Ex-Mexican drug lord Ismael  El Mayo' Zambada sentenced to life in prison

Former Mexican drug kingpin Ismael  El Mayo  Zambada was sentenced in a U.S. court on Monday to life in prison and called for an end to the brand of brutal violence he used for decades to grow the Sinaloa cartel into the world's largest drug trafficking organization.

 Nobody wins in a war like this,  the 76-year-old Zambada said through a Spanish-language translator in Brooklyn federal court. He apologized  for the harm I caused and the example I set  and urged future generations to  choose a different path. 


 Violence must end,  the Sinaloa cartel co-founder said.  In Mexico and elsewhere affected by violence, too many lives are lost. 

But violence was Zambada's  tool for more than three decades when it benefited him,  Assistant U.S. Attorney Adam Amir said.

He ordered torture and plotted murders - including the killing of his own nephew - as the Sinaloa cartel flooded the U.S. with tons of cocaine, fentanyl, methamphetamine and other drugs, Amir said.

More than a million Americans died of overdoses during Zambada's reign - many from drugs flowing from Mexico or the Sinaloa cartel, the prosecutor added.

Zambada's punishment was guaranteed by his guilty plea last year to drug trafficking charges that carry a mandatory life sentence.

His sentencing was the culmination of the U.S. government's yearslong fight to bring the long-elusive drug lord to justice. He was arrested in 2024 after he said he was kidnapped in Mexico and flown to Texas.

This undated image provided by the U.S. Department of State shows Ismael  El Mayo  Zambada, a historic leader of Mexico's Sinaloa cartel.

 The sentence here is kind of anticlimactic because I have no discretion,  Cogan said.  He is going to spend the rest of his days in prison. He accepts that. 

Cogan said he would recommend that Zambada be sent to a federal prison hospital where he can be treated for what his lawyer described as a  complex of age-related health issues. 

Zambada suffers from a number of  progressive illnesses  and his mental state is  drif

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