A video is released by the Mexican Navy which shows marines firing their assault rifles and tossing smoke grenades during an operation to recapture notorious drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman. Guzman is now back in prison as his lawyers fight his extradition to the U.S. The drug kingpin escaped from the Altiplano prison near Mexico City on July 11, launching an active manhunt. Mexican daily El Universal published photographs on Monday of Penn and Castillo that it said showed the pair being tracked at the time.
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In Penn’s story, a first-person account of his long and sprawling conversation with, the two men discuss their various businesses – movie acting for Penn and drugs and violence for El Chapo. “I don’t want to throw any other actors under the bus, but I know a lot of very, very serious actors and filmmakers who’ve been having meetings like this forever”, actor Matt Damon said.
On Monday Penn insisted: “I’ve got nothin’ to hide”.
Penn’s article on Guzman was published late Saturday by Rolling Stone magazine, a day after the drug lord’s recapture.
Federal police eventually found them on a highway outside of town and Guzman’s flight ended six months after his stunning escape from the same maximum security prison where he now sits.
William Cole, the former head of the criminal division in San Diego and the former chief assistant, said a number of factors come into play when a defendant is extradited from a foreign country and faces charges in multiple USA jurisdictions.
On one upstairs bed the marines found four DVDs from the series La Reina del Sur, starring Kate del Castillo, the Mexican actress who put Guzman in contact with the American actor Sean Penn. In it, Penn wrote of elaborate security precautions, but also said that as he flew to Mexico on Oct 2 for the meeting, “I see no spying eyes, but I assume they are there”.
Authorities launched the process on Sunday – two days after his capture – based on petitions from courts in California and Texas on charges that include drug trafficking and homicide.
But if Mr Penn had helped Guzman in some way to avoid capture – or interfered with the authorities’ efforts to find him – he could be prosecuted.
He has operated a vast drug empire that is outfitted with a fleet of trucks, aeroplanes and submarines, as he told Penn in the interview, conducted while Guzman was still in hiding. The newspaper said Monday they were part of a Mexican government intelligence file that it obtained. The drug lord also wanted a second meeting with her according to the official, who was not authorized to be quoted by name. The marine hit the weapon with a couple of shots causing the gunman to toss it, the marine guide said in the Televisa interview.
As the raid was unfolding, Guzman escaped via a secret passage in the home that descended into a tunnel that led to the city’s storm drains, a senior law enforcement source told CNN.
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In the Rolling Stone article, Guzman said he was the world’s leading supplier of heroin, methamphetamine, cocaine and marijuana.
