Because extradited Mexican Drug Lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman had escaped two times from prisons in Mexico and once in the United States, U.S. Prison authorities are not allowing him to flee again while under their custody. They have put in place extremely strict measures which the lawyers of the drug lord claim caused Guzman to hear things.
Very strict detention rules
According to the legal team, their client could not even shake their hands. El Chapo could not purchase bottled water. Guzman could not tell the time if it is night or day in his solitary confinement cell.
He has also been denied access to a Spanish-speaking priest, New York Daily News reported.
However, prosecutors insisted last week that the stringent regulations must remain intact. They also brushed aside that claim by lawyers that El Chapo has started to hear things. The prosecutors said what Guzman heard was the radio of a prison employee, but his lawyers said he heard Mexican music.
Daring escape
El Chapo was extradited in mid-January to the U.S. to face six separate indictments after he was recaptured. In 2001, he made his first and successful escape from a Mexican prison by hiding in a laundry cart. Guzman, who headed the Sinaloa Cartel, escaped the second time in July 2011 from the Altiplano prison near Mexico City through a hole in his shower.
It led to a mile-long tunnel where there was a motorbike that he used to reach a residential construction site. He was recaptured at the town of Los Mochis six months after the daring escape
Only El Chapo
The very strict rules only apply to El Chapo, according to his legal team made up of Michelle Gelernt, Edward Zas and Michael Schneider.
Other detainees at Supermax, the federal prison in Colorado where Guzman is incarcerated, could exercise and watch TV in their cells.
However, the lawyers admitted that the 59-year-old Mexican drug lord could exercise by himself at his Metropolitan Correctional Center cell and he was recently allowed by jail guards to watch DVDs.
These prison conditions were cited by El Chapo’s legal team in asking Brooklyn Federal Judge Brian Cogan to give the human rights organization Amnesty International the chance to inspect the jail conditions. The lawyers also asked the court to allow Guzman to be released to the general jail population.
