Mexico Drug Lord 'El Chapo' Faces Life in US Prison After Extradition

By Nate Raymond and Jonathan Allen (New York) 

Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman will spend the rest of his life in a U.S. prison if convicted on charges he ran the world's largest drug-trafficking organization during a decades-long criminal career, U.S. prosecutors said on Friday.

El Chapo, once one of the world's most wanted drug lords, was set to appear at 2 p.m. EST (1900 GMT) in federal court in Brooklyn to be arraigned on 17 criminal counts, a day after his surprise extradition from Mexico.

The charges carry a mandatory minimum sentence of life in prison, Robert Capers, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said at a news conference.

"Who is Chapo Guzman? In short, he's a man known for no other life but a life of crime, violence, death and destruction, and now he'll have to answer to that," Capers said.

Guzman, 59, arrived in a small jet at Long Island's MacArthur Airport after nightfall on Thursday from a prison in the city of Juarez in the northern state of Chihuahua, where his Sinaloa cartel rules.

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Source: Reuters (via The Empire Report)