The official says he will be sent to the USA with other prisoners from Mexico’s maximum security facility, Altiplano.
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The United States is also turning over a few suspects it has detained back to Mexican authorities.
“My guess is that they’re probably starting to make amends for El Chapo”, Mexican security expert Alejandro Hope told AP. But after El Chapo’s first escape from prison in 2001, the Beltran Leyva brothers began working for the Sinaloa cartel and took La Barbie with them.
The United States filed an extradition request for Guzman about 2½ weeks before his escape. His lawyer said his escape was a direct result of learning that the extradition was imminent.
Critics said Pena Nieto should have handed over Guzman given Mexico’s past record with the capo.
The U.S. Justice Department praised Mexico for its efforts.
The government of Mexico is extraditing 13 major drug cartel suspects to face justice in the United States.
La Barbie was arrested in 2010 shortly after one of his bosses, Sinaloan drug trafficker Arturo “El Barbas” Beltran Leyva, was gunned down by Mexican marines in Cuernavaca, about 30 miles south of Mexico City.
Costilla, who was arrested in 2012, was charged in 2002 in the Southern District of Texas with cocaine and marijuana importation and distribution, money laundering, and threatening federal law enforcement officers with assault, kidnapping or murder, according to the U.S. Justice Department.
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But the new Mexican attorney general has promised to change that.
