A widely propagated myth would have us believe that Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman Loera and his Sinaloa Federation are less violent than many of their competitors. Statements from journalists and analysts allege that Sinaloa is more businesslike than Los Zetas, whose reputation for brutality is well-documented, and that this business savvy somehow renders the group relatively benign. In turn, this has led many to believe that the Mexican government could broker a deal with the leader of one of Mexico's largest criminal organizations.
However, a close examination of Sinaloa's evolution demonstrates the group is hardly the hallmark of civility. In fact, the history of Mexico's cartel wars over the past decade reveals that
By that time, Guzman had begun focusing on other places to expand.
A Boss of Many Groups
On Sept. 11, 2004, Sinaloa hit men gunned down Rodolfo Carrillo Fuentes, a leader of the Vicente Carrillo Fuentes organization, also known as the Juarez cartel, as he left a theater in Culiacan, Sinaloa state. Rodolfo's brother Vicente retaliated by having Guzman's brother murdered in prison. This chain of events set off a war between the two organizations for control of the Juarez and Chihuahua City plazas that continues to this day. (While the Juarez cartel is just a shadow of its former self -- Sinaloa has all but consolidated control of Chihuahua state -- Chihuahua nonetheless remains the second-deadliest state in Mexico because of this struggle.)
Sinaloa meanwhile had resumed its efforts to control Tijuana. A string of arrests and the deaths of the Arellano Felix brothers, who constituted the core leadership of the Arellano Felix Organization, severely degraded the group's operational capability. In early 2008, internal fighting between the faction loyal to the Arellano Felix brothers' successor, Luis Fernando "El Ingeniero" Sanchez Arellano, and those loyal to the group's top enforcer, Teodoro "El Teo" Garcia Simental, further degraded the organization. This conflict sparked marked levels of violence in the region until Mexican federal police dismantled the Garcia faction.
Desperate for support against Sanchez Arellano, Garcia sought protection from the Sinaloa