Wiretaps, informants and even a failed attempt at catching the world's most wanted drug trafficker. New details are now coming to light on how Mexican and U.S. authorities finally got their hands on drug kingpin Joaquin Guzman.
"'El Chapo' Guzman's flight from the law ended inauspiciously in a rundown in a rundown bedroom of a Mexican resort. It was over the last few months — even weeks — that his room to maneuver shrank to a few square feet." (Via CBS)
Police say Guzman led the infamous Sinaloa drug cartel and eluded these kinds of raids for 13 years since his 2001 escape from prison in a laundry truck. (Via WHDH)
CNN reports one of the biggest breaks in the case came in November when U.S. authorities captured the son of Guzman's closest lieutenant at the U.S.-Mexican border. His arrest and each one that followed in the coming months gave police a new cell phone with new info they tapped into.
Police say an informant told them about a series of safe houses, each of them with reinforced steel doors and escape hatches. A week before his capture, police tried to nab Guzman at a house in Culiacan. (Via CNN)
However, investigators say the time it took them to get through those steel doors allowed Guzman to escape in these tunnels connected to the city's sewage system. (Via Daily Mirror)
Guzman now faces a trial in Mexico, though several U.S. jurisdictions want him extradited so they can try him for the massive and violent drug trafficking operation police say he led. While many in Mexico hailed Guzman's arrest, others questioned what will happen with the power vacuum he leaves behind.
"Guzman is not the only boss. If they have captured him and they're going to jail him, well, somebody else will take his place. Another mafia boss or drug baron." (Via BBC)
