Mexico City — The lawyer for Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera insists that letters sent to a Brooklyn court in recent weeks were not written by the drug lord, despite being signed with his name.
Gerardo Rincón Flores, Guzmán’s legal representative, said the dozen missives, written in English and mailed since late April, are forgeries. The letters repeatedly request Guzmán’s extradition to Mexico and a new trial, arguing that his life sentence plus 30 years is excessive.
“The letters that have been sent — none of them are from Mr. Guzmán. They are not from ‘El Chapo,’ I confirm that to you. I have the proof. In fact, I made a manifesto,” Rincón Flores said in an interview.
Rincón Flores clarified that the first letter he himself sends from the maximum-security prison will bear his client’s authentic signature. Everything circulated before is apocryphal.
The lawyer explained that removing any document from the prison where Guzmán is held is not a simple procedure. It must pass through internal prison filters and then receive express authorization from the FBI.
He noted that the notarized powers of attorney proving his representation took nearly two months to process, plus another two and a half months for amparo proceedings.
“It’s not easy to get a letter out. He doesn’t speak English, he doesn’t write English. He dominates Spanish because he’s Mexican, but he doesn’t have much facility for writing,” Rincón Flores said.
He added that the handwriting and signature do not match Guzmán’s, which he knows because he holds documents the drug lord signed to accredit his representation.
Rincón Flores said he has prepared a manifesto with his evidence and sent it to both the judge in the case and Mariel Colón, the lead defense attorney for Guzmán in the United States. In that document, he identified who is likely behind the fake letters and in which media they are being disseminated.
“I have been in communication with her, I let her know who is probably doing it, who is causing this to create clouds and distractions,” he said of the apocryphal missives.
According to the lawyer, Colón confirmed the letters are fake and that a formal investigation is underway to find the author.
