airports about 50
miles west of Mexico City.
- The U.S. Government
will act swiftly.
- The guy needs
to be behind bars.
[dramatic electronic music]
narrator: Suspects
in Chapo's escape
are rounded up
and pressed for intel.
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator:
With a $5 million reward,
Chapo sightings run wild.
- Chapo was like Elvis.
People were seeing him
everywhere.
narrator: A multi-national team
of law enforcement officials
works to track him down.
- Within three weeks,
the Mexican marines
were listening
to his communications.
- The Mexican government
started to do wire intercepts
on his attorneys,
on family members,
getting bits and pieces
of information.
narrator: That information
leads them to one region:
El Chapo's Mexican homeland,
the so-called "Golden Triangle"
in the mountains of Sinaloa.
¶ ¶
- He was up
in that mountainous region,
which is highly rugged.
If you don't want to be found,
you're never gonna be found.
[intense electronic music]
narrator:
For nearly three months,
thousands of law enforcement
officials worldwide
try to catch El Chapo Guzman
with no luck.
But then, the 61-year-old
fugitive kingpin slips up.
- Chapo made
the ultimate mistake.
He wanted to meet
with Kate del Castillo,
who played a female drug lord
in "La Reina Del Sur,"
"The Queen of the South,"
and he was enamored with her.
The big weakness
of Chapo Guzman
are beautiful women.
narrator: In October 2015,
El Chapo invites del Castillo
and actor Sean Penn
to a secret meeting
at a Sinaloa ranch,
and leaked pictures will soon
cause a social media frenzy.
- He agreed to meet with them
in order to create
a movie about his life.
He became very much interested
in growing his legend.
narrator: Photos obtained
by "Rolling Stone"
show the actors meeting
with the fugitive drug lord.
For the first time,
Chapo grants an exclusive
on-camera interview,
later released
by "Rolling Stone" magazine.
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: Meanwhile,
the authorities on both sides
of the border are listening in.
- When Chapo Guzman gave
a Blackberry cell phone
to Kate del Castillo,
the tracking really started.
- The Mexican marines were
getting closer and closer
all the time
by monitoring, by eavesdropping
and triangulating signals
and communications.
- Well, if I was Chapo,
I'd be lookin' over my shoulder,
because we're comin'.
¶ ¶
[intense music]
narrator:
Then, less than a week
after the meeting
with del Castillo and Penn,
Mexican forces make their move.
Following intercepted
cell phone signals,
they track El Chapo into the
heart of the Golden Triangle.
Residents say Black Hawk
helicopters arrive...
and open fire.
- [speaking Spanish]
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: 600 villagers
have to leave their homes.
Chapo himself
is nowhere to be found.
- [speaking Spanish]
[dramatic orchestral music]
narrator:
Soldiers sweep through
18 of his homes and properties
and come up empty.
- They got very close,
but El Chapo Guzman,
as he's incredibly good at,
escaped through
a hidden passageway.
male reporter:
The search is expanding now
for escaped drug kingpin
El Chapo.
narrator:
Then, on October 9th, 2015,
he's spotted again
near a remote village
in Sinaloa.
Black Hawks move quickly
into the area,
and soon, a sniper has Chapo
in his crosshairs.
- The Mexican marine
was authorized
to kill Chapo Guzman.
narrator:
But there's one problem.
He can't get a clean shot.
- As El Chapo Guzman started
to run down a mountain trail,
he was carrying the small child
of one of his cooks.
Guzman held that little girl in
front of him as a human shield.
The Mexican marine radioed
into his commander,
who told him to stand down.
The risk of hurting
that little girl was too great.
narrator: El Chapo makes
a run for it,
then loses his footing.
- He toppled down
a steep part of a trail
and was evidently injured.
narrator: But before
the marines can grab him,
Chapo's henchmen drag him off
into the woods.
Once again,
El Chapo disappears.
It will take
another three months
before his trackers
get a new lead.
[mellow guitar music]
In January 2016,
Mexican officers trail
one of Chapo's men
to the seaside town
of Los Mochis.
- The Mexican marines
very carefully watched
a particular house
that was undergoing
a great deal of construction.
- And they intercept
a phone call where
they indicate the "tía,"
or the "aunt," is coming,
and they believed that was
code word for Chapo Guzman.
narrator: On January 8th,
the Mexican officials
get a surprising tip-off.
- They watched
a white armored vehicle
travel to pick up
a large taco order
quite late, around midnight.
At that point, they realized
that it was El Chapo
and one of his top lieutenants,
and they were having a party
in Los Mochis
in this house
that had been retrofitted.
[intense bass music]
narrator: At 4:30 a.m.,
all is dead quiet
in the affluent neighborhood
as an elite squad
creeps into position.
After a six-month hunt,
Operation Black Swan
is about to begin.
¶ ¶
17 special ops soldiers
from the Mexican marines,
packing assault rifles
and helmet cams,
approach the house.
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: But when El Chapo's
men go on the offensive,
all hell breaks loose.
[gunshots firing]
[explosion booming]
[dramatic orchestral music]
narrator: January 2016.
El Chapo, the most wanted
drug lord in America
and the world,
has been on the run since
his dramatic escape
from a maximum security prison.
¶ ¶
Now, after
a nearly six month chase,
an elite squad of Mexican
marines is closing in on him
in the town of Los Mochis.
[men speaking Spanish]
narrator: But they walk
into a hail of bullets.
[gunshots firing]
- There is shooting.
All hell breaks loose.
[gunshots firing]
There's automatic weapons fire,
and the screams
and the agony and the blood...
[explosion booming]
- They hit the Mexican marines
with everything they had.
[gunshots firing]
- From AK-47s to M4s
to hand grenades.
narrator: The brutal gun battle
will go on for nearly an hour.
[gunshots firing]
[speaking Spanish]
[mellow ambient music]
narrator: By 6:30 a.m.,
the shooting is over.
Marines have locked down
the safe house.
- [speaking Spanish]
¶ ¶
narrator: In the chaos,
five cartel gunmen
have been killed,
six others arrested.
Marines search the house,
looking for the fugitive
drug lord.
They turn up an arsenal--
19 guns, RPGs, armored cars.
But El Chapo...
is nowhere to be seen.
- They found two escape hatches.
One behind the refrigerator
in the kitchen,
which turns out
to have been a ruse,
a trick merely meant to confuse
El Chapo's pursuers.
The second,
in a mirrored closet.
[dramatic electronic music]
narrator:
It takes the marines 90 minutes
to find the hidden switch
that opens a concealed door.
¶ ¶
The full-length mirror
they've walked past
several times swings open,
leading down
to a secret passage.
El Chapo, the master of escape,
has gotten away again.
It's no wonder thousands of
officers are hunting for Chapo.
The 58-year-old is the head
of the richest criminal
organization in history.
But his start
is very different.
He's born poor--
so poor, his cradle
is a wooden tomato crate.
He grows up in the late 1950s
in a tiny village in the hills,
with no electricity,
no running water--
nothing but ambition.
- La Tuna, where he was born,
is so remote,
these families
are so impoverished,
they look for any way they can
to put food on their table.
¶ ¶
narrator: The oldest
of seven kids,
young Joaquin gets
the nickname "Chapo",
or "Shorty."
His father pulls him out
of school in the third grade
and sends him
to work the poppy fields.
- His father was abusive,
an alcoholic,
spent all of the money on,
allegedly, alcohol and women.
- His father
was a very brutal man.
He would beat up Chapo Guzman,
his brothers, and his sisters.
¶ ¶
narrator: By the time
he's a teenager,
Chapo runs away
to start his own business,
in the drug trade.
- If you're a small kid
from a village out there,
you're gonna go for the drugs.
¶ ¶
His only role models
were drug traffickers.
They're the ones that had
the beautiful women on each arm,
they had bling, they had...
you know, beautiful cars.
So Chapo Guzman wanted to
emulate these individuals
because it was a way
out of poverty for him.
¶ ¶
narrator: And so Chapo
turns to his cousins,
the Beltran Leyvas, who
are already in the business.
They show him the ropes.
- And they help him to--
to make his own fields
when he was between 15
or 16 years old.
¶ ¶
narrator: Chapo's homeland,
Sinaloa,
in the Golden Triangle,
is rugged.
Remote.
It's also ground zero
for narcos.
- The state of Sinaloa
is to the Mexican drug cartels
a bit like how Sicily
is to the Italian mafia.
It's the cradle
of Mexican organized crime.
Chapo Guzman
was, in many ways,
born into the drug trade.
¶ ¶
narrator: Soon,
he begins at the bottom
of Mexico's main
crime syndicate,
the Guadalajara gang,
headed by Felix Gallardo,
the man they call El Padrino--
The Godfather.
- He brought Chapo Guzman in,
initially as a driver,
and then started to give him
more responsibility.
narrator: Young Chapo pays
his dues running errands.
- If you go back
to his earliest days,
he was a logistics guy,
primarily for marijuana.
narrator: He's coming into
the business at the right time.
- The United States
drug consumption
exploded in the 1960s.
narrator:
With the cultural revolution,
the demand for,
first, marijuana,
then heroin, skyrockets.
¶ ¶
And when
Colombian cocaine arrives
in the late '70s,
it's a game changer.
- Cocaine made the business
way larger
than it was in the past.
narrator: The Mexican gangs
work as drug runners
for the famed Colombian kingpin
Pablo Escobar
and his infamous
Medellín cartel.
- The Mexican traffickers
were the transporters
and they would receive a fee
from the Colombians.
- This is when cocaine flows
through Mexico in really
massive quantities.
narrator: By the mid-1980s,
Felix Gallardo
and his boys from Sinaloa
are running the largest
criminal syndicate in Mexico,
working directly under
Pablo Escobar himself.
¶ ¶
Chapo Guzman,
now in his late 20s,
shows the brains
and the drive to get ahead.
- He very quickly proved
himself as a--
just a smart, savvy operator.
- He was very adept
at coordinating flights
from Colombia containing
large shipments of cocaine.
- If you're able to get loads
safely into the United States,
your worth
is absolutely tremendous.
narrator:
He and the cartel are moving
up to 20 tons of coke a month
into California.
His two main weapons are cash
and fear.
- His ability to corrupt
and to convince
is probably boundless.
- They start to pay bribes,
directly, to very
high-level members
of the government--
generals,
members of the federal police.
narrator: It's said
he'll stop at nothing
to get what he wants.
- People were afraid
of making mistakes.
- He was vicious.
Killed people.
- When individuals lost loads,
he would put a bullet
in their head.
- He personally,
by his own hand,
would execute them.
¶ ¶
narrator: He's the most
notorious drug trafficker
in the world, a wanted man
in the United States,
but back in the mid-1980s,
30-year-old
Joaquin Guzman Loera,
El Chapo,
is rising quickly
through the ranks
of the Guadalajara cartel.
- He was well-known
as an executioner.
When loads were late,
when individuals
showed up for work drunk
or unprepared,
he would execute them.
narrator: But he's more
than just a hit man.
Although he can't
really read or write,
he has an uncanny ability
to move the product.
- And he had many ingenious
ways of trafficking drugs,
such as hiding cocaine
in tins of chili.
- They were one of the most
innovative.
This was an organization
that would essentially use
any route available.
narrator: Shipping containers,
panga boats, trucks,
even mules are used
to move concealed drugs
across the border.
By sea, Chapo and his cartel
ship immense loads
right under
the coast guard's nose.
- They perfected the art
of building these so-called
"narco submarines" carrying
tons of cocaine,
worth hundreds of millions
of dollars.
narrator: But then Chapo gets
his most inspired idea yet,
the one that will put him
on the map.
narrator: Smuggling tunnels
have been around for decades,
running underneath
the U.S./Mexico border--
some of the most
heavily patrolled terrain
on the continent.
But Chapo
takes it to a new level,
turning them into an art form:
the super tunnels.
He has the first one built
in 1989.
male reporter:
The tunnel was called
one of the most sophisticated
drug-smuggling schemes
authorities have ever seen.
- This type of tunnel
is not an amateur operation.
It's a highly sophisticated
engineering feat
that took place.
narrator:
Even the way in is surprising--
an entrance hidden under
a pool table.
Turning an outside water spigot
triggers a hydraulic system,
lifting the table,
revealing a ladder
heading down.
More than three stories below,
the tunnel runs 300 feet
under the border,
from Mexico into Arizona.
It's the prototype for dozens
of arched Sinaloa tunnels
that will follow,
complete with ventilation,
electricity, and more--
infrastructure marvels called
"the Taj Mahal of tunnels."
narrator: In 1990,
U.S. authorities are startled
to discover this passageway
is funneling massive drug loads
into the U.S.
They set out to shut down
El Chapo's tunnels.
It's a battle
that continues to this day.
- We believe
that there are tunnels
under construction as we speak,
and it's our job to find those
and put them out of business.
If we come across
a tunnel that's being built,
you know, we will
just fill it in
on the United States side.
narrator:
A lot of tunnels come up
in the Otay Mesa warehouse area
in San Diego,
where Mexico and the U.S.
sit side by side
less than a mile apart.
- So as you can see,
right over here,
that fence is the international
border with Mexico,
and where we stand
is the commercial district
in San Ysidro, San Diego County,
where there's no shortage
of commercial warehouses
to utilize
as a tunnel exit point.
narrator: Here, there's more
than 2 million square feet
of vacant real estate available
at any given point,
which gives cartels
like Chapo's
a lot of room to maneuver.
[metal clanging]
- Gloves and harnesses.
Anybody else?
Helmets?
narrator: Day in and day out,
a crew from the San Diego
Tunnel Task Force,
known as the "Tunnel Rats,"
suit up to investigate
these tunnels
that run under
the U.S./Mexico border.
They rope off
and rappel down
into the darkness.
70 feet under
the Earth's surface,
they find passageways
more than a half-mile long.
All told,
U.S. and Mexican officials
have found nearly 60
of these sophisticated tunnels
in the past decade and a half,
many masterminded
by Chapo himself.
This tunnel was discovered
in 2009, December of 2009.
Our partners on the south side
found a warehouse.
When they entered the building,
they later discovered
the whole bathroom lowered,
toilet, vanity, and all.
To access the actual
tunnel entrance itself,
the whole bottom floor actually
lowered into the tunnel.
They found they had ventilation
systems, electrical,
a phone line
was actually in there,
and a rudimentary rail system.
narrator:
For El Chapo's builders,
these are no simple tasks.
- Well, it takes time.
It takes effort.
They're digging tunnels
3,000 feet.
Some of these take, on average,
about a year, year and a half,
to span these distances,
so I mean, that's--
that's persistence.
narrator:
They also take money,
as much as $1 million apiece
to build,
but it's money well spent for
the cartels like El Chapo's.
- It's a priceless venture
for them,
meaning having a completed
tunnel into the U.S.
is, you know,
worth its weight in gold.
- One single load
would pay for whatever
expenses they incurred
multiple times over.
Classic example
is the Calle de Linea tunnel
where we found 34 tons
of marijuana.
At that time, I believe it had
a $60 million plus
estimated value.
Cost would probably
be about a million, tops,
is what I've heard,
so it's just--
you do the math--
that's a huge profit margin.
One load.
¶ ¶
narrator: By 1989,
El Chapo's smuggling tons
of cocaine and marijuana
through tunnels like these
and many other
inventive methods.
With his flair for logistics,
he earns a brand-new nickname.
- He became known as El Rápido
because he could move cocaine
loads very, very quickly,
from Colombia through Mexico
to the United States.
narrator:
It's said that before
the planes are back
in Colombia,
his coke is already
in Los Angeles.
- Wires were tingling
with the name El Chapo Guzman.
narrator: Chapo's savvy
earns him another promotion
in Mexico's Guadalajara cartel.
Now in his mid-30s,
he's reportedly making
millions of dollars.
And so, El Chapo starts
living the high life.
He's got cars, planes,
dozens of houses,
and throws extravagant bashes,
where he's known to fly in
prostitutes for the occasion.
- He used to rent
a complete floor
in one hotel in Guadalajara
or Puerto Vallarta
and make huge parties.
And he was very young,
and I think that
he didn't know what to do
with all that money and power.
narrator:
While Chapo's living large,
U.S. and Mexican officials
are working hard to crack down
on drug smuggling,
and in November 1989,
they catch a break.
- And from Mexico tonight, news
of what may be a major victory
in the war on drugs--
the arrest of a man called the
kingpin behind a drug pipeline
into the United States.
narrator: Felix Gallardo,
El Chapo's boss,
is sentenced to prison
for 40 years
on drug trafficking,
bribery, and weapons charges.
Brokaw: Mexican authorities
say that Felix Gallardo
ran the ring that funneled
Colombian cocaine
through Mexico
into this country--
two tons of cocaine
every month.
narrator:
Now there's a power vacuum
at the top
of the Guadalajara cartel,
and Chapo is about
to seize his moment.
- Everyone else seemed to be
content with their little patch.
Not him.
It's a power-grab world,
and Chapo went for the grab.
¶ ¶
narrator: In just 15 years,
El Chapo Guzman
has risen to become
one of Mexico's
major drug smugglers
into the U.S.,
flooding American streets
with cocaine and marijuana.
By November 1989,
he's a top lieutenant
in the Guadalajara cartel
when his boss,
kingpin Felix Gallardo,
is sentenced
to 40 years behind bars.
Recognizing a void in power,
Chapo is poised
to seize the moment.
- U.S. officials
are praising Mexico
for the arrest of a man
said to be one of the world's
biggest drug dealers.
narrator:
But right before his arrest,
knowing his days were numbered,
Gallardo called
Mexico's crime families
to a meeting in Acapulco.
His plan: to carve up
the country into turfs.
- Once he was imprisoned,
the Guadalajara cartel
splintered into various
organizations.
narrator:
Each group gets a corridor
to the all-important
U.S. border.
There's a Tijuana cartel,
a Juarez cartel,
a Gulf cartel,
and El Chapo and his partners
form the Sinaloa cartel,
covering the corridor
from Sinaloa and Sonora
into Arizona.
The division seems
to make sense,
but it will actually set off
a chain of narco wars
that are still going on.
- There is no honor
among thieves.
These alliances fracture
very, very quickly.
We're talking about massive
amounts of power.
Incredible amounts of ego.
narrator: In 1992,
Chapo is looking
to expand his territory
and makes a bold move
into Tijuana.
- The port of entry
between Tijuana and San Diego
is the most lucrative corridor
for drugs coming in from Mexico
into the United States.
- You traffic drugs
into California,
you reach San Diego,
Los Angeles, San Francisco--
meanwhile, Chapo Guzman
was moving drugs into Arizona.
It's obviously not quite
as profitable.
narrator: Chapo's
infiltration into Tijuana
will put him up against
some tough adversaries:
the Arellano Felix brothers.
- They had a reputation
for real, real thuggery.
They'd be sitting in a bar
and they would say, you know,
"I feel like killing someone.
Let's--let's go."
narrator: And so
a vicious turf war begins.
- What was a rivalry
turned into bloodshed
between Chapo Guzman
and the Arellano Felix brothers.
- Chapo Guzman sends emissaries
to meet with
the Arellano Felix brothers,
and they kill these emissaries,
and that is what started
the blood feud.
- They started waging war
between themselves.
- The Tijuana cartel put
a hit out on El Chapo Guzman,
recognizing him
as an up-and-comer
and a threat
to their continued dominance.
narrator:
In early November 1992,
Chapo is driving down a busy
avenue in downtown Guadalajara.
A white pickup pulls up,
and Ramon Arellano Felix
and four gunmen jump out...
[gunshots firing]
And open fire.
Chapo's car
is riddled with bullets,
but the armor plating holds
and he survives.
A few days later,
he strikes back.
[eerie dance music]
At the Disco Christine
nightclub in Puerto Vallarta,
a party is underway for two
of the Arellano Felix brothers.
300 guests
are dancing and drinking.
Chapo's hit men burst in,
dressed in police uniforms,
a deadly deception.
Then...
[gunshots firing]
They open fire.
When the shooting stops,
a half-dozen people are dead
on the dance floor.
- The conflict between
the Arellano Felix brothers
and Chapo developed
into a mafia-type arrangement,
where, you know, Chapo would try
and have one of them killed
and they would send
someone to Sinaloa
to try and have him killed.
¶ ¶
narrator: The violence
comes to a head in May 1993.
- The ongoing feud escalated.
- They sent a hit team
to execute El Chapo Guzman.
- The Arellano Felix brothers
contracted some thugs
from the San Diego area,
known as the Logan Heights gang.
narrator: The hit men
have been trying, and failing,
to track Chapo down
when they get a call.
- They had word
that El Chapo Guzman
was at the airport
in Guadalajara
and that he would be riding
in a white sedan.
They came across that sedan
and opened fire.
[gunshots firing]
narrator: But
in the crossfire, Chapo,
the master of escape,
makes his way under cars
to the terminal.
And in the confusion,
the assassins hit
a very different target:
a Roman Catholic cardinal.
- It became a horrific
assassination
that sent headlines
around the world.
narrator: For over two decades,
Joaquin Guzman Loera,
king of the narco super tunnel,
has been making his mark
as a leading transporter
of cocaine
into the United States.
But the drug lord,
now in his 30s,
wants to expand his territory.
In May 1993, El Chapo
is in a bloody battle
with rivals over Tijuana,
a key corridor
into the U.S. drug market.
A hit is ordered
to take him out
at the Guadalajara airport.
But when the assassins
open fire,
they get a shock.
- El Chapo Guzman was not
in that vehicle.
He was in another vehicle.
In that vehicle...
was the Archbishop
of Guadalajara.
- The cardinal Posadas Ocampo
is just getting out of his car
and they hit him 14 times
with rounds from AK-47s.
- Two suspects are in custody
this morning in Guadalajara
following a shootout that left
at least seven people dead,
among them
a Roman Catholic cardinal.
Authorities think the shootout
may have been a battle
between rival gangs
of drug traffickers.
[solemn mass music]
narrator: Mexico is stunned.
The shooting receives
international coverage.
- The then Mexican president
was so outraged
at this assassination
that he vowed
to bring
the full force and effect
of the Mexican government
down on the narco-traffickers.
narrator: Rumors swirl
about the Cardinal's death,
that perhaps it wasn't
an accident at all.
Some experts believe
that the real target
was the cardinal himself.
They allege he held a list
of Mexican government officials
with ties to organized crime.
- There are many
conspiracy theories
that really they killed
they cardinal
because he had some
information.
- Apparently, the cardinal
has a list of people related
with the president that receive
money from the drug cartels.
narrator:
But the government insists
the cartels are behind it all.
- [speaking Spanish]
- There was a lot of pressure
following the killing
of the cardinal
to detain some significant
drug traffickers.
narrator: Chapo's
cronies haven't been happy
with his feud over Tijuana.
To them, he seems like
the perfect scapegoat.
- The government said, "Okay,
we have to put someone in jail.
"It's an international scandal,
we have to do something."
And they said, "Well,
El Chapo just bring problems.
We can't control him."
narrator: And so Chapo
is offered up as a fall guy
for this,
a crime he didn't commit.
And the first massive manhunt
for Joaquin Chapo Guzman
begins.
- El Chapo Guzman,
realizing that the heat was on,
decided to hightail it,
crossed the border
with Guatemala,
paid off a Guatemalan official
over $1 million
to keep it a secret.
narrator:
But, hiding in Guatemala,
he'll soon be double-crossed
when that official pockets
the money
and tips off the DEA,
which alerts local authorities.
- We provide the Guatemalans
the information,
and he is arrested
in a local hotel in Guatemala.
¶ ¶
narrator: On June 9, 1993,
Chapo Guzman is unceremoniously
bound and bundled
into a pickup truck
by the Guatemalans
and dumped just
over the Mexican border.
- The Mexican military
was waiting on the other side
with all the pomp
and circumstance
of the Mexican military.
They were in full-dress
uniforms,
and all of a sudden,
they see a rustic,
beat-up old pickup truck
coming down the road,
and they see that Chapo Guzman
is in the bed of the truck,
rolling around, you know,
getting, you know,
battered and bruised.
narrator: El Chapo is arrested
and sentenced to 20 years
for conspiracy, bribery,
and drug trafficking.
- [speaking Spanish]
- Suddenly he was a name.
A real name.
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: Through the 1990s,
Chapo's legend starts to grow,
operating out of cell 307,
block C3
in the maximum-security prison
at Puente Grande.
- There's been good
documentation to show
an incredible network
of bribery
by Chapo Guzman
of prison officials.
- He was very adept
at knowing who to bribe
and how to bribe them.
- If you're a guard,
you're earning, you know,
$15,000 a year.
What are you gonna do?
If he's offered you money,
you can take the money
and be corrupt,
or you can report it to someone
who you have no idea whether
you can trust that person.
narrator: Those who turn down
Chapo Guzman's generosity
do so at their own risk.
- We will pay you handsomely
for that.
We will make you very,
very rich.
And if you decline our offer,
we will kill you.
Or even worse,
we will murder your wife
and your daughters
and your sons.
- You take our money
or you take our bullet.
¶ ¶
narrator: Seduction.
Intimidation.
That's Chapo's way
of doing business,
inside the prison
and out.
- Chapo has a lot of people
in various parts
of the governments,
all over Mexico.
In my day, we had
the Chief of Police of Mexico's
Federal Judicial District
a trafficker.
So corruption can go
to the highest levels.
narrator: The end result--
inside one of the toughest
prisons in Mexico,
El Chapo is living a life
most only dream of.
- He was able
to essentially live
in a presidential suite of sorts
during his incarceration.
- Within weeks
of Chapo's arrival,
the prison guards were calling
him "jefe," or "boss."
- He had parties.
He had the best food
that he wanted,
that was brought in
and cooked by private chefs.
narrator: And there are women,
lots of women,
sent to the prison,
including a steady
rotation of prostitutes
for himself and others--
even the guards, as seen in
these security camera images.
- He used to get visit
of many women in the jail
and make sexual competitions
with other people
that was in jail--
who has more sex in during
the day than the other.
- He was able to enjoy
a lot of relationships
with female staff,
even cleaning staff,
even one particular
female prisoner
who he fell in love with
and wrote love letters to later.
narrator: Meanwhile,
it's business as usual
for Chapo
and the Sinaloa cartel,
controlling the flow of drugs
across the border into Arizona.
- He was using cell phones,
using couriers,
using a computer.
He was still fully
operating and functioning
as the de facto leader
of the Sinaloa cartel
while imprisoned in Jalisco.
narrator: And then,
a pivotal moment
in Chapo's career
when a bullet brings down
Colombian kingpin
Pablo Escobar.
- The death of Pablo Escobar
in December of 1993
created an opening
for the Sinaloa cartel
and Chapo Guzman at its helm.
El Chapo Guzman's genius
is that he saw
the Medellín cartel fall apart
and he realized
that the Sinaloa cartel
could control that trade
into the United States.
He saw that Mexican traffickers
could actually dominate
the market.
narrator: All through
the mid to late 1990s,
Chapo's men start moving
more and more narcotics,
as he calls the shots
from the inside.
- They began to buy
the cocaine in Colombia
for about $2,000 a kilo
and sell that on the border
of the United States
for about $30,000.
So these vast
profits of cocaine
that used to go
to the Colombians
were now staying largely in the
hands of Mexican traffickers.
[indistinct shouting]
narrator: Meanwhile,
U.S. authorities
have been tracking
this activity,
and soon, they decide
to make their move.
Even though he's
in a Mexican jail,
El Chapo is indicted
in Arizona and California
for drug trafficking
and money laundering.
By 2001, as officials
put the wheels in motion
to extradite the drug lord
to the U.S.,
he tries to cut a deal.
- They don't want to serve time
in the United States.
It's hard time.
¶ ¶
- So one of our agents
traveled to Puente Grande,
escorted into a waiting room,
and then they bring in
Chapo Guzman.
Immediately gets on the floor
and looks underneath the door
to make sure
that nobody's listening,
and then he makes an offer,
and he says,
"Look, if you don't extradite me
to the United States,
"I will give you all
of the routes that I have,
"and I will tell you all of the
high-ranking Mexican officials
that I have been paying off."
narrator: But the U.S.
government isn't biting.
The DEA turns him down.
- We were not gonna strike
a deal with him
because we want him
in the United States.
- If he were extradited
to the United States,
it would be game over for him.
narrator: Out of options,
Chapo begins to think
about a great escape.
narrator:
For the last eight years,
drug lord El Chapo Guzman
has been running
the powerful Sinaloa cartel
from behind bars
of a Mexican prison,
but he's still a wanted man
in America.
With trafficking indictments
in California and Arizona,
U.S. authorities are pushing
to extradite the kingpin
to the States
and bring him to trial.
Out of options,
Chapo makes a bold move.
- There's an individual
that walks up to his cell
with a laundry cart.
Chapo Guzman jumps in,
they cover him with towels
and dirty laundry,
and wheels him
out of the penitentiary
into a car.
[sirens blaring]
They leave the area,
they stop at a gas station,
and the driver goes in
to buy water,
which Chapo Guzman requested,
and when he came out,
Chapo Guzman had gone
into the night.
narrator: After 9:00 p.m.
on that January 2001 night,
El Chapo Guzman is gone.
Word spreads about
his daring laundry cart escape,
but others later say the prison
break is even more brazen--
that he simply walks out the
door disguised as a policeman.
Mexican authorities are stunned
as their investigation uncovers
widespread corruption
within the prison,
with alleged payoffs running
into the millions,
from prison guards
to the highest levels
of the Mexican government.
- He escaped
from Puente Grande,
and none of the other guys have.
The Godfather,
Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo,
who once ran the drug trade,
is still sitting in prison,
yet Chapo got out.
narrator: And so the myth
of the elusive El Chapo,
the escape artist,
is born.
- The fact
that he was able to escape
from a maximum-security prison
just lends greater support
for his mystique.
- People have always been
fascinated by the--
by the bandito, the bad guy.
From Pancho Villa
to the Godfather
to Al Capone
and now El Chapo.
narrator: On the run,
Chapo goes underground
and on the offensive.
In the eight years Chapo
was behind bars,
there was an unspoken truce
amongst the Mexican cartels,
but now the turf wars reignite.
- He decided that he was
going to expand his territory
and take over
a lot of these major corridors
into the United States because
he could expand his business.
narrator: In early 2002,
Chapo's bitter rival,
the Tijuana cartel,
suffers a loss when one
of the Arellano Felix brothers
is killed in a shootout
with the police.
Some believe the authorities
are intentionally going after
Chapo's enemies.
Either way,
Chapo finally takes control
of the Tijuana territory
he's coveted for years.
- The Sinaloa cartel fought
a very, very vicious war
against the Tijuana cartel.
Really beat them.
Bloodied them
into near-submission.
narrator:
And that's just the start.
Looking to expand his power,
Chapo goes after
the Gulf cartel in the east.
- I think it's
a business calculation.
He probably saw the risks
and said,
"Okay, I'll lose some people,
but we're gonna gain this turf."
narrator: Chapo's team
of hit men move in,
but they're met by the Zetas,
the Gulf cartel's army
of mercenaries.
- Chapo Guzman
sent gang members,
guys with tattoos
and shaved heads,
to try and take this territory,
but the Zetas reacted
with extreme violence
and they changed the nature
of the fighting in Mexico.
narrator: Many of Chapo's men
are taken down
in this ongoing battle
against the Zetas.
Meanwhile, Chapo
is still hungry for Texas
and sets his sights
on the Juarez cartel,
the gatekeepers of El Paso.
[dramatic orchestral music]
Over the next five years,
the narco wars reach
an unprecedented level
of violence.
- You never saw that kind
of pictures before the war--
people without head,
people hanged
in public places--
I mean, horrible things.
narrator: In Juarez alone,
there are reportedly an average
of eight murders a day--
a death toll
that will one day reach 11,000.
And in the entire country,
that number will top 100,000.
- The slaughter
was just wholesale,
and the blood was running
into the drainage systems there
in Juarez at that time.
- [speaking Spanish]
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: By the late 2000s,
Chapo's forces dominate
in the fight against
the Juarez cartel.
Seizing control
of the Texas border,
Chapo makes
a savvy business decision.
- Anticipating legalization
of marijuana in certain states,
they shifted to production
of heroin and methamphetamine.
That ability to pivot,
to sense changes in the market,
to be nimble
and quick and adroit,
is what truly distinguishes
the Sinaloa cartel
from all of the other cartels.
- The Sinaloa cartel brings
heroin into the United States,
through Texas, up Arkansas,
Missouri, and Illinois,
and to Chicago.
narrator: Chicago
is one of Chapo's main hubs
where drugs can be distributed
to almost any part of the
country in a matter of days.
- You got two
international airports,
you got a really large
train network,
you got eight interstate
highways that intersect here,
and you have the third largest
Mexican-American population
in the country.
¶ ¶
narrator: Chapo entrusts
the Chicago operation
to a family with ties
to the Golden Triangle.
- The Sinaloa cartel
was very savvy in establishing
a bulkhead,
essentially, in Chicago
through two Mexican-American
twin brothers,
Margarito and Pedro Flores.
- They decided to become really,
really sophisticated
drug traffickers,
and they--
they were.
- It's alleged that those two
twin brothers alone brought
$2 billion worth of narcotics
and drugs into the Chicago area.
¶ ¶
narrator: The effects
are startling.
Over the next ten years,
violence and murder rates
in Chicago's south side
skyrocket,
as gangbangers selling
Chapo's drugs kill
to protect their turf.
[siren wailing]
Meanwhile, the Sinaloa cartel's
highly addictive
black tar heroin
is causing an extraordinary
number of overdoses.
- Addiction
is incredibly prevalent.
You got people who
are seizing on the misery.
Right? If there's money
to be made,
people are taking advantage
of it.
narrator: Realizing the scope
of the problem,
Chicago authorities will soon
declare El Chapo
"public enemy number one."
- The last time we did that
was with Al Capone,
and Capone is a minor figure
in the world of crime
compared to Chapo Guzman.
- Al Capone killed people
who were in the game.
This drug
is killing our kids.
- Enough is enough.
This man has got to be caught.
[intense electronic music]
narrator: 2007.
Fugitive kingpin Chapo Guzman
is one of the most
wanted men in America.
As the main supplier of
marijuana,
cocaine, methamphetamine, and
heroin into the United States,
he's built his drug trafficking
business into an empire.
An estimated 150,000 people
work for Chapo's Sinaloa cartel
in 50 countries around
the world, including the U.S.
- It's an illegal enterprise,
but he's a CEO.
- I've never seen
a criminal entity
this powerful, this wealthy,
this vicious.
narrator: El Chapo has become
so big that "Forbes" magazine
will soon list him as
one of the elite billionaires
and most powerful people
in the world.
- The big news there
is that we put on
a drug trafficker,
and his name is Joaquin
"El Chapo" Guzman Loera.
He is not available
for interviews because
he's on the run.
- The Sinaloa cartel
has the most diversified
money-laundering portfolio
of any organized crime network
in the world.
They do commodities trading.
They buy gold.
They buy diamonds.
They have daycare centers.
They have shopping centers.
You know, they have horse
farms, agricultural farms,
and a lot of banks.
[mellow piano music]
narrator:
An international criminal,
Chapo has grown larger
than life,
making him even more of a folk
hero back home in Culiacan.
- Chapo Guzman is a Robin Hood
to the people of Mexico,
particularly the poor people.
- [speaking Spanish]
- He has built churches,
soccer fields--
he has provided low-income
housing for individuals.
narrator: A mythical fugitive,
Chapo is even said to come
out of hiding every so often.
- He has, on occasion, been
known to enter a restaurant
with all of his bodyguards,
demand that all of the patrons
in that restaurant
enjoying their meals
surrender their cell phones.
- In walks Chapo
and has a quiet meal
and, you know, will at least
respectfully pay your bar tab
for the inconvenience.
¶ ¶
narrator: In January 2007,
Chapo arranges to go
to an annual festival
in a neighboring village.
Security is tight.
Allegedly, 200 henchmen
toting AK-47s close down roads
to protect their boss.
There, he meets up
with 17-year-old Emma Coronel,
the pageant queen of the fair.
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator:
Chapo is known as a ladies man.
He's been married
at least twice before
and is said to have
at least ten children.
His courtship with Emma
is swift,
and within a year,
on her 18th birthday,
she becomes the 53-year-old
crime boss' next wife.
¶ ¶
- Emma, she was almost a child
when she get married
with El Chapo Guzman.
She looks very innocent
and pure.
narrator: Many believe Emma
and Chapo's union is arranged
to strength a family alliance.
Although Emma denies
the claims,
her uncle is said
to be murdered drug lord
Ignacio Coronel--
infamous for building Sinaloa's
mega meth labs.
- Emma Coronel has grown up
in the drug trade.
Her father was a lieutenant
under Chapo.
Her brother is incarcerated
on drug trafficking charges.
narrator:
But American-born Emma
says her husband is not
the dangerous kingpin
the world has made him
out to be.
- Chapo Guzman,
like most drug traffickers,
will take a life
without flinching,
but when it comes
to their families--
they adore their families,
and they will protect
their families.
¶ ¶
narrator: But as El Chapo
continues to expand his empire,
it's family that threatens
to tear it apart.
For years, Chapo's cousins,
the Beltran Leyvas,
have worked the Arizona border
for the Sinaloa cartel.
It's a relationship that dates
all the way back to when Chapo
first got into the drug game.
As a young teenager,
the Beltran Leyvas
helped him grow marijuana.
Nearly 40 years later,
greed and jealousy
unravel the alliance.
In January 2008,
the Beltran Leyvas allegedly
start moving loads to the U.S.
behind Chapo's back,
undermining his authority.
- The Beltran Leyva brothers--
they were controlling as much
dope and as much territory
as Chapo Guzman.
- The betrayals start
when the business became bigger,
so the cake was really good
and you don't want to share
the cake anymore.
- It seems like,
for Chapo Guzman to consolidate
his power in the cartel,
it was necessary to confront
the Beltra Leyva brothers.
[helicopter blades whirring]
[dramatic orchestral music]
narrator: Chapo Guzman
takes it to the next level
when he reportedly
informs on his cousin,
Alfredo Beltran Leyva,
sending the police to nab him.
The Beltran Leyvas
accuse Chapo of treason
and viciously retaliate.
- Chapo Guzman's son,
Edgar Guzman,
who was a college student,
was gunned down and murdered
in Culiacan, Sinaloa.
narrator: The death of his son
rocks Chapo Guzman to the core.
- It became
a very personal battle
between Beltran Leyva
and Chapo Guzman.
narrator: And now
a family feud escalates
into an all-out war
as Chapo's henchmen carry out
retaliation killings.
- When Edgar Guzman
was murdered,
the people of Sinaloa
knew the bloodshed
after that would be immense.
And there were shoot-outs
happening right near
the central square.
- [speaking Spanish]
- [speaking Spanish]
- They carried on this
crazy tit-for-tat against
the people of Beltran Leyvas,
particularly
Arturo Beltran Leyva.
[gunshots firing]
narrator: After hundreds
of deaths in Sinaloa,
the war comes to a head
in December of 2009
when an informant
tips off the Mexican marines
to the whereabouts
of Arturo Beltran Leyva.
- The Mexican marines
stormed an apartment building
and shot dead
Arturo Beltran Leyva
and some of his cohorts.
narrator:
The Sinaloa cartel fractures,
and members are forced
to pledge allegiance
to either Chapo and his men
or the remaining
Beltran Leyva brothers.
- It's like a divorce.
You don't know if you go
with your mother or father.
¶ ¶
- It started becoming
a free-for-all
and a very, very bloody place.
narrator: During the war,
wholesale drug traffickers,
like the Flores brothers
from Chicago,
had found themselves caught
in the crossfire.
- When drug cartels
leave piles of severed heads
in the center of a town,
when they leave bodies hanging
from bridges,
they're sending different
messages to different people.
- The Flores brothers were
in a really, really hard place.
They were working
with Chapo Guzman
on the one hand,
and they were working
with Arturo Beltran Leyva
on the other,
and they've been given
ultimatums from each side
that they were to do business
with that side or nobody at all
and that was a no-win
proposition for them.
narrator: The Flores brothers
decide to take
the only out they can--
to gain protection
from U.S. authorities
by becoming informants.
¶ ¶
¶ ¶
- The Flores brothers,
collectively, were moving
between 1,500 and 2,000 kilos
a month from Chicago.
It was jaw-dropping.
That's a lot of dope.
narrator:
It doesn't take them long
to get Chapo to discuss
the price of a heroin shipment
on a recorded line.
- When that voice ID came in,
and we knew we had him,
the DEA and I did
a little backflip.
We had the world's
most wanted criminal on tape.
narrator:
With the list of indictments
against Chapo
and his cartel growing
since they first
came down in 1994,
prosecutors now have evidence
to build an even stronger case
against the drug lord
in the United States.
But Chapo,
who's been underground
since escaping prison
seven years ago,
is still at large, and he's
even more elusive than ever.
- It was very difficult
to capture Chapo Guzman
in those mountains
because if these people saw
any unusual movement,
Chapo Guzman would know
within minutes.
- When you arrive in Sinaloa,
there's a clear network
of informants going on there.
There are people at the airport
who are documenting
who's coming in.
- He had a very large
security apparatus,
hundreds of bodyguards
in concentric circles
throughout the Golden Triangle.
- We attempted
to capture him twice.
Chapo Guzman and his men,
about 40 or 50 of them,
jumped into these
all-terrain vehicles
and scattered like cockroaches,
so, you know, you didn't know
which one was Chapo Guzman.
narrator: That's as close
as authorities will get
to El Chapo
for another five years.
Finally, in 2014,
with the U.S. pressuring
the Mexican government
to capture the world's
most wanted criminal,
they get a break.
Intelligence operatives learn
the Sinaloa boss has come down
from the mountains
and is rotating among
six safe houses in Culiacan.
- Here's a man who's worth
over $1 billion.
He's got a beauty queen wife
who's 32 years younger
than he is.
She wants to go to restaurants.
She wants to go shopping.
So he goes to Culiacan.
Mistake number one.
narrator: U.S. and Mexican
forces surround the city,
ready to take down the fugitive
once and for all.
narrator: For 13 long years,
U.S. and Mexican authorities
have been trying to track down
one of the most notorious
criminals of the 21st century.
Chicago's
"public enemy number one."
Drug lord Joaquin Guzman Loera.
After a series of near misses,
a joint special ops task force
has El Chapo in its sights
at one of his safe houses
in Culiacan.
On February 16th, 2014,
the mission begins.
¶ ¶
- When the marines raided
a house in Culiacan,
the doors had steel bars.
They were completely
reinforced.
narrator: It reportedly takes
the marines ten minutes
to penetrate the compound.
- By that time, Chapo Guzman,
using the bath tub
with hydraulic lifts,
had gone down into the drainage
system of the city and escaped.
narrator:
Chapo gets away yet again,
but for his trackers,
not all is lost.
One of his lieutenants
is captured
and he tips off authorities,
leading U.S. and Mexican forces
to the beachfront resort
of Mazatlan.
- We knew he was there because
of telephone conversations,
and then some of his
"sicarios," or confidants,
provided information.
narrator: Authorities then
intercept a text message
pinpointing El Chapo's
exact location.
On February 22nd, 2014,
just after 6:00
on a Saturday morning,
they make their move.
- So the marines go
to this condominium complex
called Miramar.
They kicked down the door.
- He was there with his wife,
Emma Coronel, their daughters--
El Chapo was caught
completely unawares.
- Chapo Guzman has an AK-47
right next to his bed,
and he looks at it
but then thinks twice
'cause he knew that, you know,
he would die before
he even touched the AK-47.
- Emma Coronel started yelling
at the marines,
"Don't kill him.
Don't kill him.
He's my husband."
narrator: Within minutes,
Operation Gargoyle is over.
- No shots were fired.
Nobody was injured.
narrator: After more
than 4,700 days on the run,
El Chapo
has finally been caught.
[indistinct shouting]
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: Taken into custody,
Chapo makes
a startling admission.
- El Chapo Guzman told
the Mexican marines
that he himself
was directly responsible
for the murders of 2,000
to 3,000 Mexican citizens.
[blades whirring]
narrator: El Chapo is sent
to Altiplano Prison,
Mexico's
only supermax facility.
It's said to be escape-proof.
For U.S.
and Mexican authorities,
it's a sweet victory.
- The first time
he got caught in 2014
was probably the best day I've
had on this job in 30 years.
narrator:
But not everyone is happy.
- When El Chapo Guzman
was arrested,
it was not met with cheers or
celebrations in Sinaloa State.
It was met with great sadness.
narrator: Masses take
to the street in protest.
[people chanting in Spanish]
narrator: They demand
the return of their hero--
a man who rose to be one of
the world's elite billionaires
with only a third-grade
education.
- [speaking Spanish]
- And they're demanding
his release
because he is seen
as a folk hero of sorts.
¶ ¶
narrator: Charged with multiple
counts of cocaine trafficking,
El Chapo could face
up to 400 years behind bars,
but the master of escape has no
intention of serving his time.
- He started to plan his escape
almost immediately.
narrator: Using
his far-reaching power,
Chapo enlists an elite team
of German engineers
to help design
the perfect escape route.
His team sets up shop
in Santa Juanita
to begin construction
on Chapo's most remarkable
tunnel to date.
- They bought
a piece of property
about a mile away
from the penitentiary,
and they built a rustic
cinder block house,
and that's when they started
to build the tunnel.
narrator:
Over the next 16 months,
over 350 truckloads of sand
and dirt are hauled away
as the team methodically digs
towards Chapo's cell.
It's said prison blueprints
guide the way.
- They had to have
the floor plans.
Why? Because they needed to know
where the waterlines were.
They needed to know where
the electrical lines were.
They also used sophisticated
surveying equipment,
and it's a system
that shoots out a laser.
With this equipment,
they can tunnel 2 or 3 miles
and have a variance
of maybe 6 to 8 inches,
and that's why they were able
to pinpoint Chapo Guzman's cell
right into the shower.
narrator:
And then, on July 15th, 2015,
El Chapo Guzman makes
that epic escape,
vanishing out of his cell
and into thin air.
narrator: Setting
an international manhunt
into motion.
Chapo is out
and on the loose.
- He is like a cat.
He has many lives.
male reporter:
The latest tonight
on the drug kingpin El Chapo,
who remains one of the most
wanted men in the world.
narrator: July 2015.
Notorious narco kingpin
El Chapo,
whose Sinaloa cartel is the
leading trafficker of drugs
into the United States,
makes international headlines
with his daring escape
out of Mexico's
maximum-security prison,
Altiplano.
- We're here today to voice
our extreme displeasure
at the Mexican authorities
for the escape of one of
the most dangerous criminals
in the world.
narrator: The tunnel escape
is signature Chapo,
complete with a motorcycle
that runs a mile on rails.
- I expected nothing less.
That's just his style.
Tunnel was perfect.
narrator: Like his first
prison escape back in 2001,
he's had help from the inside.
Prison officials ignored
motion sensor alarms
and the sound of jackhammers.
[motored equipment
clacking and whirring]
- My reaction was,
how do you build a tunnel,
which is a pretty loud venture,
up into a prison without,
you know,
the prison officials knowing?
- El Chapo did not escape
because there blind spots.
He escaped because some people
on this spot decided
to be blind.
narrator: Publicly humiliated,
authorities launch the largest
manhunt in Mexico's history.
Six months and several
near-misses later,
the chase comes to a head in
the seaside town of Los Mochis.
On January 8th, 2016,
Mexican marines raid
that safe house
where Chapo and his men
are hiding.
- [speaking Spanish]
[gunshots firing]
narrator: But at some point
during the hour-long gun battle
that leaves five people dead,
Chapo and his top lieutenant
escape.
They flee into a secret passage
beneath the house
and follow a tunnel
that leads to the sewer system.
- There was a dramatic
rain storm.
- The water level in the sewers
started rising.
- El Chapo Guzman found himself
up to his neck in human waste.
and was forced to pop out
about half a mile away
in the middle of the street
through a manhole cover.
We now know he was with one
of his most prized lieutenants,
Ivan El Cholo.
They hijacked a Volkswagen.
narrator: The getaway
is all caught on camera
in this footage released
by the Mexican government.
But they only get a few blocks
before smoke starts pouring
out of the car.
- He gets one of the worst cars
in Los Mochis
that breaks down, you know,
just a few hundred feet
from where he commandeered it.
And Chapo Guzman
has got to be thinking,
"This is the worst day
of my life."
narrator: The men hurry
to hijack a second car--
a red Ford Focus.
Then they take off heading
south down highway 15.
- Calls were coming in to the
local emergency control center
about these carjackings.
By this time,
many people had seen
federal Mexican marines
spreading throughout the city,
heard the gunfire, knew that
some sort of military operation
was underway.
narrator: As heavily armed
troops surround the area,
a lookout notice for
the two carjackers goes wide.
- Local police officers went
to investigate
these two carjackings
and found the Ford Focus
on the back of a flatbed truck.
¶ ¶
They also found
El Chapo Guzman and Cholo Ivan
in that car.
narrator: The cops take Chapo
and his man into custody,
not realizing
that they have detained
the most wanted criminal
in the world.
- I have been advised
that El Chapo Guzman
was threatening
those local police officers.
He told them,
"You must know who I am.
You know how much money I have."
narrator: Allegedly,
El Chapo offers the police
a life-changing bribe
to look the other way.
- "And if you don't accept
my generous offer,
"I'm not only going to kill you,
I'm going to kill your wife,
and I'm gonna torture, rape,
and kill your daughters."
narrator:
The police reportedly get a tip
that dozens of cartel assassins
are en route
to free their boss,
so they hide
El Chapo and El Cholo
in the first place
they can find.
- They took both individuals,
El Chapo and Cholo Ivan,
to a sex motel,
where they could drive a car in
and the garage door behind them
would close.
narrator: In a room
with a satin bedspread,
eight hours since escaping
the marine firefight,
Chapo sits quietly, handcuffed.
It could all be over
in an instant
if his hit men swarm the motel.
But the marines
get there first.
- Luckily,
the Mexican marines arrived,
figured out what was happening,
secured the situation.
narrator:
The fugitive drug lord's
six months on the lam are over.
¶ ¶
One of the officers takes
a cell phone video
to capture the moment.
- Those pictures being
broadcast around the world
tell the world
that he ran for a long time,
he's escaped before,
but here is a defeated person,
and that should do something,
hopefully, to chip away
at his folk hero status.
narrator: The myth has ended.
El Chapo has fallen.
- One of the most wanted
and feared men in the world
has been captured again,
six months after his escape
from a maximum-security prison.
narrator: January 8th, 2016.
After 181 days on the run,
Joaquin Guzman Loera
has been recaptured in Mexico.
America's most wanted criminal,
the man responsible
for flooding U.S. streets
with an endless supply
of narcotics,
is paraded
in front of the world.
El Chapo is loaded
onto a helicopter
and flown back to Altiplano,
the same prison he escaped from
just six months earlier.
¶ ¶
President Enrique Pena Nieto
tweets a message
that resounds across
the globe--
"Mission accomplished:
we have him."
- This is a significant
achievement for Mexico
and a major step forward
in our shared fight against
transnational organized crime,
violence, and drug trafficking.
- This is an incredibly
important arrest.
It sends a incredibly strong
message to narco-traffickers
or would-be narco-traffickers
around the world
that a multi-national coalition
of nation states
will not tolerate your
brutality and your viciousness.
¶ ¶
narrator: Meanwhile,
federal courts across the U.S.
are waiting to get their chance
to prosecute
the world's top drug lord.
- If you look at everywhere
from New York to San Diego,
Chicago to Texas,
Phoenix to Miami,
there literally
is probably not
a single community
in the United States
that was not impacted
by the trafficking
of the Sinaloa organization.
¶ ¶
- El Chapo Guzman faces seven
different federal indictments,
issued by seven different
Federal Grand Juries,
for crimes involving
narco-trafficking,
money laundering, and murder.
- When Chapo Guzman finally
goes on trial,
ideally, I think
in the United States,
it'll be amazing what
we find out if he talks.
narrator: The list of those
who have financially benefited
from El Chapo
is long and distinguished:
police,
politicians,
business leaders,
people on both sides
of the border.
- I have every reason to believe
that he will be extradited
to the United States
and that he will be convicted
and that he will spend the rest
of his life behind bars.
- The notorious drug lord
Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman
has been moved to a new prison
this morning,
and it's just across the border
from El Paso, Texas.
narrator: May 8th, 2016.
A Mexican federal judge
rules in favor of extradition
to the United States.
Hours later,
in the middle of the night,
Chapo is secretly moved
from Altiplano supermax
to a new prison in Juarez
near the U.S. border.
Authorities say
it's for security reasons.
Others fear this transfer
could increase his chances
for another escape,
especially since Juarez
is largely controlled
by Chapo's Sinaloa cartel.
- I would be willing to bet
that he has escape plans
from every prison in Mexico.
- The prison system
is as full of the corruption
and intimidation as it was
before his last escape.
Nothing fundamental has changed.
It's a race between extradition
or a new escape.
My guess is that
the Mexican authorities
are really, really afraid
that he might escape again.
narrator: While the drug lord's
future hangs in the balance,
no matter how Joaquin Guzman
Loera's personal story ends,
it's not clear that anything
will ever change.
- Let's be honest--
if Mr. Guzman is incarcerated,
is the Sinaloa cartel
gonna stop running narcotics
into the U.S.?
The answer's no.
- Search warrant!
We've got a search warrant!
- It still remains
the most powerful,
the most vicious,
the wealthiest,
and the scariest
narco-trafficking organization
around the globe.
- The Sinaloa cartel
is like an NFL football team
that is very strong
and they have a strong bench,
so even if the quarterback
gets injured,
there's another strong
quarterback that can come in
and run the team.
[car sirens blaring and honking]
- As long as we have
the consumers here in America
spending $100 billion
every year
on cocaine, crystal meth,
marijuana, and heroin,
we're gonna have people
in Mexico trafficking drugs.
narrator: And so, even as the
legend of El Chapo lives on,
there's always another kid
in another dusty village
in the Golden Triangle
just waiting to make his mark.
In the words
of El Chapo himself...
[gunshots firing]
"This will never end."
- This guy's a stone-cold
killer.
- He makes Pablo Escobar look
like a choir boy in comparison.
male narrator: He's been called
"The Last Godfather."
- He's the world's most powerful
and vicious narco-trafficker.
narrator: Billionaire.
Drug lord.
Master of escape.
- He is like a cat.
He has many lives.
narrator: From
the mountains of Mexico
to cities all across the U.S.--
[gunshots fire]
This is the amazing story
of the world's most
notorious narco,
called by many
"public enemy number one."
Joaquin Guzman Loera.
"El Chapo."
[intense electronic music]
[lighter flicks]
[orchestral drone music]
If you've ever smoked a joint,
if you've ever had anyone
offer you drugs at a party,
odds are you're more connected
to El Chapo
than you ever realized.
¶ ¶
From small-town America
to the major urban centers,
Chapo's Sinaloa cartel
distributes most of the drugs
brought into the United States.
- He is probably responsible
for 70% to 80%
of all the illegal drugs
that we see,
certainly in the Midwest,
and around the country.
¶ ¶
[dramatic rock music]
narrator: But after four
decades in the business,
El Chapo's more
than just a drug smuggler.
- He is a folk hero.
He's created this mystique
that people are just
mesmerized with.
- Chapo Guzman is like
a major criminal CEO.
On one side he's like
a paramilitary leader,
and on the other he becomes
like a rock star.
- Here's a man who's worth
over $1 billion.
He's got a beauty-queen wife
who's 32 years younger
than he is.
- Women get the likeness
of El Chapo Guzman
painted on their nails.
Young men get tattoos
of El Chapo Guzman.
- Sometimes it can be hard
to see where the reality starts
and the myth stops.
[gunshots firing]
We're never gonna know
exactly how many people
were killed in his name,
but his legend
has grown and surpassed
that of all
the other traffickers.
[eerie chamber music]
narrator: So
how did a poor fruit seller
with a third-grade education
become a legend?
¶ ¶
For many Americans,
his story starts
with a vanishing act.
July 2015.
Altiplano.
Mexico's supermax prison.
- It's the most maximum-secure
penitentiary in Mexico.
narrator:
It's just before 9:00 p.m.,
and Joaquin Guzman Loera,
El Chapo,
paces under the surveillance
cameras in his cell.
- Chapo Guzman
was the highest-risk prisoner
that they had there.
narrator: The TV blares.
The prison guards
seem distracted.
[indistinct prison chatter]
And suddenly, he's gone.
¶ ¶
25 minutes later,
guards find an empty cell.
[men speaking Spanish]
narrator:
All that's left is a hole.
20 inches square.
Some 30 feet below,
a modified motorcycle on rails
awaits as a getaway
through a tunnel
almost one mile long.
- He's been called
the most dangerous
cartel leader in the world,
and he just staged a
spectacular escape from prison.
- This is the first time
I've heard in modern day
that somebody literally tunneled
through dirt to escape
from prison.
- What's most impressive is how
well this tunnel is built.
There are steel beams.
There's wood.
Electricity.
This is a generator to run
all the lights, we're told.
narrator: As for Chapo,
he's long gone.
¶ ¶
[intense orchestral music]
Mexico is stunned.
It's the most brazen prison
break in the country's history,
embarrassing a police force,
a government,
an entire nation.
- It's extremely frustrating.
You know, this is a blow
to the good guys
on both sides of the border.
- [speaking Spanish]
- The Mexican government
seemed incapable of keeping
the most high-profile criminal
in the nation behind bars.
That really shook
the government.
¶ ¶
[upbeat ranchera music]
narrator: Soon,
ballads about El Chapo
hit the airwaves,
from Mexico to the U.S.
[men singing in Spanish]
¶ ¶
narrator: And a national figure
becomes an international icon
as the legend
of the narco Houdini
explodes into the media
worldwide.
- He's able to escape some
of the most seriously hardened
prisons in Mexico
in these miraculous escapes.
That is something mythical.
all: Chapo! Chapo!
narrator: From Sonora
to Southern California,
El Chapo's brand goes global
and businesses cash in.
- [speaking Spanish]
- This one, this model here,
is the one that is most popular.
It's selling a lot.
A lot.
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: On July 12th, 2015,
a search begins.
An international manhunt
led by Mexican, U.S.,
even Colombian forces.
- As a former U.S.
Drug Enforcement official
put it bluntly today,
"If Guzman isn't caught
within 48 hours,
we may never find him again."
female reporter:
Flights have been suspended
at local airports about 50
miles west of Mexico City.
- The U.S. Government
will act swiftly.
- The guy needs
to be behind bars.
[dramatic electronic music]
narrator: Suspects
in Chapo's escape
are rounded up
and pressed for intel.
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator:
With a $5 million reward,
Chapo sightings run wild.
- Chapo was like Elvis.
People were seeing him
everywhere.
narrator: A multi-national team
of law enforcement officials
works to track him down.
- Within three weeks,
the Mexican marines
were listening
to his communications.
- The Mexican government
started to do wire intercepts
on his attorneys,
on family members,
getting bits and pieces
of information.
narrator: That information
leads them to one region:
El Chapo's Mexican homeland,
the so-called "Golden Triangle"
in the mountains of Sinaloa.
¶ ¶
- He was up
in that mountainous region,
which is highly rugged.
If you don't want to be found,
you're never gonna be found.
[intense electronic music]
narrator:
For nearly three months,
thousands of law enforcement
officials worldwide
try to catch El Chapo Guzman
with no luck.
But then, the 61-year-old
fugitive kingpin slips up.
- Chapo made
the ultimate mistake.
He wanted to meet
with Kate del Castillo,
who played a female drug lord
in "La Reina Del Sur,"
"The Queen of the South,"
and he was enamored with her.
The big weakness
of Chapo Guzman
are beautiful women.
narrator: In October 2015,
El Chapo invites del Castillo
and actor Sean Penn
to a secret meeting
at a Sinaloa ranch,
and leaked pictures will soon
cause a social media frenzy.
- He agreed to meet with them
in order to create
a movie about his life.
He became very much interested
in growing his legend.
narrator: Photos obtained
by "Rolling Stone"
show the actors meeting
with the fugitive drug lord.
For the first time,
Chapo grants an exclusive
on-camera interview,
later released
by "Rolling Stone" magazine.
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: Meanwhile,
the authorities on both sides
of the border are listening in.
- When Chapo Guzman gave
a Blackberry cell phone
to Kate del Castillo,
the tracking really started.
- The Mexican marines were
getting closer and closer
all the time
by monitoring, by eavesdropping
and triangulating signals
and communications.
- Well, if I was Chapo,
I'd be lookin' over my shoulder,
because we're comin'.
¶ ¶
[intense music]
narrator:
Then, less than a week
after the meeting
with del Castillo and Penn,
Mexican forces make their move.
Following intercepted
cell phone signals,
they track El Chapo into the
heart of the Golden Triangle.
Residents say Black Hawk
helicopters arrive...
and open fire.
- [speaking Spanish]
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: 600 villagers
have to leave their homes.
Chapo himself
is nowhere to be found.
- [speaking Spanish]
[dramatic orchestral music]
narrator:
Soldiers sweep through
18 of his homes and properties
and come up empty.
- They got very close,
but El Chapo Guzman,
as he's incredibly good at,
escaped through
a hidden passageway.
male reporter:
The search is expanding now
for escaped drug kingpin
El Chapo.
narrator:
Then, on October 9th, 2015,
he's spotted again
near a remote village
in Sinaloa.
Black Hawks move quickly
into the area,
and soon, a sniper has Chapo
in his crosshairs.
- The Mexican marine
was authorized
to kill Chapo Guzman.
narrator:
But there's one problem.
He can't get a clean shot.
- As El Chapo Guzman started
to run down a mountain trail,
he was carrying the small child
of one of his cooks.
Guzman held that little girl in
front of him as a human shield.
The Mexican marine radioed
into his commander,
who told him to stand down.
The risk of hurting
that little girl was too great.
narrator: El Chapo makes
a run for it,
then loses his footing.
- He toppled down
a steep part of a trail
and was evidently injured.
narrator: But before
the marines can grab him,
Chapo's henchmen drag him off
into the woods.
Once again,
El Chapo disappears.
It will take
another three months
before his trackers
get a new lead.
[mellow guitar music]
In January 2016,
Mexican officers trail
one of Chapo's men
to the seaside town
of Los Mochis.
- The Mexican marines
very carefully watched
a particular house
that was undergoing
a great deal of construction.
- And they intercept
a phone call where
they indicate the "tía,"
or the "aunt," is coming,
and they believed that was
code word for Chapo Guzman.
narrator: On January 8th,
the Mexican officials
get a surprising tip-off.
- They watched
a white armored vehicle
travel to pick up
a large taco order
quite late, around midnight.
At that point, they realized
that it was El Chapo
and one of his top lieutenants,
and they were having a party
in Los Mochis
in this house
that had been retrofitted.
[intense bass music]
narrator: At 4:30 a.m.,
all is dead quiet
in the affluent neighborhood
as an elite squad
creeps into position.
After a six-month hunt,
Operation Black Swan
is about to begin.
¶ ¶
17 special ops soldiers
from the Mexican marines,
packing assault rifles
and helmet cams,
approach the house.
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: But when El Chapo's
men go on the offensive,
all hell breaks loose.
[gunshots firing]
[explosion booming]
[dramatic orchestral music]
narrator: January 2016.
El Chapo, the most wanted
drug lord in America
and the world,
has been on the run since
his dramatic escape
from a maximum security prison.
¶ ¶
Now, after
a nearly six month chase,
an elite squad of Mexican
marines is closing in on him
in the town of Los Mochis.
[men speaking Spanish]
narrator: But they walk
into a hail of bullets.
[gunshots firing]
- There is shooting.
All hell breaks loose.
[gunshots firing]
There's automatic weapons fire,
and the screams
and the agony and the blood...
[explosion booming]
- They hit the Mexican marines
with everything they had.
[gunshots firing]
- From AK-47s to M4s
to hand grenades.
narrator: The brutal gun battle
will go on for nearly an hour.
[gunshots firing]
[speaking Spanish]
[mellow ambient music]
narrator: By 6:30 a.m.,
the shooting is over.
Marines have locked down
the safe house.
- [speaking Spanish]
¶ ¶
narrator: In the chaos,
five cartel gunmen
have been killed,
six others arrested.
Marines search the house,
looking for the fugitive
drug lord.
They turn up an arsenal--
19 guns, RPGs, armored cars.
But El Chapo...
is nowhere to be seen.
- They found two escape hatches.
One behind the refrigerator
in the kitchen,
which turns out
to have been a ruse,
a trick merely meant to confuse
El Chapo's pursuers.
The second,
in a mirrored closet.
[dramatic electronic music]
narrator:
It takes the marines 90 minutes
to find the hidden switch
that opens a concealed door.
¶ ¶
The full-length mirror
they've walked past
several times swings open,
leading down
to a secret passage.
El Chapo, the master of escape,
has gotten away again.
It's no wonder thousands of
officers are hunting for Chapo.
The 58-year-old is the head
of the richest criminal
organization in history.
But his start
is very different.
He's born poor--
so poor, his cradle
is a wooden tomato crate.
He grows up in the late 1950s
in a tiny village in the hills,
with no electricity,
no running water--
nothing but ambition.
- La Tuna, where he was born,
is so remote,
these families
are so impoverished,
they look for any way they can
to put food on their table.
¶ ¶
narrator: The oldest
of seven kids,
young Joaquin gets
the nickname "Chapo",
or "Shorty."
His father pulls him out
of school in the third grade
and sends him
to work the poppy fields.
- His father was abusive,
an alcoholic,
spent all of the money on,
allegedly, alcohol and women.
- His father
was a very brutal man.
He would beat up Chapo Guzman,
his brothers, and his sisters.
¶ ¶
narrator: By the time
he's a teenager,
Chapo runs away
to start his own business,
in the drug trade.
- If you're a small kid
from a village out there,
you're gonna go for the drugs.
¶ ¶
His only role models
were drug traffickers.
They're the ones that had
the beautiful women on each arm,
they had bling, they had...
you know, beautiful cars.
So Chapo Guzman wanted to
emulate these individuals
because it was a way
out of poverty for him.
¶ ¶
narrator: And so Chapo
turns to his cousins,
the Beltran Leyvas, who
are already in the business.
They show him the ropes.
- And they help him to--
to make his own fields
when he was between 15
or 16 years old.
¶ ¶
narrator: Chapo's homeland,
Sinaloa,
in the Golden Triangle,
is rugged.
Remote.
It's also ground zero
for narcos.
- The state of Sinaloa
is to the Mexican drug cartels
a bit like how Sicily
is to the Italian mafia.
It's the cradle
of Mexican organized crime.
Chapo Guzman
was, in many ways,
born into the drug trade.
¶ ¶
narrator: Soon,
he begins at the bottom
of Mexico's main
crime syndicate,
the Guadalajara gang,
headed by Felix Gallardo,
the man they call El Padrino--
The Godfather.
- He brought Chapo Guzman in,
initially as a driver,
and then started to give him
more responsibility.
narrator: Young Chapo pays
his dues running errands.
- If you go back
to his earliest days,
he was a logistics guy,
primarily for marijuana.
narrator: He's coming into
the business at the right time.
- The United States
drug consumption
exploded in the 1960s.
narrator:
With the cultural revolution,
the demand for,
first, marijuana,
then heroin, skyrockets.
¶ ¶
And when
Colombian cocaine arrives
in the late '70s,
it's a game changer.
- Cocaine made the business
way larger
than it was in the past.
narrator: The Mexican gangs
work as drug runners
for the famed Colombian kingpin
Pablo Escobar
and his infamous
Medellín cartel.
- The Mexican traffickers
were the transporters
and they would receive a fee
from the Colombians.
- This is when cocaine flows
through Mexico in really
massive quantities.
narrator: By the mid-1980s,
Felix Gallardo
and his boys from Sinaloa
are running the largest
criminal syndicate in Mexico,
working directly under
Pablo Escobar himself.
¶ ¶
Chapo Guzman,
now in his late 20s,
shows the brains
and the drive to get ahead.
- He very quickly proved
himself as a--
just a smart, savvy operator.
- He was very adept
at coordinating flights
from Colombia containing
large shipments of cocaine.
- If you're able to get loads
safely into the United States,
your worth
is absolutely tremendous.
narrator:
He and the cartel are moving
up to 20 tons of coke a month
into California.
His two main weapons are cash
and fear.
- His ability to corrupt
and to convince
is probably boundless.
- They start to pay bribes,
directly, to very
high-level members
of the government--
generals,
members of the federal police.
narrator: It's said
he'll stop at nothing
to get what he wants.
- People were afraid
of making mistakes.
- He was vicious.
Killed people.
- When individuals lost loads,
he would put a bullet
in their head.
- He personally,
by his own hand,
would execute them.
¶ ¶
narrator: He's the most
notorious drug trafficker
in the world, a wanted man
in the United States,
but back in the mid-1980s,
30-year-old
Joaquin Guzman Loera,
El Chapo,
is rising quickly
through the ranks
of the Guadalajara cartel.
- He was well-known
as an executioner.
When loads were late,
when individuals
showed up for work drunk
or unprepared,
he would execute them.
narrator: But he's more
than just a hit man.
Although he can't
really read or write,
he has an uncanny ability
to move the product.
- And he had many ingenious
ways of trafficking drugs,
such as hiding cocaine
in tins of chili.
- They were one of the most
innovative.
This was an organization
that would essentially use
any route available.
narrator: Shipping containers,
panga boats, trucks,
even mules are used
to move concealed drugs
across the border.
By sea, Chapo and his cartel
ship immense loads
right under
the coast guard's nose.
- They perfected the art
of building these so-called
"narco submarines" carrying
tons of cocaine,
worth hundreds of millions
of dollars.
narrator: But then Chapo gets
his most inspired idea yet,
the one that will put him
on the map.
narrator: Smuggling tunnels
have been around for decades,
running underneath
the U.S./Mexico border--
some of the most
heavily patrolled terrain
on the continent.
But Chapo
takes it to a new level,
turning them into an art form:
the super tunnels.
He has the first one built
in 1989.
male reporter:
The tunnel was called
one of the most sophisticated
drug-smuggling schemes
authorities have ever seen.
- This type of tunnel
is not an amateur operation.
It's a highly sophisticated
engineering feat
that took place.
narrator:
Even the way in is surprising--
an entrance hidden under
a pool table.
Turning an outside water spigot
triggers a hydraulic system,
lifting the table,
revealing a ladder
heading down.
More than three stories below,
the tunnel runs 300 feet
under the border,
from Mexico into Arizona.
It's the prototype for dozens
of arched Sinaloa tunnels
that will follow,
complete with ventilation,
electricity, and more--
infrastructure marvels called
"the Taj Mahal of tunnels."
narrator: In 1990,
U.S. authorities are startled
to discover this passageway
is funneling massive drug loads
into the U.S.
They set out to shut down
El Chapo's tunnels.
It's a battle
that continues to this day.
- We believe
that there are tunnels
under construction as we speak,
and it's our job to find those
and put them out of business.
If we come across
a tunnel that's being built,
you know, we will
just fill it in
on the United States side.
narrator:
A lot of tunnels come up
in the Otay Mesa warehouse area
in San Diego,
where Mexico and the U.S.
sit side by side
less than a mile apart.
- So as you can see,
right over here,
that fence is the international
border with Mexico,
and where we stand
is the commercial district
in San Ysidro, San Diego County,
where there's no shortage
of commercial warehouses
to utilize
as a tunnel exit point.
narrator: Here, there's more
than 2 million square feet
of vacant real estate available
at any given point,
which gives cartels
like Chapo's
a lot of room to maneuver.
[metal clanging]
- Gloves and harnesses.
Anybody else?
Helmets?
narrator: Day in and day out,
a crew from the San Diego
Tunnel Task Force,
known as the "Tunnel Rats,"
suit up to investigate
these tunnels
that run under
the U.S./Mexico border.
They rope off
and rappel down
into the darkness.
70 feet under
the Earth's surface,
they find passageways
more than a half-mile long.
All told,
U.S. and Mexican officials
have found nearly 60
of these sophisticated tunnels
in the past decade and a half,
many masterminded
by Chapo himself.
This tunnel was discovered
in 2009, December of 2009.
Our partners on the south side
found a warehouse.
When they entered the building,
they later discovered
the whole bathroom lowered,
toilet, vanity, and all.
To access the actual
tunnel entrance itself,
the whole bottom floor actually
lowered into the tunnel.
They found they had ventilation
systems, electrical,
a phone line
was actually in there,
and a rudimentary rail system.
narrator:
For El Chapo's builders,
these are no simple tasks.
- Well, it takes time.
It takes effort.
They're digging tunnels
3,000 feet.
Some of these take, on average,
about a year, year and a half,
to span these distances,
so I mean, that's--
that's persistence.
narrator:
They also take money,
as much as $1 million apiece
to build,
but it's money well spent for
the cartels like El Chapo's.
- It's a priceless venture
for them,
meaning having a completed
tunnel into the U.S.
is, you know,
worth its weight in gold.
- One single load
would pay for whatever
expenses they incurred
multiple times over.
Classic example
is the Calle de Linea tunnel
where we found 34 tons
of marijuana.
At that time, I believe it had
a $60 million plus
estimated value.
Cost would probably
be about a million, tops,
is what I've heard,
so it's just--
you do the math--
that's a huge profit margin.
One load.
¶ ¶
narrator: By 1989,
El Chapo's smuggling tons
of cocaine and marijuana
through tunnels like these
and many other
inventive methods.
With his flair for logistics,
he earns a brand-new nickname.
- He became known as El Rápido
because he could move cocaine
loads very, very quickly,
from Colombia through Mexico
to the United States.
narrator:
It's said that before
the planes are back
in Colombia,
his coke is already
in Los Angeles.
- Wires were tingling
with the name El Chapo Guzman.
narrator: Chapo's savvy
earns him another promotion
in Mexico's Guadalajara cartel.
Now in his mid-30s,
he's reportedly making
millions of dollars.
And so, El Chapo starts
living the high life.
He's got cars, planes,
dozens of houses,
and throws extravagant bashes,
where he's known to fly in
prostitutes for the occasion.
- He used to rent
a complete floor
in one hotel in Guadalajara
or Puerto Vallarta
and make huge parties.
And he was very young,
and I think that
he didn't know what to do
with all that money and power.
narrator:
While Chapo's living large,
U.S. and Mexican officials
are working hard to crack down
on drug smuggling,
and in November 1989,
they catch a break.
- And from Mexico tonight, news
of what may be a major victory
in the war on drugs--
the arrest of a man called the
kingpin behind a drug pipeline
into the United States.
narrator: Felix Gallardo,
El Chapo's boss,
is sentenced to prison
for 40 years
on drug trafficking,
bribery, and weapons charges.
Brokaw: Mexican authorities
say that Felix Gallardo
ran the ring that funneled
Colombian cocaine
through Mexico
into this country--
two tons of cocaine
every month.
narrator:
Now there's a power vacuum
at the top
of the Guadalajara cartel,
and Chapo is about
to seize his moment.
- Everyone else seemed to be
content with their little patch.
Not him.
It's a power-grab world,
and Chapo went for the grab.
¶ ¶
narrator: In just 15 years,
El Chapo Guzman
has risen to become
one of Mexico's
major drug smugglers
into the U.S.,
flooding American streets
with cocaine and marijuana.
By November 1989,
he's a top lieutenant
in the Guadalajara cartel
when his boss,
kingpin Felix Gallardo,
is sentenced
to 40 years behind bars.
Recognizing a void in power,
Chapo is poised
to seize the moment.
- U.S. officials
are praising Mexico
for the arrest of a man
said to be one of the world's
biggest drug dealers.
narrator:
But right before his arrest,
knowing his days were numbered,
Gallardo called
Mexico's crime families
to a meeting in Acapulco.
His plan: to carve up
the country into turfs.
- Once he was imprisoned,
the Guadalajara cartel
splintered into various
organizations.
narrator:
Each group gets a corridor
to the all-important
U.S. border.
There's a Tijuana cartel,
a Juarez cartel,
a Gulf cartel,
and El Chapo and his partners
form the Sinaloa cartel,
covering the corridor
from Sinaloa and Sonora
into Arizona.
The division seems
to make sense,
but it will actually set off
a chain of narco wars
that are still going on.
- There is no honor
among thieves.
These alliances fracture
very, very quickly.
We're talking about massive
amounts of power.
Incredible amounts of ego.
narrator: In 1992,
Chapo is looking
to expand his territory
and makes a bold move
into Tijuana.
- The port of entry
between Tijuana and San Diego
is the most lucrative corridor
for drugs coming in from Mexico
into the United States.
- You traffic drugs
into California,
you reach San Diego,
Los Angeles, San Francisco--
meanwhile, Chapo Guzman
was moving drugs into Arizona.
It's obviously not quite
as profitable.
narrator: Chapo's
infiltration into Tijuana
will put him up against
some tough adversaries:
the Arellano Felix brothers.
- They had a reputation
for real, real thuggery.
They'd be sitting in a bar
and they would say, you know,
"I feel like killing someone.
Let's--let's go."
narrator: And so
a vicious turf war begins.
- What was a rivalry
turned into bloodshed
between Chapo Guzman
and the Arellano Felix brothers.
- Chapo Guzman sends emissaries
to meet with
the Arellano Felix brothers,
and they kill these emissaries,
and that is what started
the blood feud.
- They started waging war
between themselves.
- The Tijuana cartel put
a hit out on El Chapo Guzman,
recognizing him
as an up-and-comer
and a threat
to their continued dominance.
narrator:
In early November 1992,
Chapo is driving down a busy
avenue in downtown Guadalajara.
A white pickup pulls up,
and Ramon Arellano Felix
and four gunmen jump out...
[gunshots firing]
And open fire.
Chapo's car
is riddled with bullets,
but the armor plating holds
and he survives.
A few days later,
he strikes back.
[eerie dance music]
At the Disco Christine
nightclub in Puerto Vallarta,
a party is underway for two
of the Arellano Felix brothers.
300 guests
are dancing and drinking.
Chapo's hit men burst in,
dressed in police uniforms,
a deadly deception.
Then...
[gunshots firing]
They open fire.
When the shooting stops,
a half-dozen people are dead
on the dance floor.
- The conflict between
the Arellano Felix brothers
and Chapo developed
into a mafia-type arrangement,
where, you know, Chapo would try
and have one of them killed
and they would send
someone to Sinaloa
to try and have him killed.
¶ ¶
narrator: The violence
comes to a head in May 1993.
- The ongoing feud escalated.
- They sent a hit team
to execute El Chapo Guzman.
- The Arellano Felix brothers
contracted some thugs
from the San Diego area,
known as the Logan Heights gang.
narrator: The hit men
have been trying, and failing,
to track Chapo down
when they get a call.
- They had word
that El Chapo Guzman
was at the airport
in Guadalajara
and that he would be riding
in a white sedan.
They came across that sedan
and opened fire.
[gunshots firing]
narrator: But
in the crossfire, Chapo,
the master of escape,
makes his way under cars
to the terminal.
And in the confusion,
the assassins hit
a very different target:
a Roman Catholic cardinal.
- It became a horrific
assassination
that sent headlines
around the world.
narrator: For over two decades,
Joaquin Guzman Loera,
king of the narco super tunnel,
has been making his mark
as a leading transporter
of cocaine
into the United States.
But the drug lord,
now in his 30s,
wants to expand his territory.
In May 1993, El Chapo
is in a bloody battle
with rivals over Tijuana,
a key corridor
into the U.S. drug market.
A hit is ordered
to take him out
at the Guadalajara airport.
But when the assassins
open fire,
they get a shock.
- El Chapo Guzman was not
in that vehicle.
He was in another vehicle.
In that vehicle...
was the Archbishop
of Guadalajara.
- The cardinal Posadas Ocampo
is just getting out of his car
and they hit him 14 times
with rounds from AK-47s.
- Two suspects are in custody
this morning in Guadalajara
following a shootout that left
at least seven people dead,
among them
a Roman Catholic cardinal.
Authorities think the shootout
may have been a battle
between rival gangs
of drug traffickers.
[solemn mass music]
narrator: Mexico is stunned.
The shooting receives
international coverage.
- The then Mexican president
was so outraged
at this assassination
that he vowed
to bring
the full force and effect
of the Mexican government
down on the narco-traffickers.
narrator: Rumors swirl
about the Cardinal's death,
that perhaps it wasn't
an accident at all.
Some experts believe
that the real target
was the cardinal himself.
They allege he held a list
of Mexican government officials
with ties to organized crime.
- There are many
conspiracy theories
that really they killed
they cardinal
because he had some
information.
- Apparently, the cardinal
has a list of people related
with the president that receive
money from the drug cartels.
narrator:
But the government insists
the cartels are behind it all.
- [speaking Spanish]
- There was a lot of pressure
following the killing
of the cardinal
to detain some significant
drug traffickers.
narrator: Chapo's
cronies haven't been happy
with his feud over Tijuana.
To them, he seems like
the perfect scapegoat.
- The government said, "Okay,
we have to put someone in jail.
"It's an international scandal,
we have to do something."
And they said, "Well,
El Chapo just bring problems.
We can't control him."
narrator: And so Chapo
is offered up as a fall guy
for this,
a crime he didn't commit.
And the first massive manhunt
for Joaquin Chapo Guzman
begins.
- El Chapo Guzman,
realizing that the heat was on,
decided to hightail it,
crossed the border
with Guatemala,
paid off a Guatemalan official
over $1 million
to keep it a secret.
narrator:
But, hiding in Guatemala,
he'll soon be double-crossed
when that official pockets
the money
and tips off the DEA,
which alerts local authorities.
- We provide the Guatemalans
the information,
and he is arrested
in a local hotel in Guatemala.
¶ ¶
narrator: On June 9, 1993,
Chapo Guzman is unceremoniously
bound and bundled
into a pickup truck
by the Guatemalans
and dumped just
over the Mexican border.
- The Mexican military
was waiting on the other side
with all the pomp
and circumstance
of the Mexican military.
They were in full-dress
uniforms,
and all of a sudden,
they see a rustic,
beat-up old pickup truck
coming down the road,
and they see that Chapo Guzman
is in the bed of the truck,
rolling around, you know,
getting, you know,
battered and bruised.
narrator: El Chapo is arrested
and sentenced to 20 years
for conspiracy, bribery,
and drug trafficking.
- [speaking Spanish]
- Suddenly he was a name.
A real name.
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: Through the 1990s,
Chapo's legend starts to grow,
operating out of cell 307,
block C3
in the maximum-security prison
at Puente Grande.
- There's been good
documentation to show
an incredible network
of bribery
by Chapo Guzman
of prison officials.
- He was very adept
at knowing who to bribe
and how to bribe them.
- If you're a guard,
you're earning, you know,
$15,000 a year.
What are you gonna do?
If he's offered you money,
you can take the money
and be corrupt,
or you can report it to someone
who you have no idea whether
you can trust that person.
narrator: Those who turn down
Chapo Guzman's generosity
do so at their own risk.
- We will pay you handsomely
for that.
We will make you very,
very rich.
And if you decline our offer,
we will kill you.
Or even worse,
we will murder your wife
and your daughters
and your sons.
- You take our money
or you take our bullet.
¶ ¶
narrator: Seduction.
Intimidation.
That's Chapo's way
of doing business,
inside the prison
and out.
- Chapo has a lot of people
in various parts
of the governments,
all over Mexico.
In my day, we had
the Chief of Police of Mexico's
Federal Judicial District
a trafficker.
So corruption can go
to the highest levels.
narrator: The end result--
inside one of the toughest
prisons in Mexico,
El Chapo is living a life
most only dream of.
- He was able
to essentially live
in a presidential suite of sorts
during his incarceration.
- Within weeks
of Chapo's arrival,
the prison guards were calling
him "jefe," or "boss."
- He had parties.
He had the best food
that he wanted,
that was brought in
and cooked by private chefs.
narrator: And there are women,
lots of women,
sent to the prison,
including a steady
rotation of prostitutes
for himself and others--
even the guards, as seen in
these security camera images.
- He used to get visit
of many women in the jail
and make sexual competitions
with other people
that was in jail--
who has more sex in during
the day than the other.
- He was able to enjoy
a lot of relationships
with female staff,
even cleaning staff,
even one particular
female prisoner
who he fell in love with
and wrote love letters to later.
narrator: Meanwhile,
it's business as usual
for Chapo
and the Sinaloa cartel,
controlling the flow of drugs
across the border into Arizona.
- He was using cell phones,
using couriers,
using a computer.
He was still fully
operating and functioning
as the de facto leader
of the Sinaloa cartel
while imprisoned in Jalisco.
narrator: And then,
a pivotal moment
in Chapo's career
when a bullet brings down
Colombian kingpin
Pablo Escobar.
- The death of Pablo Escobar
in December of 1993
created an opening
for the Sinaloa cartel
and Chapo Guzman at its helm.
El Chapo Guzman's genius
is that he saw
the Medellín cartel fall apart
and he realized
that the Sinaloa cartel
could control that trade
into the United States.
He saw that Mexican traffickers
could actually dominate
the market.
narrator: All through
the mid to late 1990s,
Chapo's men start moving
more and more narcotics,
as he calls the shots
from the inside.
- They began to buy
the cocaine in Colombia
for about $2,000 a kilo
and sell that on the border
of the United States
for about $30,000.
So these vast
profits of cocaine
that used to go
to the Colombians
were now staying largely in the
hands of Mexican traffickers.
[indistinct shouting]
narrator: Meanwhile,
U.S. authorities
have been tracking
this activity,
and soon, they decide
to make their move.
Even though he's
in a Mexican jail,
El Chapo is indicted
in Arizona and California
for drug trafficking
and money laundering.
By 2001, as officials
put the wheels in motion
to extradite the drug lord
to the U.S.,
he tries to cut a deal.
- They don't want to serve time
in the United States.
It's hard time.
¶ ¶
- So one of our agents
traveled to Puente Grande,
escorted into a waiting room,
and then they bring in
Chapo Guzman.
Immediately gets on the floor
and looks underneath the door
to make sure
that nobody's listening,
and then he makes an offer,
and he says,
"Look, if you don't extradite me
to the United States,
"I will give you all
of the routes that I have,
"and I will tell you all of the
high-ranking Mexican officials
that I have been paying off."
narrator: But the U.S.
government isn't biting.
The DEA turns him down.
- We were not gonna strike
a deal with him
because we want him
in the United States.
- If he were extradited
to the United States,
it would be game over for him.
narrator: Out of options,
Chapo begins to think
about a great escape.
narrator:
For the last eight years,
drug lord El Chapo Guzman
has been running
the powerful Sinaloa cartel
from behind bars
of a Mexican prison,
but he's still a wanted man
in America.
With trafficking indictments
in California and Arizona,
U.S. authorities are pushing
to extradite the kingpin
to the States
and bring him to trial.
Out of options,
Chapo makes a bold move.
- There's an individual
that walks up to his cell
with a laundry cart.
Chapo Guzman jumps in,
they cover him with towels
and dirty laundry,
and wheels him
out of the penitentiary
into a car.
[sirens blaring]
They leave the area,
they stop at a gas station,
and the driver goes in
to buy water,
which Chapo Guzman requested,
and when he came out,
Chapo Guzman had gone
into the night.
narrator: After 9:00 p.m.
on that January 2001 night,
El Chapo Guzman is gone.
Word spreads about
his daring laundry cart escape,
but others later say the prison
break is even more brazen--
that he simply walks out the
door disguised as a policeman.
Mexican authorities are stunned
as their investigation uncovers
widespread corruption
within the prison,
with alleged payoffs running
into the millions,
from prison guards
to the highest levels
of the Mexican government.
- He escaped
from Puente Grande,
and none of the other guys have.
The Godfather,
Miguel Angel Felix Gallardo,
who once ran the drug trade,
is still sitting in prison,
yet Chapo got out.
narrator: And so the myth
of the elusive El Chapo,
the escape artist,
is born.
- The fact
that he was able to escape
from a maximum-security prison
just lends greater support
for his mystique.
- People have always been
fascinated by the--
by the bandito, the bad guy.
From Pancho Villa
to the Godfather
to Al Capone
and now El Chapo.
narrator: On the run,
Chapo goes underground
and on the offensive.
In the eight years Chapo
was behind bars,
there was an unspoken truce
amongst the Mexican cartels,
but now the turf wars reignite.
- He decided that he was
going to expand his territory
and take over
a lot of these major corridors
into the United States because
he could expand his business.
narrator: In early 2002,
Chapo's bitter rival,
the Tijuana cartel,
suffers a loss when one
of the Arellano Felix brothers
is killed in a shootout
with the police.
Some believe the authorities
are intentionally going after
Chapo's enemies.
Either way,
Chapo finally takes control
of the Tijuana territory
he's coveted for years.
- The Sinaloa cartel fought
a very, very vicious war
against the Tijuana cartel.
Really beat them.
Bloodied them
into near-submission.
narrator:
And that's just the start.
Looking to expand his power,
Chapo goes after
the Gulf cartel in the east.
- I think it's
a business calculation.
He probably saw the risks
and said,
"Okay, I'll lose some people,
but we're gonna gain this turf."
narrator: Chapo's team
of hit men move in,
but they're met by the Zetas,
the Gulf cartel's army
of mercenaries.
- Chapo Guzman
sent gang members,
guys with tattoos
and shaved heads,
to try and take this territory,
but the Zetas reacted
with extreme violence
and they changed the nature
of the fighting in Mexico.
narrator: Many of Chapo's men
are taken down
in this ongoing battle
against the Zetas.
Meanwhile, Chapo
is still hungry for Texas
and sets his sights
on the Juarez cartel,
the gatekeepers of El Paso.
[dramatic orchestral music]
Over the next five years,
the narco wars reach
an unprecedented level
of violence.
- You never saw that kind
of pictures before the war--
people without head,
people hanged
in public places--
I mean, horrible things.
narrator: In Juarez alone,
there are reportedly an average
of eight murders a day--
a death toll
that will one day reach 11,000.
And in the entire country,
that number will top 100,000.
- The slaughter
was just wholesale,
and the blood was running
into the drainage systems there
in Juarez at that time.
- [speaking Spanish]
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: By the late 2000s,
Chapo's forces dominate
in the fight against
the Juarez cartel.
Seizing control
of the Texas border,
Chapo makes
a savvy business decision.
- Anticipating legalization
of marijuana in certain states,
they shifted to production
of heroin and methamphetamine.
That ability to pivot,
to sense changes in the market,
to be nimble
and quick and adroit,
is what truly distinguishes
the Sinaloa cartel
from all of the other cartels.
- The Sinaloa cartel brings
heroin into the United States,
through Texas, up Arkansas,
Missouri, and Illinois,
and to Chicago.
narrator: Chicago
is one of Chapo's main hubs
where drugs can be distributed
to almost any part of the
country in a matter of days.
- You got two
international airports,
you got a really large
train network,
you got eight interstate
highways that intersect here,
and you have the third largest
Mexican-American population
in the country.
¶ ¶
narrator: Chapo entrusts
the Chicago operation
to a family with ties
to the Golden Triangle.
- The Sinaloa cartel
was very savvy in establishing
a bulkhead,
essentially, in Chicago
through two Mexican-American
twin brothers,
Margarito and Pedro Flores.
- They decided to become really,
really sophisticated
drug traffickers,
and they--
they were.
- It's alleged that those two
twin brothers alone brought
$2 billion worth of narcotics
and drugs into the Chicago area.
¶ ¶
narrator: The effects
are startling.
Over the next ten years,
violence and murder rates
in Chicago's south side
skyrocket,
as gangbangers selling
Chapo's drugs kill
to protect their turf.
[siren wailing]
Meanwhile, the Sinaloa cartel's
highly addictive
black tar heroin
is causing an extraordinary
number of overdoses.
- Addiction
is incredibly prevalent.
You got people who
are seizing on the misery.
Right? If there's money
to be made,
people are taking advantage
of it.
narrator: Realizing the scope
of the problem,
Chicago authorities will soon
declare El Chapo
"public enemy number one."
- The last time we did that
was with Al Capone,
and Capone is a minor figure
in the world of crime
compared to Chapo Guzman.
- Al Capone killed people
who were in the game.
This drug
is killing our kids.
- Enough is enough.
This man has got to be caught.
[intense electronic music]
narrator: 2007.
Fugitive kingpin Chapo Guzman
is one of the most
wanted men in America.
As the main supplier of
marijuana,
cocaine, methamphetamine, and
heroin into the United States,
he's built his drug trafficking
business into an empire.
An estimated 150,000 people
work for Chapo's Sinaloa cartel
in 50 countries around
the world, including the U.S.
- It's an illegal enterprise,
but he's a CEO.
- I've never seen
a criminal entity
this powerful, this wealthy,
this vicious.
narrator: El Chapo has become
so big that "Forbes" magazine
will soon list him as
one of the elite billionaires
and most powerful people
in the world.
- The big news there
is that we put on
a drug trafficker,
and his name is Joaquin
"El Chapo" Guzman Loera.
He is not available
for interviews because
he's on the run.
- The Sinaloa cartel
has the most diversified
money-laundering portfolio
of any organized crime network
in the world.
They do commodities trading.
They buy gold.
They buy diamonds.
They have daycare centers.
They have shopping centers.
You know, they have horse
farms, agricultural farms,
and a lot of banks.
[mellow piano music]
narrator:
An international criminal,
Chapo has grown larger
than life,
making him even more of a folk
hero back home in Culiacan.
- Chapo Guzman is a Robin Hood
to the people of Mexico,
particularly the poor people.
- [speaking Spanish]
- He has built churches,
soccer fields--
he has provided low-income
housing for individuals.
narrator: A mythical fugitive,
Chapo is even said to come
out of hiding every so often.
- He has, on occasion, been
known to enter a restaurant
with all of his bodyguards,
demand that all of the patrons
in that restaurant
enjoying their meals
surrender their cell phones.
- In walks Chapo
and has a quiet meal
and, you know, will at least
respectfully pay your bar tab
for the inconvenience.
¶ ¶
narrator: In January 2007,
Chapo arranges to go
to an annual festival
in a neighboring village.
Security is tight.
Allegedly, 200 henchmen
toting AK-47s close down roads
to protect their boss.
There, he meets up
with 17-year-old Emma Coronel,
the pageant queen of the fair.
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator:
Chapo is known as a ladies man.
He's been married
at least twice before
and is said to have
at least ten children.
His courtship with Emma
is swift,
and within a year,
on her 18th birthday,
she becomes the 53-year-old
crime boss' next wife.
¶ ¶
- Emma, she was almost a child
when she get married
with El Chapo Guzman.
She looks very innocent
and pure.
narrator: Many believe Emma
and Chapo's union is arranged
to strength a family alliance.
Although Emma denies
the claims,
her uncle is said
to be murdered drug lord
Ignacio Coronel--
infamous for building Sinaloa's
mega meth labs.
- Emma Coronel has grown up
in the drug trade.
Her father was a lieutenant
under Chapo.
Her brother is incarcerated
on drug trafficking charges.
narrator:
But American-born Emma
says her husband is not
the dangerous kingpin
the world has made him
out to be.
- Chapo Guzman,
like most drug traffickers,
will take a life
without flinching,
but when it comes
to their families--
they adore their families,
and they will protect
their families.
¶ ¶
narrator: But as El Chapo
continues to expand his empire,
it's family that threatens
to tear it apart.
For years, Chapo's cousins,
the Beltran Leyvas,
have worked the Arizona border
for the Sinaloa cartel.
It's a relationship that dates
all the way back to when Chapo
first got into the drug game.
As a young teenager,
the Beltran Leyvas
helped him grow marijuana.
Nearly 40 years later,
greed and jealousy
unravel the alliance.
In January 2008,
the Beltran Leyvas allegedly
start moving loads to the U.S.
behind Chapo's back,
undermining his authority.
- The Beltran Leyva brothers--
they were controlling as much
dope and as much territory
as Chapo Guzman.
- The betrayals start
when the business became bigger,
so the cake was really good
and you don't want to share
the cake anymore.
- It seems like,
for Chapo Guzman to consolidate
his power in the cartel,
it was necessary to confront
the Beltra Leyva brothers.
[helicopter blades whirring]
[dramatic orchestral music]
narrator: Chapo Guzman
takes it to the next level
when he reportedly
informs on his cousin,
Alfredo Beltran Leyva,
sending the police to nab him.
The Beltran Leyvas
accuse Chapo of treason
and viciously retaliate.
- Chapo Guzman's son,
Edgar Guzman,
who was a college student,
was gunned down and murdered
in Culiacan, Sinaloa.
narrator: The death of his son
rocks Chapo Guzman to the core.
- It became
a very personal battle
between Beltran Leyva
and Chapo Guzman.
narrator: And now
a family feud escalates
into an all-out war
as Chapo's henchmen carry out
retaliation killings.
- When Edgar Guzman
was murdered,
the people of Sinaloa
knew the bloodshed
after that would be immense.
And there were shoot-outs
happening right near
the central square.
- [speaking Spanish]
- [speaking Spanish]
- They carried on this
crazy tit-for-tat against
the people of Beltran Leyvas,
particularly
Arturo Beltran Leyva.
[gunshots firing]
narrator: After hundreds
of deaths in Sinaloa,
the war comes to a head
in December of 2009
when an informant
tips off the Mexican marines
to the whereabouts
of Arturo Beltran Leyva.
- The Mexican marines
stormed an apartment building
and shot dead
Arturo Beltran Leyva
and some of his cohorts.
narrator:
The Sinaloa cartel fractures,
and members are forced
to pledge allegiance
to either Chapo and his men
or the remaining
Beltran Leyva brothers.
- It's like a divorce.
You don't know if you go
with your mother or father.
¶ ¶
- It started becoming
a free-for-all
and a very, very bloody place.
narrator: During the war,
wholesale drug traffickers,
like the Flores brothers
from Chicago,
had found themselves caught
in the crossfire.
- When drug cartels
leave piles of severed heads
in the center of a town,
when they leave bodies hanging
from bridges,
they're sending different
messages to different people.
- The Flores brothers were
in a really, really hard place.
They were working
with Chapo Guzman
on the one hand,
and they were working
with Arturo Beltran Leyva
on the other,
and they've been given
ultimatums from each side
that they were to do business
with that side or nobody at all
and that was a no-win
proposition for them.
narrator: The Flores brothers
decide to take
the only out they can--
to gain protection
from U.S. authorities
by becoming informants.
¶ ¶
¶ ¶
- The Flores brothers,
collectively, were moving
between 1,500 and 2,000 kilos
a month from Chicago.
It was jaw-dropping.
That's a lot of dope.
narrator:
It doesn't take them long
to get Chapo to discuss
the price of a heroin shipment
on a recorded line.
- When that voice ID came in,
and we knew we had him,
the DEA and I did
a little backflip.
We had the world's
most wanted criminal on tape.
narrator:
With the list of indictments
against Chapo
and his cartel growing
since they first
came down in 1994,
prosecutors now have evidence
to build an even stronger case
against the drug lord
in the United States.
But Chapo,
who's been underground
since escaping prison
seven years ago,
is still at large, and he's
even more elusive than ever.
- It was very difficult
to capture Chapo Guzman
in those mountains
because if these people saw
any unusual movement,
Chapo Guzman would know
within minutes.
- When you arrive in Sinaloa,
there's a clear network
of informants going on there.
There are people at the airport
who are documenting
who's coming in.
- He had a very large
security apparatus,
hundreds of bodyguards
in concentric circles
throughout the Golden Triangle.
- We attempted
to capture him twice.
Chapo Guzman and his men,
about 40 or 50 of them,
jumped into these
all-terrain vehicles
and scattered like cockroaches,
so, you know, you didn't know
which one was Chapo Guzman.
narrator: That's as close
as authorities will get
to El Chapo
for another five years.
Finally, in 2014,
with the U.S. pressuring
the Mexican government
to capture the world's
most wanted criminal,
they get a break.
Intelligence operatives learn
the Sinaloa boss has come down
from the mountains
and is rotating among
six safe houses in Culiacan.
- Here's a man who's worth
over $1 billion.
He's got a beauty queen wife
who's 32 years younger
than he is.
She wants to go to restaurants.
She wants to go shopping.
So he goes to Culiacan.
Mistake number one.
narrator: U.S. and Mexican
forces surround the city,
ready to take down the fugitive
once and for all.
narrator: For 13 long years,
U.S. and Mexican authorities
have been trying to track down
one of the most notorious
criminals of the 21st century.
Chicago's
"public enemy number one."
Drug lord Joaquin Guzman Loera.
After a series of near misses,
a joint special ops task force
has El Chapo in its sights
at one of his safe houses
in Culiacan.
On February 16th, 2014,
the mission begins.
¶ ¶
- When the marines raided
a house in Culiacan,
the doors had steel bars.
They were completely
reinforced.
narrator: It reportedly takes
the marines ten minutes
to penetrate the compound.
- By that time, Chapo Guzman,
using the bath tub
with hydraulic lifts,
had gone down into the drainage
system of the city and escaped.
narrator:
Chapo gets away yet again,
but for his trackers,
not all is lost.
One of his lieutenants
is captured
and he tips off authorities,
leading U.S. and Mexican forces
to the beachfront resort
of Mazatlan.
- We knew he was there because
of telephone conversations,
and then some of his
"sicarios," or confidants,
provided information.
narrator: Authorities then
intercept a text message
pinpointing El Chapo's
exact location.
On February 22nd, 2014,
just after 6:00
on a Saturday morning,
they make their move.
- So the marines go
to this condominium complex
called Miramar.
They kicked down the door.
- He was there with his wife,
Emma Coronel, their daughters--
El Chapo was caught
completely unawares.
- Chapo Guzman has an AK-47
right next to his bed,
and he looks at it
but then thinks twice
'cause he knew that, you know,
he would die before
he even touched the AK-47.
- Emma Coronel started yelling
at the marines,
"Don't kill him.
Don't kill him.
He's my husband."
narrator: Within minutes,
Operation Gargoyle is over.
- No shots were fired.
Nobody was injured.
narrator: After more
than 4,700 days on the run,
El Chapo
has finally been caught.
[indistinct shouting]
- [speaking Spanish]
narrator: Taken into custody,
Chapo makes
a startling admission.
- El Chapo Guzman told
the Mexican marines
that he himself
was directly responsible
for the murders of 2,000
to 3,000 Mexican citizens.
[blades whirring]
narrator: El Chapo is sent
to Altiplano Prison,
Mexico's
only supermax facility.
It's said to be escape-proof.
For U.S.
and Mexican authorities,
it's a sweet victory.
- The first time
he got caught in 2014
was probably the best day I've
had on this job in 30 years.
narrator:
But not everyone is happy.
- When El Chapo Guzman
was arrested,
it was not met with cheers or
celebrations in Sinaloa State.
It was met with great sadness.
narrator: Masses take
to the street in protest.
[people chanting in Spanish]
narrator: They demand
the return of their hero--
a man who rose to be one of
the world's elite billionaires
with only a third-grade
education.
- [speaking Spanish]
- And they're demanding
his release
because he is seen
as a folk hero of sorts.
¶ ¶
narrator: Charged with multiple
counts of cocaine trafficking,
El Chapo could face
up to 400 years behind bars,
but the master of escape has no
intention of serving his time.
- He started to plan his escape
almost immediately.
narrator: Using
his far-reaching power,
Chapo enlists an elite team
of German engineers
to help design
the perfect escape route.
His team sets up shop
in Santa Juanita
to begin construction
on Chapo's most remarkable
tunnel to date.
- They bought
a piece of property
about a mile away
from the penitentiary,
and they built a rustic
cinder block house,
and that's when they started
to build the tunnel.
narrator:
Over the next 16 months,
over 350 truckloads of sand
and dirt are hauled away
as the team methodically digs
towards Chapo's cell.
It's said prison blueprints
guide the way.
- They had to have
the floor plans.
Why? Because they needed to know
where the waterlines were.
They needed to know where
the electrical lines were.
They also used sophisticated
surveying equipment,
and it's a system
that shoots out a laser.
With this equipment,
they can tunnel 2 or 3 miles
and have a variance
of maybe 6 to 8 inches,
and that's why they were able
to pinpoint Chapo Guzman's cell
right into the shower.
narrator:
And then, on July 15th, 2015,
El Chapo Guzman makes
that epic escape,
vanishing out of his cell
and into thin air.
narrator: Setting
an international manhunt
into motion.
Chapo is out
and on the loose.
- He is like a cat.
He has many lives.
male reporter:
The latest tonight
on the drug kingpin El Chapo,
who remains one of the most
wanted men in the world.
narrator: July 2015.
Notorious narco kingpin
El Chapo,
whose Sinaloa cartel is the
leading trafficker of drugs
into the United States,
makes international headlines
with his daring escape
out of Mexico's
maximum-security prison,
Altiplano.
- We're here today to voice
our extreme displeasure
at the Mexican authorities
for the escape of one of
the most dangerous criminals
in the world.
narrator: The tunnel escape
is signature Chapo,
complete with a motorcycle
that runs a mile on rails.
- I expected nothing less.
That's just his style.
Tunnel was perfect.
narrator: Like his first
prison escape back in 2001,
he's had help from the inside.
Prison officials ignored
motion sensor alarms
and the sound of jackhammers.
[motored equipment
clacking and whirring]
- My reaction was,
how do you build a tunnel,
which is a pretty loud venture,
up into a prison without,
you know,
the prison officials knowing?
- El Chapo did not escape
because there blind spots.
He escaped because some people
on this spot decided
to be blind.
narrator: Publicly humiliated,
authorities launch the largest
manhunt in Mexico's history.
Six months and several
near-misses later,
the chase comes to a head in
the seaside town of Los Mochis.
On January 8th, 2016,
Mexican marines raid
that safe house
where Chapo and his men
are hiding.
- [speaking Spanish]
[gunshots firing]
narrator: But at some point
during the hour-long gun battle
that leaves five people dead,
Chapo and his top lieutenant
escape.
They flee into a secret passage
beneath the house
and follow a tunnel
that leads to the sewer system.
- There was a dramatic
rain storm.
- The water level in the sewers
started rising.
- El Chapo Guzman found himself
up to his neck in human waste.
and was forced to pop out
about half a mile away
in the middle of the street
through a manhole cover.
We now know he was with one
of his most prized lieutenants,
Ivan El Cholo.
They hijacked a Volkswagen.
narrator: The getaway
is all caught on camera
in this footage released
by the Mexican government.
But they only get a few blocks
before smoke starts pouring
out of the car.
- He gets one of the worst cars
in Los Mochis
that breaks down, you know,
just a few hundred feet
from where he commandeered it.
And Chapo Guzman
has got to be thinking,
"This is the worst day
of my life."
narrator: The men hurry
to hijack a second car--
a red Ford Focus.
Then they take off heading
south down highway 15.
- Calls were coming in to the
local emergency control center
about these carjackings.
By this time,
many people had seen
federal Mexican marines
spreading throughout the city,
heard the gunfire, knew that
some sort of military operation
was underway.
narrator: As heavily armed
troops surround the area,
a lookout notice for
the two carjackers goes wide.
- Local police officers went
to investigate
these two carjackings
and found the Ford Focus
on the back of a flatbed truck.
¶ ¶
They also found
El Chapo Guzman and Cholo Ivan
in that car.
narrator: The cops take Chapo
and his man into custody,
not realizing
that they have detained
the most wanted criminal
in the world.
- I have been advised
that El Chapo Guzman
was threatening
those local police officers.
He told them,
"You must know who I am.
You know how much money I have."
narrator: Allegedly,
El Chapo offers the police
a life-changing bribe
to look the other way.
- "And if you don't accept
my generous offer,
"I'm not only going to kill you,
I'm going to kill your wife,
and I'm gonna torture, rape,
and kill your daughters."
narrator:
The police reportedly get a tip
that dozens of cartel assassins
are en route
to free their boss,
so they hide
El Chapo and El Cholo
in the first place
they can find.
- They took both individuals,
El Chapo and Cholo Ivan,
to a sex motel,
where they could drive a car in
and the garage door behind them
would close.
narrator: In a room
with a satin bedspread,
eight hours since escaping
the marine firefight,
Chapo sits quietly, handcuffed.
It could all be over
in an instant
if his hit men swarm the motel.
But the marines
get there first.
- Luckily,
the Mexican marines arrived,
figured out what was happening,
secured the situation.
narrator:
The fugitive drug lord's
six months on the lam are over.
¶ ¶
One of the officers takes
a cell phone video
to capture the moment.
- Those pictures being
broadcast around the world
tell the world
that he ran for a long time,
he's escaped before,
but here is a defeated person,
and that should do something,
hopefully, to chip away
at his folk hero status.
narrator: The myth has ended.
El Chapo has fallen.
- One of the most wanted
and feared men in the world
has been captured again,
six months after his escape
from a maximum-security prison.
narrator: January 8th, 2016.
After 181 days on the run,
Joaquin Guzman Loera
has been recaptured in Mexico.
America's most wanted criminal,
the man responsible
for flooding U.S. streets
with an endless supply
of narcotics,
is paraded
in front of the world.
El Chapo is loaded
onto a helicopter
and flown back to Altiplano,
the same prison he escaped from
just six months earlier.
¶ ¶
President Enrique Pena Nieto
tweets a message
that resounds across
the globe--
"Mission accomplished:
we have him."
- This is a significant
achievement for Mexico
and a major step forward
in our shared fight against
transnational organized crime,
violence, and drug trafficking.
- This is an incredibly
important arrest.
It sends a incredibly strong
message to narco-traffickers
or would-be narco-traffickers
around the world
that a multi-national coalition
of nation states
will not tolerate your
brutality and your viciousness.
¶ ¶
narrator: Meanwhile,
federal courts across the U.S.
are waiting to get their chance
to prosecute
the world's top drug lord.
- If you look at everywhere
from New York to San Diego,
Chicago to Texas,
Phoenix to Miami,
there literally
is probably not
a single community
in the United States
that was not impacted
by the trafficking
of the Sinaloa organization.
¶ ¶
- El Chapo Guzman faces seven
different federal indictments,
issued by seven different
Federal Grand Juries,
for crimes involving
narco-trafficking,
money laundering, and murder.
- When Chapo Guzman finally
goes on trial,
ideally, I think
in the United States,
it'll be amazing what
we find out if he talks.
narrator: The list of those
who have financially benefited
from El Chapo
is long and distinguished:
police,
politicians,
business leaders,
people on both sides
of the border.
- I have every reason to believe
that he will be extradited
to the United States
and that he will be convicted
and that he will spend the rest
of his life behind bars.
- The notorious drug lord
Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman
has been moved to a new prison
this morning,
and it's just across the border
from El Paso, Texas.
narrator: May 8th, 2016.
A Mexican federal judge
rules in favor of extradition
to the United States.
Hours later,
in the middle of the night,
Chapo is secretly moved
from Altiplano supermax
to a new prison in Juarez
near the U.S. border.
Authorities say
it's for security reasons.
Others fear this transfer
could increase his chances
for another escape,
especially since Juarez
is largely controlled
by Chapo's Sinaloa cartel.
- I would be willing to bet
that he has escape plans
from every prison in Mexico.
- The prison system
is as full of the corruption
and intimidation as it was
before his last escape.
Nothing fundamental has changed.
It's a race between extradition
or a new escape.
My guess is that
the Mexican authorities
are really, really afraid
that he might escape again.
narrator: While the drug lord's
future hangs in the balance,
no matter how Joaquin Guzman
Loera's personal story ends,
it's not clear that anything
will ever change.
- Let's be honest--
if Mr. Guzman is incarcerated,
is the Sinaloa cartel
gonna stop running narcotics
into the U.S.?
The answer's no.
- Search warrant!
We've got a search warrant!
- It still remains
the most powerful,
the most vicious,
the wealthiest,
and the scariest
narco-trafficking organization
around the globe.
- The Sinaloa cartel
is like an NFL football team
that is very strong
and they have a strong bench,
so even if the quarterback
gets injured,
there's another strong
quarterback that can come in
and run the team.
[car sirens blaring and honking]
- As long as we have
the consumers here in America
spending $100 billion
every year
on cocaine, crystal meth,
marijuana, and heroin,
we're gonna have people
in Mexico trafficking drugs.
narrator: And so, even as the
legend of El Chapo lives on,
there's always another kid
in another dusty village
in the Golden Triangle
just waiting to make his mark.
In the words
of El Chapo himself...
[gunshots firing]
"This will never end."