Alleged Sinaloa Cartel leader and accused drug trafficker Ovidio Guzmán López has reportedly entered the United States Federal Witness Protection Program — but some experts aren’t buying it.
El Universal reported Friday that it was notified by an unnamed Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) source of Guzmán’s entry into the program operated by the United States Marshals Service.
But as of Friday afternoon, neither government sources nor other news organizations had independently confirmed the report.
Dolia Estévez, a Washington-based journalist specializing in U.S.-Mexico relations characterized the report as “completely false” in a publication on the social media platform X.
“Agreed. This is nonsense,” added New York Times criminal justice writer Alan Feuer.
Estévez said Ovidio is scheduled to appear in court Oct. 1 according to Nicole Navas Oxman, senior communications advisor for the U.S. Justice Department.
Agreed. This is nonsense. https://t.co/lFoCNUvcel
— Alan Feuer (@alanfeuer) August 30, 2024
Meanwhile, according to award-winning Mexican journalist Arturo Ángel, “Ovidio Guzmán is not free nor is he lost. He’s under the custody of federal agents at a secure site while they analyze whether or not to admit him to a program of protected witnesses.”
Guzmán was arrested in Culiacán in January 2023 and extradited to the United States last September.
He was released from a high-security United States prison on July 23, two days before his brother, Joaquín Guzmán López, and Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada were arrested after flying into an airport near El Paso, Texas.
The Federal Attorney General’s Office said Thursday that it was unaware of Ovidio’s “current status” and of his location in the United States.
The DEA source told El Universal that his case is classified and he won’t make any public appearances.
According to the U.S. Marshalls Service website, that law enforcement agency “provides for the security, health and safety of government witnesses, and their immediate dependents, whose lives are in danger as a result of their testimony against drug traffickers, terrorists, organized crime members and other major criminals.”
“… The successful operation of this program is widely recognized as providing a unique and valuable tool in the government’s battle against organized crime and terrorism,” the website says.
“Witnesses and their families typically get new identities and funding for basic living expenses and medical care. Job training and employment assistance may also be provided. The U.S. Marshals Service provides 24-hour protection to all witnesses, while they are in a high-threat environment including pretrial conferences, trial testimonials, and other court appearances.”
Nicknamed “El Ratón” (The Mouse), Ovidio Guzmán López was accused of drug trafficking, money laundering, firearms offenses and other charges in the United States, where his father, Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera is imprisoned in the “Supermax” facility near Florence, Colorado. He pleaded not guilty to all charges.
Before his release, Guzmán López — an alleged leader of Los Chapitos faction of the Sinaloa Cartel — was imprisoned in the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Chicago.
His brother Joaquín is currently incarcerated at the same prison. Zambada, who founded the Sinaloa Cartel with Guzmán Loera and others, has accused Joaquín of kidnapping him and forcing him onto a U.S.-bound plane.
Mexico’s Security Minister Rosa Icela Rodríguez said on Aug. 6 that Joaquín turned himself in to United States authorities after reaching an agreement with Ovidio to surrender. That would suggest that they both planned to collaborate with U.S. authorities.
However, after Joaquín pleaded not guilty to drug trafficking and other charges in a Chicago court on July 30, lawyer Jeffrey Lichtman said his client did not have any agreement with U.S. authorities.
Ovidio Guzmán was first arrested in Culiacán in October 2019, but he was released by federal security forces after his capture triggered a wave of cartel attacks in the Sinaloa capital.
In a surreal episode two months after his second capture, he claimed in court that he wasn’t the son of El Chapo.
“I’m not the person they believe I am, that the United States is asking for,” Guzmán said.
On April 14, 2023, narcotics, money laundering, and firearms charges were unsealed in Illinois against the four Chapitos: Ivan Guzmán Salazar, Alfredo Guzmán Salazar, Joaquin Guzmán López, and Ovidio Guzmán López.
“Today’s indictments send a clear message to the Chapitos, the Sinaloa Cartel, and criminal drug networks around the world that the DEA will stop at nothing to protect the national security of the United States and the safety and health of the American people,” DEA Administrator Anne Milgram said at the time.
“The Chapitos pioneered the manufacture and trafficking of fentanyl — the deadliest drug threat our country has ever faced — flooded it into the United States for the past eight years and killed hundreds of thousands of Americans,” she added.
With reports from El Universal
