Border Tunnel

Verified Timeline

Lore & Background

The cartel's roots trace back to Pedro Avilés Pérez in the late 1960s, who pioneered the use of aircraft for drug smuggling. His organization was a training ground for the second generation of Sinaloan traffickers, including Joaquín 'El Chapo' Guzmán and Ismael Zambada García. The Guadalajara Cartel, co-founded by Félix Gallardo between 1978 and 1980, controlled much of Mexico's drug trafficking corridors along the U.S. border throughout the 1980s. Following Gallardo's arrest in 1989, the cartel splintered, and the Sinaloa Cartel emerged. Throughout the 1990s and 2000s, under leaders like Guzmán, the cartel expanded significantly, engaging in violent conflicts with rivals such as the Tijuana Cartel, the Gulf Cartel, and the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG). The cartel diversified into cocaine, fentanyl, heroin, cannabis, and methamphetamine, developing sophisticated networks across the Americas, Europe, and Asia using underground tunnels, maritime shipments, and corrupt officials.

In Their Own Story

The war between the Sinaloa and Tijuana cartels was supposedly at its worst from 1992 to the year 2000. Family members of some of the cartel's leaders lived in fear or 'everyday like it was their last,' as stated by Zambada's wife at the time. On 8 November 1992, Héctor Luis Palma Salazar struck out against the Tijuana Cartel at a disco club in Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco, where eight Tijuana Cartel members were killed. Zambada used this conflict to his advantage, as the Mexican government began to crack down primarily on the Tijuana Cartel, allowing Sinaloa to step up in the trafficking world. By around the year 2000, Zambada became recognized as one of the biggest and most powerful drug lords in Mexico, having built strong distribution networks from Colombia to the United States. El Mayo was reportedly the one who sent a private helicopter for El Chapo after he escaped Puente Grande prison in 2001.

Reader's Guide

The Sinaloa Cartel is primarily involved in the distribution of cannabis (marijuana), cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, fentanyl, and MDMA. It has operations in many world regions but primarily in the Mexican states of Sinaloa, Baja California, Durango, Sonora, and Chihuahua, with presence in other regions in Latin America, as well as cities across the U.S. The cartel has been waging a war against the Tijuana Cartel over the Tijuana smuggling route to the border city of San Diego, California. The rivalry between the two cartels dates back to the Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo setup of Palma's family. Following the discovery of a tunnel system used to smuggle drugs across the Mexican/US border, the group has been associated with such means of trafficking. As of 2025, the cartel remains Mexico's most dominant drug cartel. After the arrest of Joaquín 'El Chapo' Guzmán and his son Ovidio Guzmán López in 2016 and 2023 respectively, the cartel was headed by Ismael 'El Mayo' Zambada, as well as Guzmán's other sons, until 2024 when both Zambada and Joaquín Guzmán López were arrested by U.S. authorities in El Paso, Texas.

Did You Know?

• Pedro Avilés Pérez is credited with pioneering the use of aircraft for drug smuggling, laying the groundwork for large-scale trafficking operations.
• The Sinaloa Cartel was partially splintered in 2008 when the Beltrán-Leyva brothers broke apart from the cartel.
• By the mid-1990s, according to one court opinion, the Sinaloa organization was believed to be the size of the Medellín Cartel during its prime.
• The United States Intelligence Community considers the cartel to be the largest and most powerful drug trafficking organization in the world, perhaps more influential than Pablo Escobar's Medellín Cartel.
• El Mayo Zambada's traditional major distribution hubs were allegedly in Chicago, Phoenix, Los Angeles, Atlanta, and Denver.