Motley crew of lawyers defends Mexico’s ‘Chapo’ Guzman

In this Friday, Jan. 8, 2016 photo, Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman is made to face the press as he’s escorted to a helicopter in handcuffs by soldiers and marines at a federal hangar in Mexico City. Guzman’s second prison escape in 2015 from a top security prison though a tunnel had embarrassed President Enrique Pena Nieto and made his capture a national priority. AP FILE PHOTO

MEXICO CITY, Mexico—One lawyer is accused of helping Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman escape from prison. Another claims to represent the fallen drug lord for free. In total, 13 attorneys have recently worked for Guzman.

This motley crew of legal eagles is representing Mexico’s most powerful imprisoned criminal, with some working in the shadows and a few vocal ones defending him in front of television cameras.

READ: Guzman’s lawyers condemn treatment in Mexico jail

One of them, Oscar Manuel Gomez, is accused of acting more like an accomplice than a member of Guzman’s legal team.

Gomez was arrested under charges that he helped the Sinaloa drug cartel leader plan his brazen prison break on July 11, when he slipped out through a 1.5-kilometer (one-mile) tunnel.

While Guzman was on the run, it was another lawyer, Andres Granados, who put the then-fugitive in touch with Mexican-American actress Kate del Castillo.

READ: Mexico asks actress to testify on Guzman links

Granados, Del Castillo and Guzman exchanged text messages last year, leading to the drug baron’s astonishing meeting with the actress and US star Sean Penn in October, though it ended up working against him as it helped the authorities locate him.

“His legal team looks more like a team of company advisors. They’re partners, accomplices of the business,” said Raul Benitez Manaut, security expert at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.

’13 different lawyers’

But now his lawyers are working hard to prevent the 58-year-old cartel leader’s extradition to the United States.

While most keep a low profile, Juan Pablo Badillo, 74, has not been shy about appearing in front of TV cameras.

Badillo represented Guzman after his first arrest in 1993. The slippery criminal escaped from prison for the first time eight years later.

The lawyer described his client in a Washington Post interview last year as someone of “exceeding intelligence,” who has the “greatest fortitude” and treats others with the “utmost respect.”

Badillo visited Guzman six times while he was held at the Altiplano maximum-security prison from February 2014 until his July escape.

But he was not the only one.

Oscar Manuel Gomez, who was arrested in October, visited Guzman several times and even saw him hours before his client escaped from the prison 90 kilometers (55 miles) west of Mexico City.

“Last time (Guzman was in prison) 13 different lawyers saw him,” Interior Minister Miguel Angel Osorio Chong said last week.

“Now we will be much stricter. All the flaws have been corrected,” Osorio Chong said.

While Badillo claims that Guzman has not been allowed to see his attorneys since his arrest, the interior minister said one of them, Jorge Rodriguez, has visited the notorious inmate.

Rodriguez and four other lawyers are the only ones registered to defend Guzman, according to a prison official. Their faces however are unknown to the public.

Working for free

One man whose face has become a familiar sight is Jose Luis Gonzalez Meza, a small 73-year-old man known for his theatrical public appearances who claims to represent Guzman.

Gonzalez Meza has gone as far as saying that even Adolf Hitler would not have been treated like the drug lord. He told AFP that he does not know Guzman and does not plan to bill him.

Last week, Gonzalez Meza appeared outside the prison and showed the media a pair of shaggy slippers and underwear that guards did not let him bring inside.

Outside the Supreme Court on Tuesday, he held a sign protesting the extradition process.

Gonzalez Meza’s resume stands in odd contrast with the man he claims to represent, as he heads a human rights organization that defends “the poorest people.” He also had a failed bid to run for president in 2012.

The attorney said that he started representing Guzman after “a relative” contacted him shortly after the drug lord’s capture.

Gonzalez Meza believes that Guzman hired him because of his left-leaning views and his choice words for former Mexican presidents like Carlos Salinas.

He calls Salinas (president 1988-1994) an “assassin,” a “dictator” and a “drug trafficker” in three books that he has written about the politician.

“Do you know why I like (Guzman)? His group has never kidnapped poor people. … Has a Mexican politician ever given money to the poor? None! But these people, yes. So I consider him admirable,” Gonzalez Meza said, adding that the deaths attributed to Guzman are “insignificant.”

“By defending ‘El Chapo,’ I’m attacking the government,” he said.