Joaquin Guzman Lopez, a central figure among the four brothers collectively known as the “Chapitos” who assumed command of the Sinaloa Cartel after their father’s extradition, entered a formal guilty plea Monday before a federal judge in Chicago, becoming the second son of Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman to surrender to United States prosecutors within the span of five months.

Standing in an orange prison jumpsuit, the 38-year-old defendant admitted full responsibility for two grave charges: engaging in a continuing criminal enterprise and conspiracy to import and distribute staggering volumes of cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, marijuana, and especially fentanyl—the synthetic opioid that has driven more than 100,000 annual overdose deaths in the United States alone. Prosecutors described his operation as one of the most prolific fentanyl pipelines ever uncovered.

The defendant’s dramatic journey to American custody began in July 2024 when he and Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, the cartel’s 76-year-old co-founder and last remaining old-guard leader, landed together on a private aircraft at a small airport outside El Paso, Texas. Within hours of their arrests, ferocious street battles erupted across Sinaloa state as the Chapitos faction clashed with Zambada loyalists, leaving dozens dead and exposing the cartel’s deepest internal fracture in decades.

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Monday’s courtroom capitulation mirrors the path taken by his elder brother Ovidio Guzman Lopez, whose own guilty plea in July marked the first time a direct heir of El Chapo agreed to cooperate with U.S. authorities. Legal analysts note that the rapid succession of plea deals from two of the cartel’s most wanted figures delivers an unprecedented blow to an organisation that once seemed untouchable despite the 2019 life sentence imposed on its legendary founder.

With their father entombed in the harshest supermax facility in Colorado and two sons now facing decades—or potentially life—in U.S. prisons, the once-mighty Sinaloa Cartel confronts an existential crisis, as federal prosecutors signal that the dismantling of the Guzman dynasty is accelerating far faster than even the most optimistic forecasts had predicted.

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