›› PDF: Read excerpt of Sinaloa document













According to the documents, Zambada-Niebla then told Flores to find U.S. soldiers returning from the war in the Middle East who can obtain weapons.

"We don't want Middle Eastern or Asian guns, we want big U.S. guns, or RPGs (rocket-propelled grenades). É You know what I'm talking about. We don't need one, we need a lot of them, 20, 30, a lot of them."

Zambada-Niebla made it clear that money was no object when it came to the weapons.

The meeting allegedly took place three years ago with Guzman at an undisclosed mountaintop compound in Northern Mexico.

Documents allege that brothers Margarito and Pedro Flores were drug traffickers in the Chicago area and imported large quantities of cocaine and heroin from Guzman's Sinaloa drug cartel. At some point, the brothers became cooperating witnesses and informants for the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration's investigation.

U.S. officials have alleged that the Sinaola cartel used Chicago to extend its influence internationally.

Earlier this year, Zambada-Niebla's defense alleged in court filings that he was allowed to smuggle tons of cocaine into the United States from 2004 until his arrest in 2009.

Zambada-Niebla claims that he had Guzman's permission to help U.S. agents, and that a Mexican lawyer named Humberto Loya-Castro acted as the liaison for such alleged negotiations between the Sinaloa cartel and U.S. authorities.

Loya-Castro, a former high-ranking Sinaloa cartel associate, had his 1995 U.S. drug-trafficking case dismissed in 2008 after serving as an informant for 10 years for the U.S. government, according to court documents.

In one of the recent court filings, Loya-Castro said that a DEA agent named "Manny" allegedly was his handler. "In 2009, Manny informed Loya-Castro that the federal prosecutor in Washington, D.C., and the DEA had agreed that Mr. Zambada-Niebla's charges would also be dismissed and he would not be subject to prosecution in exchange for information."

U.S. officials have denied that Zambada-Niebla was promised any kind of immunity from prosecution.

The agent identified only as "Manny" later allegedly contacted Loya-Castro to let him know that Manny could not testify for the defense, according to the court filing.

The document also said that Manny told him that if his and the cartel's relationship with him and the U.S. government were exposed, and if Mr. Loya-Castro's activities in providing information on other rival cartel leaders was exposed, it would be bad not only for Loya-Castro but also the U.S. government, because they didn't want anyone to know about their relationship with the heads of the Sinaloa cartel.

The DEA agent allegedly also told Loya-Castro to tell Guzman and his associates that the defense lawyers' tactics were bad and could endanger them, the documents said.

Zambada-Niebla's lawyers also argued in their pleadings that U.S. agents did not use their contacts within the Sinaloa cartel to tell them where Guzman was so he could be arrested. U.S. authorities have investigated Guzman-Loera since 1995.

To advance their argument, the defense lawyers cited an article in Foreign Affairs in which former DEA chief Robert C. Bonner says that U.S. authorities used a similar strategy of pitting cartel leaders against each other against Pablo Escobar, the Colom bian drug kingpin-politician who was killed in a shootout in 1993.

According to court documents, the Flores brothers were able to order drugs from the Sinaloa cartel on credit, and they had to provide law enforcement records to the cartel whenever one of their drug loads was seized.

The court documents also said that Zambada-Niebla coordinated the transportation of drug shipments, and was observed with "a radio with which to contact the Mexican police to secure safe passage of the cocaine load."

On another occasion, the documents said, during a meeting in Culiacan, Sinaloa, Zambada-Niebla used a Nextel-type radiophone to speak to one of his workers. "Zambada-Niebla informed his worker that there was a new 'comandante' law enforcement commander, in Culiacan.

"Zambada-Niebla ordered his worker to bring the comandante to (him) for a meeting. (Cooperating witness D) heard Zambada-Niebla say, in words or substance, 'he (the comandante) is either going to work with us, or you know what will happen to him,'" the documents stated.

The Sinaloa cartel had several 747 jetliners it used to transport cocaine from Central or South America, the court documents said. At one point, using these airplanes, "The Sinaloa cartel arranged to have shipments of clothing sent to Central and South America as part of a humanitarian aid project."

The trip involved dropping off clothing at the Central or South American airports, and placing up to 13 tons of cocaine in the plane for the return trip to the Mexico City airport.
