Despite being criminally charged as the head of a violent cartel that’s responsible for countless murders and pumping tons of drugs into the United States,…
Despite being criminally charged as the head of a violent cartel that’s responsible for countless murders and pumping tons of drugs into the United States, Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman is still regarded as a hero back in Mexico.
In Culiacan, the capital of Sinaloa, street vendors hawk figurines of the 61-year-old toting guns and hats emblazoned with “701” — his ranking on Forbes’ 2009 billionaires list, according to Agence France-Presse.
“El Chapo was a media star. He had a theatrical streak, and that put the spotlight on him even more,” said Tomas Guevara, a sociologist at the University of Sinaloa.
Guzman’s reputation as a living legend is part of the local “narco culture” where dangerous drug lords are beloved by the community just as much as they are feared.
And Guzman — whose trial on a slew of drug trafficking charges gets underway Tuesday in Brooklyn federal court — has a has a rags-to-riches story, selling fruit on the street as a boy then growing marijuana and opium poppies at age 15 before being recruited into the Guadalajara cartel.
Guzman left that enterprise to start his own Sinaloa cartel with two others, and together they turned their home-grown operation into an multi-billion dollar international operation.
Adding to his celebrity appeal are his two dramatic jailbreaks from maximum-security prisons — allegedly by hiding in a laundry basket and then through a nearly mile-long tunnel dug underneath his jail cell.
“Narco culture” is on full display at the Jardines de Humaya cemetery in Culiacan, where the bodies of late kingpins lie in luxurious tombs with bulletproof glass and air conditioning.
Nearby, locals pack a chapel dedicated to Jesus Malverde, the so-called “narco saint” with a Robin Hood-esque reputation. Folklore says he stole from the rich to give to the poor in early 20th-century Sinaloa.
“The narcos’ original idea — and this is how they won people’s hearts — is that they built roads to the villages, installed electricity, gave them money to build a church,” said Guevara. “They did the things the state was supposed to do and didn’t.”
Guadalupe Bustamente said she started praying at the chapel when she was diagnosed with cancer.
“I imagine [drug traffickers’] faith must be great indeed, because it’s gotten them through very big, serious problems,” the 35-year-old said. “Matters of life and death, because that’s the reality here.”
