The third capture of Joaquin Guzman is an extraordinary event that challenges traditional paradigms about the relationship between organized crime and political power.
While the global “War on Drugs” seems lost to the greater social tolerance towards consumption and the entertainment industry exploits the old culture of glorification of criminals, the legend of El Chapo became a case of global media celebrity in which the Hollywood project of his personal history, paradoxically ended up being a perfectly natural outcome in the life of a character that was able to project himself as a simple man who loves his mom and thanks God for his last escape, or as well the fearsome murderer of thousands and a major global strategist in the drug business worldwide.
No doubt, countless books, newspaper articles and many movies and soap operas will tell, soon enough, the story of El Chapo Guzman. Without considering the many “narco-corridos” that for long have sang his adventures. For its media impact his legend will overcome, all the big names in the world of drug traffickers, including Pablo Escobar and forcing things a bit, maybe even the legend Al Capone, the capo tutti capi.
The hard fact is that his fame is less related to his actual weight in the business of production, trafficking and sale of illegal drugs and more with his three arrests and of course, with his digital affair with Kate Del Castillo, the movie star that wanted to be the producer of his Hollywood debut.
But now the most wanted capo is back, for a third time, to the Almoloya jail, and maybe in a while he will be a resident of one of the Supermax prisons in the U.S. Although, as with the great singers and actors who retire or die, with the alleged end of his public life -in this case his new arrest-, it seems natural to assume that his fame and legend will continue to grow.
Being a big media figure for over 22 years, common sense indicates that El Chapo hardly could have had time to be that gigantic capitalist that could control half of the illegal drug business in the world.
Besides, nobody has even tried to assume that with his arrest the flow of drugs will stop coming to the streets of New York, Miami, Los Angeles or Mexico City, of course it will not. Even worse, most Mexicans told pollsters that what they expect to happen is that, with El Chapo captured, the likely outcome will be more violence all over the country. They also believe that the same government that let him escape does not deserve too much credit for his re-capture.
Anyway, what started as a major breaking news ended as an entertainment show with the leaked details of the digital affair between the capo and the actress, which probably will serve for the movie production process that began with those several hours of chat, dinning and drinking Tequila between Penn, Del Castillo and El Chapo.
Although, if the movie is finally done it seems hard to imagine that he will be able to attend the premiere. But, honestly, at this point, who really knows?
