Miguel Angel Martinez, who described himself as a former manager
in the cartel, took the witness stand on the sixth day of
Guzman's drug trafficking trial, testifying under an agreement
to cooperate with prosecutors. For his safety, court sketch
artists were ordered not to draw an accurate likeness of him.
"I knew that he was the boss," Martinez said when a prosecutor,
Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Robotti, asked him about
Guzman's role in the organization. "Since I met him, he would
give all of us orders."
Guzman, 61, was extradited from Mexico in January 2017 and faces
life in prison if convicted. His lawyers are seeking to prove
that another drug lord, Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada, actually ran
the cartel and used Guzman as a scapegoat.
Martinez said he began working for Guzman as a pilot and as a
guide to other pilots on drug flights in 1987. He said one of
the pilots he assisted that year, on a flight carrying 170
kilograms (375 lbs) of cocaine, claimed he had flown in the U.S.
Navy.
Martinez said he was soon relieved of his pilot duties after
damaging a propeller in a botched landing with Guzman on board.
Guzman, he recalled, told him he was a "really bad pilot" and
sent him instead to Mexico City to open an office for the
cartel.
Posing as attorneys, Martinez said, he and others at the office
directed bribes to government officials so the cartel could
operate undisturbed. The beneficiaries included a high-ranking
police official, Guillermo Calderoni, who fed Guzman information
about law enforcement activities "every day," Martinez said.
Martinez said he and Guzman became close, and that in 1989,
Guzman became the godfather to Martinez's newborn son.
Martinez said he often talked by radio to the Colombian cartel
pilots who would bring cocaine to Mexico, using code words to
avoid detection. Drug shipments, he explained, were "parties."
"Wine" meant jet fuel, and "girls" were planes.
In the 1990s, Martinez said, U.S. authorities became more
capable of intercepting planes, and Guzman and his Colombian
suppliers largely switched to using fishing and merchant ships.
Martinez is expected to continue testifying on Tuesday.
(Reporting by Brendan Pierson in New York; Editing by Lisa
Shumaker)
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