Category World News

Joaquin Guzman Lopez, the son of notorious Mexican drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, has pleaded guilty to two counts of drug trafficking and organized crime in a Chicago court, replacing his earlier not guilty verdict after his arrest last year.

Guzman Lopez sparingly in court on Monday while sporting an orange jumpsuit and matching pair of shoes. Sharon Coleman, the judge of the Northern District of Illinois, questioned him about his work-related activities early in the hearing.

Guzman Lopez responded, “Drug trafficking.”

Coleman chuckled back, “Oh, that’s your job.”

According to reports, Guzman Lopez is expected to avoid life in prison if he accepts a guilty plea as part of a deal that allows him to cooperate with US prosecutors and pay an $80 million fine for his crimes.

He still faces a minimum sentence of 10 years in prison, according to federal government attorney Andrew Erskine.

According to reports, Guzman Lopez will be sentenced by a judge at a later time and won’t be able to file an appeal as part of the plea deal.

After the hearing, Guzman Lopez’s defense attorney, Jeffrey Lichtman, stated that the government has treated Joaquin fairly so far.

According to Lichtman, “I do appreciate the fact that the Mexican government did not interfere.”

In the 35-page plea deal, Guzman Lopez and his brothers admitted to supporting the cartel’s activities by paying off officials and using weapons and other weapons to execute threats against law enforcement, rival traffickers, and even members of their own organization, according to a report from the Chicago Tribune.

The “Chapitos”

In the US, Guzman Lopez and his brother Ovidio are accused of leading a powerful Sinaloa cartel faction after their father allegedly inherited their father from El Chapo and are one of the four sons known as the “Chapitos” or “little Chapos” in the country.

In July, Ovidio Guzman Lopez admitted guilt on two counts of drug distribution and two counts of engaging in a persistent criminal activity in the US. He might receive a life sentence.

Two more brothers are still at large. El Chapo, their father, was sentenced to life in a maximum security prison in 2017, and was extradited to the US in 2017.

US federal authorities described the Sinaloa cartel’s activities as a “staggering” network that brought “staggering” amounts of fentanyl into the US in 2023.

As prosecutors on Monday outlined the circumstances that led to Guzman Lopez’s dramatic arrest in Chicago in July 2024, along with another long-standing Sinaloa leader, Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, the security at the federal court was raised.

After landing in a&nbsp, a small private plane, the pair were detained in Texas. In response to reports of betrayal that led to the arrests in the US, two factions of the Sinaloa cartel clashed, prompting a rise in violence in Mexico’s northern state of Sinaloa.

El Mayo’s kidnapping appears to be an admission made by Guzman Lopez.

Guzman Lopez also admits to kidnapping an unnamed person who is alleged to be Zambada in his plea deal.

The alleged kidnapping was described in court by Erskine, a federal government lawyer, who claimed Guzman Lopez had the glass removed from a floor-to-ceiling window.

Guzman Lopez allegedly arranged for someone else to enter through an open window, seize the person, stuff his head over his head, and take him to a plane while they were having a meeting there. Before the plane touched down at a New Mexico airport close to the Texas border, he was zip-tied and given sedatives.

Erskine claimed that Guzman Lopez’s alleged kidnapping was part of a campaign to show cooperation with the US government, which did not sanction his actions. Because of the kidnapping, he claimed, Guzman Lopez would not be eligible for cooperation credit.

Guzman Lopez’s information accentuates some of the details that Zambada already disclosed in a letter he signed and that his lawyer released shortly after his arrest last year.

Zambada’s attorney claimed that his client had been “forced to kidnapped” onto the US flight. Zambada claimed Guzman Lopez asked him to meet with local politicians on July 25 in the two-page letter. According to Zamboda, El Chapo’s son organized the meeting to “help resolve the political leaders’ differences.”

The document states that “the idea that I gave up or worked for others completely false.”

At a pre-trial hearing on Monday, a prison guard testified that Luigi Mangione, the 27-year-old who is accused of killing the chief executive of the biggest health insurer in the country in December of this year, had a 3D-printed gun in his backpack.

In a court in New York City, prosecutors will be able to use the evidence against Mangione, who is accused of shooting the death of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.

The guard claimed that Mangione had a 3D-printed pistol in his backpack and that he had a silencer and other allegedly-identifiable journal entries in his bag without question.

A defense lawyer disputed the guard’s claim that Mangione, who was appearing before Justice Gregory Carro at the hearing wearing a grey suit and a white shirt with a red checkered pattern, provided the necessary information on his own.

You “weren’t speaking to him at all,” he says to you “I had a 3D-printed pistol” out of nowhere. Marc Agnifilo, a defense attorney, contacted.

The guard claimed during subsequent questioning by a prosecutor that he did not care about the outcome of the case and that he did not ask Mangione any questions.

Mangione’s attorneys contend that his lawyers’ claims that his lawyers violated his legal rights and that his purported statements to law enforcement and his backpack may be significant pieces of evidence at his trial should be inadmissible.

Mangione’s attorneys refute allegations that she was subjected to unlawful searches and interrogations.

The prosecution would benefit greatly by excluding the gun and notebook from a potential murder weapon and evidence that they claim points to motive, and by doing so would eliminate them.

In court documents, Mangione’s alleged praise for the late “Unabomber” Theodore Kaczynski, who carried out a number of mail bombings between 1978 and 1995 has been extensively quoted in Mangione’s writings.

According to prosecutors, Mangione allegedly mused about rebelling against “the deadly, greed-fueled health insurance cartel” and justified killing business executives.

The wealthy Maryland family’s scion, Mangione, has entered a not-guilty plea to murder and other charges, and is scheduled to go on trial next year.

In a separate federal case where prosecutors intend to seek the death penalty, he has entered a not-guilty plea.

At the hearing on Monday, Mangione stoically watched the prosecution play surveillance videos of Thompson’s murder and, presumably, Mangione’s arrest five days later.

As he ate breakfast at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania, which is about 370 kilometers (230 miles) west of Manhattan, Mangione placed a thumb and finger on his lips in response to surveillance footage of two police officers approaching him.

As prosecutors played a 911 call from a McDonald’s manager who had concerns that Mangione might be the suspect in Thompson’s murder, he held a pen in his right hand and made a fist at times.

The employee was reportedly able to say in a recording of the first court hearing that “I have a customer here that some other customers are suspicious of, who looks like the CEO shooter.”

If Mangione is found guilty of second-degree murder, which is defined as an intentional killing, he could face life in prison. Additionally, he faces one count of false identification and seven counts of criminal possession of a weapon.

In September, Judge Carro dropped two terrorism charges against Mangione because prosecutors lacked sufficient evidence to show Mangione intended to stifle health insurance workers or influence government decisions.

Before the hearing, several Mangione supporters showed up outside the court, including a woman wearing a “Free Luigi” sash and a man wearing a Super Mario Bros villain’s outfit with a sign that read, “When patients die, profits rise.”

Following discussions with European and US officials in Paris, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has stated that the biggest challenge facing Ukraine’s ongoing negotiations over a US plan to end the war is still to be solved.

At a joint news conference on Monday, Zelenskyy, who spoke alongside French President Emmanuel Macron, stated that Ukraine’s top priorities include protecting its sovereignty, security guarantees, and preventing concessions that would allow Russia to continue to control Ukrainian land.

He urged partners to avoid any results that “rewards the war it]Russia started,” noting that “the territorial issue is our biggest challenge.

As part of an intensifying diplomatic campaign to end the war, which Russia launched with its full-scale invasion in February 2022, officials from France, Germany, Italy, Poland, and the United Kingdom called on to meet in Paris.

According to Zelenskyy, the meeting also looked at the content of the discussions between Ukrainian and American officials the day before in the United States, noting that more meetings are being planned throughout Europe.

In the event that a resolution to end the war is reached, Macron reiterated that “Ukraine must be the one who determines its own territorial boundaries.” He also said that further discussions are planned between Washington and European allies regarding potential security guarantees for Ukraine.

Giorgia Meloni, the prime minister of Italy, also stressed the importance of a path to peace between Europe and the US. She praised Zelenskyy’s “consistently constructive approach” in a statement and expressed hope that Russia will “offer its own concrete contribution” to upcoming discussions.

diplomatic angst is exacerbated by territorial issues.

As Witkoff and Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of US President Donald Trump, prepare for a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday, the territorial issue is likely to be the most contentious point in the negotiations.

After those discussions, Zelenskyy has stated that he intends to speak with Trump. However, Ukrainian officials have already informed the US that Kyiv won’t accept a territory-ceded settlement.

Rustem Umerov, Zelenskyy’s adviser, told Al Jazeera Arabic, “We told the American side that it is unacceptable for Russia to continue its occupation of our territory and then demand that we grant it legitimacy.” The granting of our territory implies that any party can impose itself on another party’s sovereignty by using force to do so.

Security guarantees are still a delicate topic of discussion, according to Umerov, who stated that “we are seeking security for both Europe and Ukraine.” He added that if Russia actually engages, negotiations will be “extremely difficult,” and Moscow still thinks that “continuing the war is less expensive than ending it” is true.

Hashem Ahelbarra, a journalist from Brussels, reported on the report that “land swaps must be made between the Ukrainian people” and that no significant concessions must be made to Russia.

A draft US plan was leaked to the press in the middle of November, which raised questions in Ukraine and among its allies in Europe, who claimed the draft plan was in stark favor of Moscow.

Without making any mention of a cap on Russia, the plan proposed to limit Ukraine’s army to 600 000 men. Additionally, it forbade Kyiv from ever joining NATO, and it had plans for Moscow to maintain Ukrainian territory.

Dnipro was hit by Russian strikes.

Ukraine was the victim of yet another deadly attack earlier on Monday as diplomatic efforts grew. Russian missiles were used in the city of Dnipro on Tuesday, according to local officials, killing at least four people.

According to Vladyslav Haivanenko, the acting head of the Dnipropetrovsk Regional Military Administration, injuries have increased to 43, according to Interfax. Ten people were reported to be seriously ill, according to him. An administrative building, several businesses, four educational facilities, several high-rise buildings, two service stations, and more than 50 vehicles were all damaged by the strike.

Before the war, Dnipro, which is located 62 kilometers away from the front line and where nearly one million people lived, was frequently targeted by Russian bombardments.

The settlement of Klynove in Ukraine’s Donetsk region was “liberated,” according to the Russian Ministry of Defense, claiming that it had advanced deeply into Ukrainian positions. These assertions have been refuted by the Ukrainian army.

In the past 24 hours, Ukraine reported that it had lost about 1,415 soldiers across the front. In the same time, Kyiv reported that it had killed 1, 060 Russian soldiers, one tank, six armored vehicles, 14 artillery systems, 239 drones, and 71 other vehicles.