El Chapo Escape New York 2018

Said to have helped plan her husband's intricate escape from a high-security Mexican prison, Emma Coronel Aispuro is accused of deep involvement in the inner workings of Mexico's most notorious cartel.

A Brooklyn federal judge set an April 2018 trial date for Mexican drug lord Joaquin (El Chapo) Guzman. Federal prosecutors told Judge Brian Cogan on Friday that they need up to three months to pin.

WASHINGTON (CN) — The wife of imprisoned drug kingpin Joaquín 'El Chapo' Guzmán Loera appeared before a U.S. judge Tuesday afternoon after her arrest at Dulles International Airport.

• Emma Coronel, center, the wife of Joaquin Guzman, leaves Brooklyn Federal Court after opening arguments in the trial of the Mexican drug lord known as 'El Chapo,' Nov. 13, 2018, in New York.
• FILE - In this Feb. 12, 2019 file photo, Emma Coronel Aispuro, center, wife of Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman, leaves federal court in New York. The wife of Mexican drug kingpin and escape artist Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman has been arrested on international drug trafficking charges at an airport in Virginia.

Emma Coronel Aispuro, 31, will remain in detention until her defense proposes a bail package at a later court date, U.S. Magistrate Judge Robin M. Merriweather ordered at the hearing Tuesday afternoon, which was translated into Spanish for Coronel.

A dual citizen of the U.S. and Mexico, Coronel had been a regular attendee when Guzmán went on trial in New York for three months beginning in 2018.

The U.S. extradited Guzman after two notorious escapes from high-security Mexican prisons. It is said Guzmán accomplished his first escape in 2001 by way of a laundry cart. This was five years before he married Coronel; the former beauty queen was just 17 and he was 49. Today the notorious leader of the Sinaloa drug cartel is serving life in prison plus 30 years.

The newly unsealed charges against Coronel, who was arrested Monday at the Washington-area airport, say she coordinated Guzman's 2015 escape via an underground tunnel that led to a shower in his cell at Mexico's high-security Altiplano prison.

Special Agent Eric McGuire explains in an affidavit dated Feb. 17 that Coronel organized the jailbreak with help from two of Guzmán's sons and a high-ranking cartel associate who will testify for prosecutors. After buying a plot of land near the prison, firearms and an armored truck, according to the affidavit, Coronel smuggled Guzman a GPS watch so they could 'pinpoint his exact whereabouts' to lay out the mile-long tunnel, which included ventilation ducts, stairs and a motorbike on rails.

Guzman was arrested again the next year, and McGuire says Coronel tried to have her husband brought back to Altiplano so they could free him again before his extradition to the U.S.

In 2016, Coronel allegedly arranged again to buy more land near the Altiplano prison, ultimately paying $1 million to the cartel associate identified in court papers as Cooperating Witness 1.

When Guzmán was transferred to a facility in Ciudad Juárez, Coronel paid Mexico's top prison official $2 million to facilitate the Altiplano transfer that never came to be.

Coronel continued showing loyalty to Guzman throughout his imprisonment, lobbying the Mexican government to improve his prison conditions and launching a clothing line in his name after he was convicted in 2019. Together, they have twin daughters.

Prosecutors say Coronel also relayed messages from the cartel to Guzman that enabled him make drug shipments from behind bars. She was 'aware' of the Sinaloa cartel's massive shipments of drugs and 'understood the drug proceeds she controlled' were 'derived from these shipments,' according to McGuire's affidavit.

The Sinaloa cartel, which Guzman still heavily controlled from prison, smuggled more cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine and marijuana from South America to the United States than any other drug trafficker in history.

During his powerful 25-year reign of the multibillion-dollar enterprise, Guzmán directed an army of hit men who murdered thousands.

McGuire's affidavit explains that Coronel grew up in the drug trade. Both her father and brother, Ines Coronel Barreras and Ines Omar Coronel Aispuro, are serving 10-year sentences for their involvement in the cartel.

Coronel is charged with conspiracy to distribute cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin and marijuana in the United States. If convicted, Coronel could face 10 years to life in prison, plus a fine up to $10 million.

The Mexican drug kingpin known as El Chapo — 'Shorty' — is said to have first met the elegant teenage daughter of one of his lieutenants at a small-town dance. Smitten, he later hosted a lavish bash to support her bid to become a beauty contest queen.

She was just 18 — and more than three decades his junior — when they married in 2007 in the town of La Angostura, deep in the Sierra Madre and in the heart of the so-called Golden Triangle of heroin production in Mexico.

El Chapo's Escape From Prison

Years later, decked out in designer garb and spiked heels, she was a paparazzi-pleasing daily presence as Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzman faced his legal reckoning in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn as the leader of the Sinaloa cartel.

On Monday, U.S. authorities arrested Emma Coronel Aispuro at Dulles International Airport in Virginia, alleging that she was more than the loyal and fashion-conscious wife of the world's most notorious narco.

Mirroring some of the allegations that felled her husband, Coronel — a citizen of both the U.S. and Mexico — faces charges of participating in a broad conspiracy to distribute cocaine, methamphetamine, heroin and marijuana into the United States.

After Guzman was imprisoned in Mexico, an FBI affidavit states, his wife acted as a 'go-between and messenger,' relaying his orders to his lieutenants and his four sons, all of whom are allegedly high-ranking cartel members.

U.S. authorities allege she assisted in his sensational 2015 prison escape, when Guzmán dropped into a hole scooped out beneath the shower in his Mexican cell and hopped onto a rail-mounted motorcycle, which whisked him to freedom through a mile-long tunnel.

Coronel allegedly met with Guzmán's son to discuss the plan, which had involved purchasing land and a warehouse near the prison, along with firearms and an armored truck, according to an FBI affidavit.

Guzmán was captured six months later in the Pacific Coast city of Los Mochis, Mexico.

The FBI said his wife later helped organize a second escape scheme for which a Guzmán confederate received about $1 million — and told a 'cooperating witness' that a senior prison official had been paid $2 million to help. The prison chief was not identified.

But that plan never came to fruition. Guzmán was extradited to the United States in January 2017.

A U.S. District judge in New York sentenced Guzmán to life in prison in July 2019 after a jury found him guilty of drug-trafficking, money laundering and conspiracy to commit murder.

Prosecutors also sought an order demanding Guzman turn over more than $12.6 billion in assets — their approximation of his drug earnings over the decades. His lawyers called the request preposterous and said he didn't have anything close to that.

With her husband n U.S. custody, Coronel has been a frequent poster on Instagram and occasional visitor to the United States.

In September 2018, as Guzmán and his lawyers prepared for trial in New York, photos showed up on Instagram detailing a birthday party that Coronel threw for the couple's twin daughters, who were born in 2011 at Antelope Valley Hospital in Lancaster.

The decadent bash featured carnival rides, hundreds of pink balloons and a set featuring gold chandeliers and a rose-hued throne.

Coronel wore 4-inch heels and posed in front of a fake pink mansion and a long table covered with flowers, desserts and a towering birthday cake.

The next year, as Guzmán, 64, awaited sentencing, Coronel said on Instagram that she was launching a fashion line inspired by her husband's style. His image — square jaw, beady eyes, black mustache — is emblazoned on ball caps, T-shirts and posters in Mexico, especially in his home state of Sinaloa, where many regard him as a hero and Robin Hood figure who helped the poor.

In court, Coronel was equal parts spectacle and enigma. She spent almost every day of her husband's trial in the second row of the gallery, silent but impossible to miss.

By opening statements, the pair had not had any direct contact in two years. Still, her petition to be allowed to hug him once before the trial began was denied.

Guzmán would search for her from the moment he was led into the courtroom each day. The couple often waved and flirted, sometimes to the consternation of U.S. District Judge Brian Cogan.

When she brought their twins to court, Guzmán couldn't tear his eyes from them. Coronel often fussed to her husband's lawyers about his ties, his expression, his health.

When Did El Chapo Escape

Although she rarely spoke to the press, she never shied from the cameras outside of court. Her chic outfits — designer jeans, sky-high stilettos, military blazers and velvet body suits — got plenty of attention, and she was fastidious about her makeup. But suspicion hung over her.

El Chapo Escape 2017

Her uncle, Ignacio Coronel — the so-called King of Crystal for his part in the smuggling of methamphetamines to the United States — was killed in a 2010 shootout with the Mexican military. He was said to be number three in the Sinaloa cartel hierarchy. Authorities allege that Coronel's father, who is currently imprisoned in Mexico, 'coordinated narcotics transports' for the Sinaloa cartel.

During the trial, many speculated she was more involved in her husband's business dealings than she let on. She was obliged to pass through the metal detector twice before a sensitive witness was brought in to testify, out of concern she might smuggle in a cellphone to take his picture.

As the weeks dragged on, it was impossible for Coronel to conceal her boredom. She fidgeted in her seat and played with her long hair, and was scolded for using her lawyer's phone in the courtroom.

Her arrest reverberated across social media, especially in Mexico, where many suggested tongue-in-cheek that Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador would help get her returned to Mexico — as he did in the case of a former Mexican defense chief arrested in Los Angeles last year for alleged drug trafficking.

As the weeks dragged on, it was impossible for Coronel to conceal her boredom. She fidgeted in her seat and played with her long hair, and was scolded for using her lawyer's phone in the courtroom.

Her arrest reverberated across social media, especially in Mexico, where many suggested tongue-in-cheek that Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador would help get her returned to Mexico — as he did in the case of a former Mexican defense chief arrested in Los Angeles last year for alleged drug trafficking.

'Don't worry Emma,' wrote ex-President Vicente Fox on Twitter. 'The president will come to the rescue!!'

Did El Chapo Escape Again

McDonnell reported from Mexico City and Sharp from Los Angeles. Times staff writers Kate Linthicum in Mexico City, Tracy Wilkinson in Washington and special correspondent Cecilia Sánchez in Mexico City also contributed to this report.

El Chapo Escape New York 2018 Season

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.