El Chapo’s wife Emma Coronel Aispuro has been sentenced to three years in prison after pleading guilty to three federal counts, including conspiracy.
Aispuro was accused of helping her husband’s Sinaloa cartel while he was in custody, Bloomberg reports. Previously, prosecutors wanted to impose a four-year sentence on her for drug trafficking and money laundering charges. Aispuro was also given credit for time served, having been in custody for nine months.
The 32-year-old former beauty queen is the mother of El Chapo’s daughters.
“The defendant is going to have to participate in raising her 9-year-old twins because their father will not be able to do so, given his long-term incarceration,” the judge said. El Chapo is currently serving a life sentence.
Aispuro has been in custody since February and was compliant with authorities by turning herself in and pleading guilty. She also voluntarily gave more than $1.5 million in criminal proceeds to the government. She has no prior criminal history, with prosecutor Anthony Nardozzi telling the court that she “took accountability for her actions.”
“The defendant was not an organizer, leader, boss, or other type of manager,” Nardozzi told the court, per ABC 7. “Rather, she was a cog in a very large wheel of a criminal organization.”
Authorities apprehended Emma Coronel Aispuro at Dulles International Airport on Feb. 22 and she later pleaded guilty to drug trafficking and money laundering charges. She was allegedly the go-between El Chapo and his associates, and even helped the cartel leader escape from a Mexican prison in 2015.
