(To see the full photo gallery, click here: Contacts between "El Chapo" and Kate del Castillo)
Since August 2014, when Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán ordered his lawyers to contact Kate del Castillo to advise him for an autobiographical film and a book, intelligence personnel started to follow their negotiations.
Intelligence reports show that the Mexican actress met with Guzmán's lawyers four times, and that she was taken along with American actor Sean Penn to the municipality of Cosalá, Sinaloa, in a private plane to meet the world's most notorious drug lord. The interview, published on the website of Rolling Stones magazine a day after El Chapo's recapture, helped Mexican authorities track the fugitive down.
The first contact between del Castillo and “El Chapo” was made through his lawyer, Andrés Granados Flores, in October 2014.
The star of “The Queen of the South” said right from the beginning that she was willing to collaborate with Guzmán in everything he needed. They kept exchanging letters through the drug lord's legal team while he was behind bars at El Altiplano prison in the State of Mexico.
The first meeting between Kate del Castillo and Andrés Granados took place on June 16, 2015 at the upscale San Angel Inn in Mexico City. The photos of the meeting show that the actress wore a black blouse and a white skirt, while the lawyer wore a black suit.
On that day they agreed the terms of the contract for Guzmán's autobiographical film and the actress was named "head" and coordinator of the project, according to intelligence reports.
They met again on September 25, 2015 in Guadalajara, Jalisco. Kate del Castillo arrived in Aeromexico flight 783 from Los Angeles, California. From the airport she went to Hotel NH Collection Crystal in Guadalajara and had dinner with El Chapo's lawyers: Granados and Óscar Manuel Gómez Núñez. On that day they talked about the details of the movie.
The next morning they gave a special phone to Del Castillo so that she could talk to Guzmán personally.
Kate del Castillo flew back to Los Angeles and on October 2, 2015, she returned to Guadalajara accompanied by actor Sean Penn. Both actors arrived aboard a Hawker 900XP aircraft and went to hotel Villa Ganz, where they were expected by Andrés Granados. Once they checked in and dropped their luggage, they were taken on two trucks from Guadalajara to Paraiso del Sol resort in Tepic, Nayarit. From there, they took two private planes, one white and another one yellow to meet with El Chapo.