When Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán is sentenced on 25 June, he will most likely be sent to US maximum-security prison from which there will be no more tunnels and no more escapes.

Guzmán was convicted on all 10 charges after years of painstaking behind-the-scenes work by US Department of Justice prosecutors who cut deals with captive drug traffickers to get their man.

The driving theme of the trial was that – unlike Italian godfathers of yore – the Mexican and Colombian cartels which nowadays shift most of the world’s drugs do not honour the old mafia dictum of omertà, the bond of silence.

The courthouse where Guzmán was convicted – New York’s eastern district – was the setting for the 1992 trial of John Gotti, head of the Sicilian Gambino clan. His conviction marked the end of Cosa Nostra’s reign in New York – and, indirectly, the rise of the Latin American syndicates which replaced them.

That same year, saw the culmination of Italy’s five-year mafia “maxi-trial” in Palermo. Prosecutors Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino secured convictions against 360 operatives. Both paid with their lives, but the Sicilian mafia was mortally wounded.

It took one snitch – Sammy “the Bull” Gravano – to nail Gotti. The mafia kingpins – Bernardo Provenzano and Salvatore Riina – were brought down by two “penitent” witnesses.

By contrast, Mexican and Colombian mobsters have lined up to squeal against Guzmán: 16 testified at this trial, and the prosecution had more to choose from.

First up was Jesús Zambada García, the Sinaloa cartel’s former accountant, who spoke of investors, overheads and profit margins as though he were selling hamburgers, not cocaine and methamphetamines.

Then, in quick succession, came Miguel Ángel Martínez, who said he had “the best time in the world” as Guzmán’s lieutenant; naturalised American citizen Edgar Galván, who described Guzmán’s torture chamber of horrors; and Juan Carlos Ramírez, alias “Lollipop”, who laid out a manual for the routine corruption of national governments.

Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán is seen in this courtroom sketch, giving thumbs up sign to wife Emma Coronel Aispuro, on the day he was found guilty. Photograph: Jane Rosenberg/Reuters

Institutional corruption became a second major theme of the trial, which at times became a litigation of Mexico’s politics, army and police – despite the efforts of the prosecution and judge.

Witnesses described bribes to the drug tsar who was supposed to be fighting Guzmán; federal and highway police who escorted consignments of Colombian cocaine; an army general on the payroll in return for safe passage, and Guzmán’s worries that a police commander was not receiving his monthly cheque.

There were allegations of bribes to former Mexican presidents Felipe Calderón and Enrique Peño Nieto (denied by both) , and allegations of bribes to a senior aide of the current president, Andrés Manuel López Obrador.

Defence lawyers tried to make such allegations the focus of the trial instead of the allegations against Guzmán; the jury didn’t buy it.

And what the trial successfully did – to the repeated outrage of Mexican journalists covering the trial – was bury the money trail.

Throughout the evidence, cash was always described as going “back in Mexico”. Martínez flew planes loaded with between $8m and $10m from Tijuana three times a month. Cash deposits were hidden beneath beds and even underwater.

Martínez described hauling a Samsonite case filled with $10m to “a Mexico City bank” every month – but he was never asked which one, not by prosecution, defence or bench.

The trial lasted three months without mentioning Wachovia, HSBC or other banks who have admitted bringing the billions Zambada García described “back to America” for dissemination throughout the “legal” economy.

The guilty verdict means no more tunnels for El Chapo, but as the door slams behind him, it may well mean sighs of relief around US boardrooms.