Mexico Extradites Top Drug Lord ‘El Chapo’ to United States

The Mexican government said that the infamous drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman was extradited from a prison in northern Mexico to the United States, the Associated Press reported Thursday afternoon. “The government … today handed Mr Guzman Loera to the U.S. authorities,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.

Guzman, one of the world’s most wanted drug kingpins, was captured in January 2016 after he escaped from a high-security penitentiary in central Mexico. Prior to his capture, he spoke with actor Sean Penn in an exclusive interview for Rolling Stone. 

For the last year, Guzman was imprisoned in the volatile city of Juarez, near the Mexico-U.S. border. 

ABC News reports that the U.S. Department of Justice issued a statement confirming Guzman’s extradition to the U.S. The drug kingpin is being charged in six separate indictments throughout the U.S., the DOJ said. 

The announcement comes one day before Donald Trump’s presidential inauguration.