News

El Chapo’s lawyer: Mexican presidents are on cartel’s payroll

Brooklyn prosecutors asked a judge Wednesday to strike explosive opening statements made by Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman’s lawyer — in which he claimed both former and current Mexican presidents are on the drug cartel’s payroll.

“Opening statements are not argument, and should be confined to statements about the evidence,” US Attorney Richard P. Donoghue wrote to federal Judge Brian Cogan in a letter filed early Wednesday.

In his openings, which are expected to continue Wednesday, one of Guzman’s lawyers, Jeffrey Lichtman, claimed that his client was the victim of a vast conspiracy orchestrated to “scapegoat” the accused kingpin and allow the drug trade in Mexico to go on uninterrupted.

Lichtman even asserted that longtime Guzman associate Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada had “bribed” the entire Mexican government, including President Enrique Peña Nieto, and was the true leader of the Sinaloa Cartel.





Both Peña Nieto and his presidential predecessor, Felipe Calderón, decried the statements as blatantly false on Twitter on Tuesday.

Lichtman’s claims failed to touch on the boatloads of evidence prosecutors told jurors they have on Guzman, including statements in his own words implicating him as a major cartel figure.

In court Wednesday morning, Lichtman argued with Cogan while continuing to claim that Guzman was the victim of a “frame-up by the government.

“And it’s been done in American courtrooms a thousand times a day,” the lawyer complained.

Cogan replied dryly, “No, that’s not hyperbolic at all.

“What does it matter if the last two presidents took bribes if it’s not tied to the defendant here?” the judge said.

He added to Lichtman, “Your opening statements handed out a lot of promissory notes that it’s not going to be able to cash.”





But Cogan refused to strike the defense’s opening statements, instead issuing a reminder to jurors that the arguments are not evidence.

“There were some references in Mr. Lichtman’s opening statements to conduct that might be considered outrageous,” he told the panel. “The conduct of the government is for me to decide, not you.”

Guzman stands accused of running a criminal enterprise, multiple counts of importing cocaine, heroin and methamphetamine from Mexico into the US, and other charges.

If convicted, he faces life behind bars.





Share this: