“El Chapo” Guzmán's defense attorney fears death penalty for cartel leader if extradited

Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera's defense team will file two appeals against a sentence handed down by a federal judge in Mexico that denies El Chapo the right to file for an appeal against two pending extradition orders that could see the infamous cartel leader being extradited to the U.S. as early as February of next year.

His defense attorney's main line of defense according to official court documents obtained by EL UNIVERSAL, is that the District Court for the Western District of Texas, the state with the highest number of executions in the U.S., has charged El Chapo with conspiracy, crimes against public health, money laundering, organized crime, illegal possession of firearms and murder, which may result in El Chapo receiving the death penalty.

His defense attorney also argued that U.S. law concerning crimes of possession and trafficking of narcotics was reformed in recent years, and therefore, since charges were pressed against Guzmán Loera in California in 1994 before the reform, they have since expired, thus invalidating the District Court Southern District of California's extradition bid.