The "El Chapo" case stands out both by the extent of Guzman's enterprise and by the difficulty in bringing him to justice. The manhunt for his capture started in 1993 and he was only convicted in 2019. El Chapo made the Sinaloa Cartel one of the biggest cartels in the world. The success of his enterprise relied on the diversification of the drugs it sold, its suppliers, its means to transport and smuggle the drugs and the expansion of his enterprise’s control over other countries. In the 2000s, in addition to cocaine, heroin and marijuana, Guzman commenced the distribution of methamphetamine. He then spread his influence over Pacific and Atlantic ports and to border towns between Mexico and the US and between Mexico and Guatemala; all highly strategic locations for the smuggling of drugs. He infiltrated other Central American countries such as Honduras, El Salvador, Costa Rica and Panama for the receipt of cocaine shipments. In those countries, he established small landing strips to facilitate the use of small planes for drug transportation. In addition to air transport, he diversified the ways of drug transportation to land, underground, and (under)water transportation. Furthermore, although Guzman used to have his cocaine supplied by Colombian cartels, he enlarged his array of supply countries to Ecuador and Venezuela, which allowed him to negotiate directly with the suppliers. As for methamphetamines, he bought precursor chemicals for producing it in African and Asian countries, including China and India.

Guzman’s cartel laundered the proceeds of its drug trafficking through US-based insurance companies, reloadable debit cards, numerous shell companies, including a juice company and a fish flour company and through the smuggling of cash in bulk from the US to Mexico.  To avoid apprehension, Guzman’s cartel used corrupt officials in Mexico to facilitate the safe transport of drugs and to protected his co-offenders from arrest and prosecution. Additionally, Guzman’s cartel systematically intimidated potential witness wishing to testify against him as well as former cartel members wanting to betray him. All these elements significantly complicated the task for law enforcement to bring him to justice. And, even if he got arrested in 1993, it did not prevent him from running his enterprise from the Mexican prison in which he was incarcerated. However, as soon as he learnt about his extradition to the US in 2001, he escaped a first time, supposedly in a laundry cart. As he gained more power over the years, the manhunt for his capture intensified and several raids were conducted in 2014 by Mexican law enforcement services and military. He escaped several of them thanks to escape hatches leading to an elaborate maze Guzman had constructed within Mexico city’s sewer system. He was eventually captured in February 2014, but he managed to escape a second time in July 2015. His final arrest took place in January 2016 and he was extradited to the US a year later, in January 2017.