At least half of Badiraguato’s population cultivate marijuana, Valenzuela said, the same trade Guzman plied as a poor boy in the sierra with his father long before he became so rich that Forbes magazine put him on its list of billionaires.
In Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman’s hometown, some thought they were dreaming and others shed tears of joy when they heard the drug lord had broken out of Mexico’s top maximum security prison through a tunnel built into his cell.
A picturesque, agricultural backwater in the foothills of the Sierra Madre mountains of northwestern Mexico, Badiraguato has been the breeding ground for some of the world’s most notorious – and successful – drug traffickers.
Above them all stands “El Chapo”, or “Shorty”, whose second escape from prison a week ago humiliated President Enrique Pena Nieto and utterly exposed the limits of the federal government’s power.
From the “El Chapo” roast chicken restaurant by the main square to the words of local officials, the presence of the gang boss locals refer to as “El Viejon” – The Old Man – hangs over the 400-year-old town that lives, breathes and sleeps drugs.
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