Mexican security forces have released captured drug lord Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán’s son from a house where they briefly apprehended him on Thursday, Security Minister Alfonso Durazo told Reuters, saying the decision was taken to protect lives.
Durazo’s comments followed an earlier statement that did not fully clarify whether the accused drug trafficker, Ovidio Guzmán , was still in custody, following hours of intense gunbattles in the northern city of Culiacán .
On Friday, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador defended security forces over their handling of a shocking outbreak of drug violence , saying they had saved lives by releasing a son of jailed kingpin Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, who was sentenced to life in prison, after his bungled arrest.
On Thursday, Sinaloa cartel gunmen surrounded security forces in the northwestern city of Culiacán and made them free the drug lord’s son, Ovidio Guzmán , after his brief capture triggered gun battles and a jailbreak that stunned the country.
The chaos in Culiacán, long a stronghold for the Guzmáns’ Sinaloa Cartel, raised pressure on López Obrador, who took office in December promising to pacify a country weary of more than a decade of gang violence, disappearances, and shootouts .
López Obrador, who came under strong criticism overnight on social media that he had caved into the gang, vigorously defended the government response, although he emphasized it was his security cabinet that made the decision to release Guzmán’s son.
“Capturing a criminal can’t be worth more than people’s lives,” he said, noting that officials “did well” to free Ovidio Guzmán. “We’re doing really well in our strategy,” said López Obrador, a veteran leftist who has advocated a less confrontational approach to tackling the gangs.
The violent reaction to Guzmán’s detention was on a scale rarely seen during Mexico’s long drug war, even after his more famous father’s arrests.
Defense Minister Luis Cresencio Sandoval
told a news conference that he had reports of at least eight people killed, including five suspected gang members, in Culiacán, a city of nearly 1 million people in Sinaloa state .
Footage on social media of panicked residents fleeing and high caliber gunfire ringing out dealt a stiff blow to López Obrador.
At the center of his strategy has been the creation of a new National Guard , but thousands of that militarized police force’s members have instead been sent to contain illegal immigration through Mexico at the behest of U.S. President Donald Trump.
Security experts
were highly critical.
Gladys McCormick
, a security analyst at Syracuse University in the United States, said in a statement the latest news from Mexico read like that of a country in “the throes of war.”
“What is incontrovertible is that the Sinaloa Cartel won yesterday’s battle ,” she added. “Not only did they get the government to release Ovidio, they demonstrated to the citizens of Culiacán as well as the rest of Mexico who is in control.”
BUNGLED ARREST
Chaos in Culiacan continued into the night after a large group of inmates also escaped from the city prison on Thursday. Residents cowered in shopping centers and supermarkets as gunfire roared. Black plumes of smoke rose across the skyline.
López Obrador rejected the suggestion the government had acted weakly in releasing the younger Guzmán, describing this view as “conjecture” put about by his adversaries to hurt him.
A trenchant critic of past administrations, López Obrador said the previous strategy had turned Mexico into a “graveyard” and that his critics wanted him to continue with it.
He argues that authorities should focus more on the root causes of drug violence , such as poverty and a lack of jobs .
Still, the murder tally in Mexico this year is on track to surpass last year’s record total of more than 29,000.
López Obrador said security forces had swooped on the house in Culiacán to capture Ovidio Guzmán after a judge issued a warrant for his arrest and extradition .
That contradicted the version put out on Thursday by the government, which was that the officers had come under fire from the house while passing, then found Guzmán inside.
Defense minister Sandoval
later acknowledged that security forces had set out to capture Ovidio Guzmán but that the operation was carried out “hastily.”
Thursday’s events followed the massacre of more than a dozen police in western Mexico earlier this week and the killing of 14 suspected gangsters by the army a day later.
The elder Guzmán escaped from prison in Mexico twice, in 2001 and 2015 . Under the previous administration, security forces captured him twice in Sinaloa, in 2014 and 2016.
The previous government extradited him to the United States on the eve of President Donald Trump’s accession. He was found guilty in a U.S. court in February of smuggling tons of drugs and sentenced to life in prison .
Joaquín Guzman is believed to have about 12 children including Ovidio. The U.S. Department of Justice unveiled an indictment against Ovidio and another of the brothers in February, charging them with conspiracy to distribute cocaine, methamphetamine, and marijuana in the United States.
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