Send this page to someone via email In the world of corrections, there are inmates who pose security risks, and then there’s “El Chapo.” Drug lord Joaquin Guzman has an unparalleled record of jailbreaks, having escaped two high-security Mexican prisons before his ultimate capture and extradition to the United States. So with Guzman convicted Tuesday of drug trafficking and staring at an expected life sentence, where will the U.S. imprison a larger-than-life kingpin with a Houdini-like tendency to slip away? Experts say Guzman seems the ideal candidate for the federal government’s “Supermax” prison in Florence, Colorado, also known as ADX for “administrative maximum.” The facility is so secure, so remote and so austere that it has been called the “Alcatraz of the Rockies.” Story continues below advertisement “El Chapo fits the bill perfectly,” said Cameron Lindsay, a retired warden who ran three federal lockups, including the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn. “I’d be absolutely shocked if he’s not sent to the ADX.” WATCH: Mexican drug lord El Chapo found guilty on all counts 1:48 Mexican drug lord El Chapo found guilty on all counts Mexican drug lord El Chapo found guilty on all counts – Feb 12, 2019 Located outside an old mining town about two hours south of Denver, Supermax’s hardened buildings house the nation’s most violent offenders, with many of its 400 inmates held alone for 23 hours a day in 7-by-12-foot (2.1-by-3.7 metre) cells with fixed furnishings made of reinforced concrete. Story continues below advertisement Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, Sept. 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui and Oklahoma City bombing accomplice Terry Nichols are among those who call it home. But Guzman, set to be sentenced in June for smuggling enormous amounts of narcotics into the U.S and having a hand in dozens of murders, would stand out even from Supermax’s infamous roster because of his almost mythical reputation for breaking out. View image in full screen Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman arrives at Long Island MacArthur Airport in Ronkonkoma, N.Y., after being extradited to the United States to face drug trafficking charges. That includes a sensational 2015 escape from the maximum-security Altiplano prison in central Mexico, where he communicated with accomplices for weeks via cellphone, slipped into an escape hatch beneath his shower, hopped on the back of a waiting motorcycle and sped through a mile-long, hand-dug tunnel to freedom. Bribery is widely believed to have enabled that jailbreak, as well as a 2001 escape in which Guzman was smuggled out of another top-security Mexican prison in a laundry basket. Story continues below advertisement WATCH: El Chapo’s wife leaves court after guilty verdict 1:19 El Chapo’s wife leaves court after guilty verdict El Chapo’s wife leaves court after guilty verdict – Feb 12, 2019 “There had to be collusion from within,” said Mike Vigil, a former U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent who worked undercover in Mexico. “There is no doubt corruption played a role in both of his spectacular escapes.” Could that happen at Supermax? Not likely. Prisoners at Supermax spend years in solitary confinement and often go days “with only a few words spoken to them,” an Amnesty International report found. One former prisoner, in an interview with The Boston Globe, described the lockup as a “high-tech version of hell, designed to shut down all sensory perception.” Story continues below advertisement Most inmates at Supermax are given a television, but their only actual view of the outside world is a 4-inch window. The window’s design prevents them from even determining where they are housed in the facility. Human interaction is minimal. Prisoners eat all meals in the solitude of their own cells, within feet of their toilets. The facility itself is guarded by razor-wire fences, gun towers, heavily armed patrols and attack dogs. “If ever there were an escape-proof prison, it’s the facility at Florence,” said Burl Cain, the former longtime warden of the maximum-security Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola. “It’s the prison of all prisons.” WATCH: Agent who helped take ‘El Chapo’ down speaks about hunt to recapture cartel boss after 2014 escape 1:27 Agent who helped take ‘El Chapo’ down speaks about hunt to recapture cartel boss after 2014 escape Agent who helped take ‘El Chapo’ down speaks about hunt to recapture cartel boss after 2014 escape – Feb 13, 2019 While federal authorities have not said for certain where El Chapo will be housed, he’s staring at “a sentence from which there is no escape and no return,” U.S. Attorney Richard Donoghue said after Tuesday’s verdict. Story continues below advertisement Guzman’s confinement leading up to his three-month trial included remarkable security measures reflecting his immense flight risk. He has been housed in solitary confinement in a high-security wing of the Metropolitan Correctional Center, a Manhattan lockup known as “Little Gitmo” that has held notorious terrorists and mobsters. Authorities have routinely shut down the Brooklyn Bridge to shuttle “El Chapo” to federal court in a police motorcade that includes a SWAT team and ambulance tracked by helicopters. Heavily armed federal officers and bomb-sniffing dogs have patrolled outside the federal courthouse in Brooklyn. Officials were so concerned about security, in fact, that Guzman was forbidden from hugging his wife at his trial. WATCH: Trump praises ‘El Chapo’ conviction as a ‘fantastic job’ by law enforcement, prosecutors 1:14 Trump praises ‘El Chapo’ conviction as a ‘fantastic job’ by law enforcement, prosecutors Trump praises ‘El Chapo’ conviction as a ‘fantastic job’ by law enforcement, prosecutors – Feb 13, 2019 That apparently won’t be a problem if he winds up in Supermax, where all visits are non-contact, and prisoners are separated from their visitors by a thick plexiglass screen. Story continues below advertisement “Other than when being placed in restraints and escorted by guards, prisoners may spend years without touching another human being,” the Amnesty International report found. WATCH: How Mexican drug lord El Chapo escaped a maximum security prison<doc-sep>What will happen to El Chapo? Mr. Guzmán will likely spend the rest of his life in prison. We won’t know exactly where until he is sentenced on June 25. During that time, Mr. Guzmán is likely to be held at Metropolitan Correctional Center, a jail that has been called tougher than Guantánamo Bay. Where will El Chapo most likely go to jail? We won’t know until sentencing, but it’s probable that Mr. Guzmán will be sent to the United States Penitentiary Administrative Maximum Facility in Florence, Colo., more commonly known as the ADX. From a New York Times Magazine story from 2015 about the ADX: The ADX can house up to 500 prisoners in its eight units. Inmates spend their days in 12-by-7-foot cells with thick concrete walls and double sets of sliding metal doors (with solid exteriors, so prisoners can’t see one another). A single window, about three feet high but only four inches wide, offers a notched glimpse of sky and little else. Each cell has a sink-toilet combo and an automated shower, and prisoners sleep on concrete slabs topped with thin mattresses. Most cells also have televisions (with built-in radios), and inmates have access to books and periodicals, as well as certain arts-and-craft materials. Why did it take so long? Six days of deliberations is not a long time. But as a result of the extensive amount of evidence, many people thought a conviction would happen sooner. But it was a complicated case. Almost 11 weeks of testimony by 56 witnesses for the prosecution produced an exhaustive amount of evidence for jurors to process. Also, the charges were complicated. For the first count, engaging in a continuing criminal enterprise, jurors had to determine 27 different violations within that count. For example: “Violation One (International Distribution of Cocaine — 3,200 kilograms — January 2005).” As mentioned earlier, jurors had to work through an eight-page verdict sheet with 53 boxes. Requests by jurors to see complete transcripts for several witnesses — including major figures like Jorge and Alex Cifuentes-Villa, Vicente Zambada, Jesus Zambada García and Dámaso López Núñez — indicated they were being thorough in filling out that sheet.<doc-sep>Mexican cartel chief Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman was sentenced to life in prison on Wednesday. Guzman was whisked off within hours of sentencing, and authorities would only tell his lawyer that the convicted kingpin was headed to the supermax facility in Colorado — ADX Florence. Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories. Mexican cartel chief Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman was sentenced to life in prison on Wednesday, five months after he was found guilty in a US court of running a criminal enterprise that smuggled drugs into the US. On Thursday, Jeffrey Lichtman, one of Guzman's lawyers, said his client was whisked away by helicopter a few hours after sentencing in New York City and that authorities would tell him only Guzman was headed to the supermax facility in Florence, Colorado. The US Penitentiary, Administrative Maximum Facility in Florence, Colorado, known as ADX Florence, opened in 1994 to house the most dangerous inmates in the US prison system. Since then, no one has escaped. Read more: The rise and fall of Joaquín 'El Chapo' Guzmán, the world's most ambitious drug lord "ADX is the kind of prison that was designed for a high-profile inmate like El Chapo," Larry Levine, a former federal inmate who is the director and founder of Wall Street Prison Consultants, told Reuters in February. Guzman, 61, led the Sinaloa cartel for decades and escaped from maximum-security prisons in Mexico twice before his most recent capture in 2016. US authorities have said little about where Guzman would be imprisoned, but it was widely expected after his extradition to the US in January 2017 that, if convicted, he would be sent to ADX Florence. "For someone like Guzman, the chances of escape from a facility like that are nil," L. Thomas Kucharski, a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York, told Reuters in February. Prison officials and prosecutors wouldn't discuss Guzman's whereabouts on Thursday. Take a look inside the 'Alcatraz of the Rockies':<doc-sep>
Detaining Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman for the rest of his life won't be easy. He escaped from two high-security Mexican prisons. That's why experts said the kingpin, who was convicted Tuesday of drug trafficking, is probably headed to the federal government's "Supermax" prison in Florence, Colorado. The facility is known as ADX for "administrative maximum" – a prison so remote and protected that it has earned the nickname the "Alcatraz of the Rockies." “El Chapo fits the bill perfectly,” Cameron Lindsay, who served as a warden in three federal lockups, including the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, told the Associated Press. “I’d be absolutely shocked if he’s not sent to the ADX.” El Chapo's fellow inmates at ADX would include Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, Sept. 11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui and Oklahoma City bombing accomplice Terry Nichols. More:Now that he's been convicted of all counts, what's next for El Chapo? Although federal authorities have not publicly said where El Chapo will be sent, U.S. Attorney Richard Donoghue said Thursday Guzman faces "a sentence from which there is no escape and no return." El Chapo's escapes Guzman escaped for the first time in 2001, when he was smuggled out of a top-security Mexican prison in a laundry basket. His most famous escape came in 2015, when he broke out of the maximum-security Altiplano prison in central Mexico. After working with accomplices for weeks, he slipped into a hatch beneath his shower and drove a waiting motorcycle through a mile-long tunnel dug underground. Start the day smarter:Get USA TODAY's Daily Briefing in your inbox 'High-tech version of hell' Even considering El Chapo's history and his vast network of accomplices, escaping from Supermax is almost impossible. The notorious prison, in an old mining town two hours south of Denver, is surrounded by razor-wired fences, gun towers, armed patrols and attack dogs. In an interview with The Boston Globe, a former prisoner called Supermax a “high-tech version of hell, designed to shut down all sensory perception.” Prisoners often spend years in solitary confinement and can go days without words spoken to them, according to an Amnesty International report. Although they have access to a television, their only look into the world outside is through one 4-inch window in their 7-by-12-foot cells. The window's design prevents prisoners from even seeing where in the facility they might be housed. More:Ted Cruz says billions in assets tied to 'El Chapo' should fund the border wall All meals are eaten in the solitude of a prisoner's cell, and the cells contain toilets. The prison holds approximately 400 inmates, and many are confined to solitude for 23 hours a day. “If ever there were an escape-proof prison, it’s the facility at Florence,” Burl Cain, the former warden of the maximum-security Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola, told the AP. “It’s the prison of all prisons.” Prisoners at Supermax can't touch any visitors and are separated by a thick plexiglass screen. “Other than when being placed in restraints and escorted by guards, prisoners may spend years without touching another human being,” the Amnesty International report said. Contributing: Associated Press