Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzman in dock for biggest US drugs trial

Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman goes on trial in New York today, accused of running the world’s biggest drug cartel and spending a quarter of a century smuggling more than 155 tons of cocaine into the United States. The mammoth trial in a Brooklyn federal court, which will cost millions of dollars and is expected to last more than four months, will see one of the world’s most notorious criminals face the US justice system.

Prosecutors spent years piecing together a sweeping case against Guzman, who was extradited in 2017 after twice escaping prison in Mexico -- first hidden in a laundry cart, then slipping down a tunnel that reached his prison shower. Guzman has been branded the world’s biggest drug lord since Colombia’s Pablo Escobar, who was dubbed “The King of Cocaine” and was one of the wealthiest men in the world until police shot him dead in 1993.

Experts say the government has a near water-tight case likely to send Guzman, 61, to a maximum security US prison for the rest of his life. But at what price? “Is it going to stop even one additional pound of cocaine from coming into the United States? Probably not. The machine keeps rolling,” says Rob Heroy, a North Carolina lawyer who has defended other Mexican drug barons.

The Sinaloa cartel that Guzman founded in 1989 is still hugely powerful. His co-defendant Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada remains at large, and violent drug trafficking continues unabated in Mexico. US prosecutors contend that from 1989 to 2014, the cartel smuggled at least 340,892 pounds (154,626 kilograms) of cocaine into the United States, as well as heroin, methamphetamine and marijuana, raking in $14 billion.

Guzman pleads not guilty, but the government has presented so much evidence -- more than 300,000 pages and at least 117,000 audio recordings -- that the defense complains they haven’t had enough time to review it all. Heroy estimates the trial will cost US taxpayer “more than $50 million,” a price tag that includes protection programs for at least some of the several hundred witnesses expected to testify