Wife of drug lord El Chapo has been released from prison

The wife of drug lord El Chapo has been released from prison today (13 September).

Emma Coronel Aispuro, wife of Mexican crime lord Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzmán, is now a free woman after being released from a prison in Los Angeles after serving just over half of her three-year sentence.

The Federal Bureau of Prisons confirmed her release.

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The 34-year-old was sentenced to three years in prison back in November 2021 on charges that included conspiring to distribute drugs.

Earlier that same year, Coronel Aispuro pleaded guilty to multiple federal crimes, including conspiring to distribute heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine and marijuana for several years after being arrested at Dulles International Airport near Washington.

Charges included conspiracy to launder money and engaging in transactions with a foreign narcotics trafficker.

US justice officials have said that, before her arrest, Coronel Aispuro had helped Guzmán - who was the the head of Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel at the time - escape from a high-security Mexican prison back in 2015.

Prosecutors previously alleged Coronel Aispuro 'worked closely with the command-and-control structure' of the Sinaloa cartel and conspired to distribute large quantities of drugs, knowing they would be smuggled into the US.

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One prosecutor, Anthony Nardozzi, said she had 'aided and abetted' the Sinaloa cartel’s objectives to smuggle drugs into the US and helped to import more than 450,000 kilograms of cocaine, 90,000 kilograms of heroin, 45,000 kilograms of methamphetamine and about 90,000 kilograms of marijuana.

During her trial, Nardozzi said Coronel Aispuro 'served as a go-between' to deliver messages to cartel members after her husband was arrested and also conspired with Guzman’s sons to 'plan and coordinate' his prison escapes.

At the time, Coronel Aispuro expressed her 'true regret for any and all harm' she caused through her actions and begged officials for a sentence that would let her watch her twin daughters who she had with El Chapo, now 12, grow up.

The judge in charge of Coronel Aispuro's sentencing said her sentence had been reduced after she promptly accepted responsibility as well as agreed to hand over $1.5 million in fines to the US government.

However, while she has served just over half of her three-year sentence, Coronel Aispuro will serve four more years of probation upon her release.

During this probation period, she will be heavily supervised by authorities.

Her 66-year-old husband Guzmán, on the other hand, is currently serving a life sentence in a supermax jail in Oregon.