Mexico extradites 13 people including top drug lords to US

“We have carried out the extraditions of 13 individuals… on court extradition requests from several jurisdictions in the United States”, said Tomas Zeron, who leads the criminal investigation unit at the Justice Ministry.

Valdez and Costilla were housed at Mexico’s maximum security facility, Altiplano, the scene of a dramatic escape in July by the world’s most powerful drug lord, Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman. Agents arrested him after he arrived in Las Vegas in 2013 on a flight from Mexico.

That disclosure came Wednesday at a Chicago hearing for Hector Miguel Valencia Ortega’s brother.

This is the second arrest warrant for extradition issued against Guzman in less than two weeks.

Valdez Villarreal was a top lieutenant to Arturo Beltran Leyva.

Thirteen suspects in total are being extradited, to face charges in the U.S. He was nicknamed “the Barbie” for his fair complexion and green eyes.

Others are suspects in the murders of a United States consulate employee and her husband in 2010. They were sent by plane and are wanted for various violent crimes and drug trafficking-related offenses. In Mexico, he is accused of executing dozens of people, including 50 he allegedly buried in a mass grave. “Maybe they don’t feel as safe now about the security in the prison system”.

Compiling information on the methods likely used by those digging the tunnel that Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel leader Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman escaped prison through, this detailed infographic presents the tools and costs of the operation.