APNewsBreak: Daughter of Mexican Drug Lord Held

By ELLIOT SPAGAT Associated Press
SAN DIEGO October 16, 2012 (AP)

The daughter of one of the world's most sought-after drug lords has been arrested on suspicion of trying to enter the United States on someone else's passport, U.S. officials said Monday.

Alejandrina Gisselle Guzman Salazar was arrested Friday at San Diego's San Ysidro port of entry and charged with fraud and misuse of visas, permits and other documents.

Two U.S. officials said Monday that she told authorities her father was Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, leader of Mexico's Sinaloa cartel. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the arrest publicly.

A woman under that name has been charged in federal court in San Diego. Kelly Thornton, a spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney's office, said she could not confirm that the woman charged was Guzman's daughter.

The complaint said Guzman Salazar attempted to enter the country on foot, presenting a non-immigrant visa contained in a Mexican passport.

The arrest and investigation were being led by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which oversees the nation's largest border crossing in San Diego.

The Sinaloa cartel, named after the Pacific coast state of the same name, controls trafficking on the border with California and has in recent years successfully battled rivals to expand east and west along the 2,000-mile-long U.S.-Mexico border.

The Los Angeles Times reported last year that Guzman's wife — former beauty queen Emma Coronel — traveled to Southern California and gave birth to twin girls at Antelope Valley Hospital in Lancaster, north of Los Angeles. The newspaper said Coronel, then 22, holds U.S. citizenship, which entitles her to travel freely to the U.S. and to use its hospitals.

APNewsBreak: Daughter of Mexican Drug Lord Held - ABC News