Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada Garcia has been sentenced in federal court in Brooklyn to life in prison without the possibility of parole for his role as a principal leader of the Sinaloa Cartel — and for Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) violations.
Zambada Garcia pleaded guilty on August 25, 2025, admitting to being a principal leader of the continuing criminal enterprise and to the RICO charge. As part of his plea agreement, the Court entered a $15 billion forfeiture money judgment against him at sentencing.
“Ismael Zambada Garcia spent nearly four decades poisoning American communities to make billions of dollars in profit and ordering the murders of anyone who stood in his way. Today, that chapter closes for good,” stated United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York Joseph Nocella, Jr. “He will spend the rest of his life in a United States prison, exactly where he belongs. This sentence was made possible by the tireless bilateral cooperation between U.S. and Mexican law enforcement who refused to let El Mayo’s years of evading justice become a permanent state of affairs. We hope that today’s sentence brings some measure of justice to the countless victims of the Sinaloa Cartel’s narcotics trafficking and violence.”
“Today, narco-trafficker El Mayo was sentenced to life in prison, marking the end of his reign over the Sinaloa Cartel, one of the most violent and deadly drug cartels in history. He will never again inflict carnage, corrupt public officials, or traffic deadly drugs into our communities that ruin Americans and their families,” said Assistant Attorney General A. Tysen Duva of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. “El Mayo’s conviction is historic, and it reflects the Justice Department’s commitment to the total elimination of cartels and transnational criminal organizations that threaten American lives. To those who remain: we will find you, we will prosecute you, and you, too, will face substantial time in prison.”
“Today’s sentencing sends a clear message to every cartel, every foreign terrorist leader: no matter how powerful you become or how long you evade justice, DEA will not stop pursuing you. For decades, Ismael ‘El Mayo’ Zambada García helped lead the Sinaloa Cartel – now designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization – fueling violence, corrupting public institutions, and trafficking fentanyl into the United States, where it has become a weapon of mass destruction that has claimed countless American lives. This outcome reflects the unwavering determination of DEA and our law enforcement partners, who never stopped pursuing this case. Justice does not have an expiration date, and neither does our resolve. We will continue targeting the leaders of the Sinaloa Cartel and every criminal organization that threatens the American people,” stated DEA Administrator Terrance C. Cole.
“Today, the United States closes the book on one of the most violent and destructive criminal figures of our time — the most prolific drug trafficker in modern history: Ismael ‘El Mayo’ Zambada Garcia,” stated HSI Acting Executive Associate Director John A. Condon. “For nearly two decades, HSI special agents and investigators interviewed countless witnesses, dissected every shred of evidence, and devoted themselves, through sleepless nights and early mornings, to making certain that ‘El Mayo’ and his co-conspirators would face justice on behalf of Sinaloa’s victims. Through the Homeland Security Task Force framework, HSI fused its global investigative reach, financial expertise, and border authorities with the invaluable capabilities of the FBI, the DEA, the U.S. Marshals Service, and our Department of Justice counterparts. With this sentencing, HSI, together with our invaluable HSTF partners, has taken one of the world’s most dangerous criminals off the map permanently.”
“El Mayo’s sentencing is a testament to the dedication of dozens of law enforcement officers and attorneys who labored over this case for decades,” stated Jeffrey Tyler, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI Washington Field Office’. “It’s also a victory for every American family who has lost a loved one to a drug overdose and every Mexican community that has lived in fear of cartel violence. In the wake of this sentencing, the FBI and our partners vow to continue to pour our collective resources into dismantling the cartel — bringing every faction leader, plaza boss, and assassin to justice.”
“Ismael ‘El Mayo’ Zambada Garcia spent nearly four decades leading a cartel that poisoned American communities, corrupted public officials, and used murder and terror to protect its power. Today’s life sentence ensures that his reign of violence is over for good. This result reflects years of determined work by prosecutors in the Southern District of Florida, who helped build and carry this case alongside our partners in Brooklyn, Texas, the Criminal Division, and federal law enforcement. No cartel leader is beyond the reach of American justice, and the Southern District of Florida will stay in the fight until the job is finished,” stated Jason A. Reding Quiñones, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida.
“The sentencing of Zambada Garcia to life in federal prison is a landmark moment in the fight against transnational criminal organizations,” stated Justin R. Simmons, United States Attorney for the Western District of Texas. “This Administration has made the total elimination of cartels a national priority because Mexican drug cartels are a multifaceted threat to the American way of life. Today’s sentencing is yet another example of our commitment to accomplishing that goal. The Western District of Texas is literally on the front lines of that fight, and our AUSAs and support staff will continue to wake up every day and do the next right thing on behalf of the American people just as they did in this case and so many cases like it.”
Zambada Garcia had faced indictments in six federal jurisdictions: the Eastern District of New York, United States v. Zambada Garcia, et al., 09-CR-466 (EDNY) (the “EDNY Indictment”); the Western District of Texas, United States v. Zambada Garcia, et al., 12-CR-849 (WDTX) (the “WDTX Indictment”); the District of Columbia (03-CR-34; 03-CR-331 (DDC)); the Northern District of Illinois (09-CR-383 (NDIL)); the Southern District of California (14-CR-658 (SDCA)); and the Central District of California (15-CR-566 (CDCA)).
Pursuant to a plea agreement, Zambada Garcia agreed to the transfer of the WDTX Indictment for plea and sentencing in the Eastern District of New York. Zambada Garcia was thus held accountable in the Eastern District of New York for the criminal conduct encompassing both indictments. The remaining indictments will be dismissed in the coming days.
The EDNY Indictment charged Zambada Garcia with being a principal leader of a continuing criminal enterprise for conduct spanning January 1989 through January 2024. The WDTX Indictment charged him with RICO conspiracy for his participation in money laundering, murder, and drug conspiracies, as well as violations of state law for murder and kidnapping, for conduct between January 1, 2000 and April 11, 2012.
Zambada Garcia’s rise to power began with the Sinaloa Cartel’s inception and ended with his arrest in July 2024. Previously known as the Mexican Federation, the Sinaloa Cartel is a drug trafficking organization based in Sinaloa, Mexico, that since approximately the late 1980s has imported lethal quantities of narcotics — including, among others, cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, and fentanyl — into the United States and laundered billions of dollars in drug proceeds back to Mexico.
The Sinaloa Cartel’s operations initially focused on cocaine distribution based on cooperative arrangements and close coordination with South American sources of supply and distribution networks. This changed in the 2000s when the Colombians, seeing increased law enforcement activity, started to abandon their U.S. distribution businesses in favor of permitting Mexican traffickers to invest in cocaine shipments at wholesale prices, which those Mexican traffickers would then distribute in the United States. As a result, Mexican traffickers and the Sinaloa Cartel began to take a more integral role in moving cocaine from Colombia into and throughout the United States. Under Zambada Garcia’s leadership, the Cartel also recently branched out into the production and trafficking of fentanyl, including by purchasing fentanyl precursor chemicals from Chinese companies and producing many thousands of kilograms of fentanyl in laboratories both in rural areas and major cities in Mexico for distribution in the United States.
The Sinaloa Cartel’s distribution networks also have supported money laundering efforts that have delivered billions of dollars in illegal profits generated from drug sales in the United States back to the Sinaloa Cartel. Increased profits allowed the Sinaloa Cartel’s operations to grow a large-scale narcotics transportation network involving the use of land, air, and sea transportation assets, which eventually led to the Sinaloa Cartel shipping multi-ton quantities of cocaine from South America, through Central America and Mexico, and finally into the United States.
Zambada Garcia has devoted his efforts over decades to growing, increasing, and enhancing the power of the Cartel, and to growing his individual power and position in the Cartel after his partner El Chapo was captured in 2016. Under Zambada Garcia’s leadership, the Cartel regularly used brutal violence, intimidation, and murder to silence potential witnesses and dissuade law enforcement from performing its duties. Zambada Garcia has operated with impunity at the highest levels of the Mexican drug trafficking world while being assured of his continued success and safety from arrest through his payment of bribes to Mexican government officials and law enforcement officers. He controlled those corrupt officials and officers who protected his workers and drug shipments as his drugs were transported across Mexico and into the United States. Numerous witnesses have testified, including at the trials of El Chapo and corrupt former Mexican Secretary of Public Security Genaro García Luna, that corruption at all levels was necessary to allow the Zambada Garcia’s criminal enterprise to function so effectively at such a large scale: from local police officers who escorted the drugs through Mexico, to corrupt officials who informed the Cartel of military actions, thwarted capture operations, and consulted with the Cartel about proceedings and investigations against it.
HSI, the FBI, and the DEA investigated the case.
The original announcement can be found here.
