Emma Coronel Aispuro, El Chapo’s Wife

In a televised interview with Telemundo, Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzman’s wife Emma Coronel Aispuro said her husband is a regular guy whose notoriety is a product of an unfair media.

“They don’t want to bring him down from the pedestal to make him more like he is, a normal, ordinary person,” she said in an interview with the Spanish language media company.

The 28-year-old American-born former teen beauty pageant winner married the accused mass murder and drug lord when she was just 18 and he was 53.

With her husband on trial in New York for his drug trafficking, Coronel Aispuro has been a fixture in court.

Here’s what you need to know about Emma Coronel Aispuro:

1. Born in California, Coronel Aispuro is the Niece of El Chapo’s Former Partner Ignacio ‘Nacho’ Coronel Vilarreal Captain & Confidante

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Verso Books@VersoBooks

Anabel Hernandez speaks to Emma Coronel Aispuro, wife of drug lord “El Chapo” http://www.latimes.com/world/mexico-americas/la-fg-el-chapo-wife-20160221-story.html …

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9:52 AM – Feb 23, 2016

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It’s said that Coronel Aispuro didn’t marry into the Sinaloa Cartel but was born into it.

Born in northern California in 1989, her father Inés Coronel Barreras, was a cattle rancher and Guzmán deputy. The U.S. Department of the Treasury sanctioned Coronel Barreras under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin designation. His daughter would grow up in a campo in Durango, Mexico.

Her uncle is Ignacio Coronel Villareal, aka Nacho Coronel. The U.S. government said he was the third in command of the Sinaloa Cartel. Coronel Villareal was killed in 2010 by the Mexican Army during a raid near Guadalajara, Mexico.

Her mother was an American citizen and Coronel Aispuro has both US and Mexican passports.

2. El Chapo Helped to Fix a Beauty Pageant so She’d Win & She Did: The 2007 Miss Coffee and Guava. Days Later, the 18-Year-Old Married the 53-Year-old Drug Kingpin

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Campechealdia@nicoguzmn

Emma Coronel Aispuro, cuando fue enamorada por Joaquín el “Chapo” Guzmán durante un concurso de belleza.

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2:30 PM – Dec 4, 2015

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The story goes that Guzman helped solicit support for the teen to be crowned in the beauty pageant. Coronel entered the 2007 Coffee and Guava Festival beauty pageant in Canelas, Durango and like every other contestant, she had to host a party to encourage support for her being crowned.

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El Blog del Narco@NarcoBlogger

Y que se nos casa el Chapo Guzmán asi fue la historia de la boda con Emma Coronel Aispuro, la reina, su reina: Aquí, en pleno corazón del Triángulo Dorado del narcotráfico -como se conoce a la zona donde confluyen los estados de Sinaloa, Chihua-hua y Durango-, Joaquín El Chapo…

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11:27 PM – Dec 17, 2017

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The day of the party, “hundreds of black-clad gunmen on motorcycles flooded the town” and Guzman arrived with a separate entourage of gunmen to urge that she should be named the winner, but also to announce he’d be marrying her.

Not surprisingly she won the contest. And they were married on her 18th birthday.

3. The Couple Have Twin Daughters Who Were Born in the U.S. Guzman is Not Named on Their Birth Certifcates

In 2011, Coronel Aispuro flew from Mexico to Lancaster, California in order for her daughters to be born in the United States. The girls, Emaly Guadalupe Guzmán Coronel, and Maria Joaquina Guzmán Coronel were born in September of 2011, in Antelope Valley Hospital. It’s reported federal law enforcement kept tabs on Coronel Aispuro but she was not arrested.

The youngest daughters of El Chapo are American citizens but their mother did not register Guzmán as their father on their birth certificates.

4. Coronel Aispuro Was Widely Criticized For the Lavish Barbie-Themed Birthday She Threw For Her Daughters

The price tag was never made public, but one can only imagine the cost of the elaborate and far-over-the-top Barbie-themed party for her daughters’ 7th birthday.

“Cumpleaños de mis princesas👩‍👧‍👧❤️”

As can be seen in the video, the event featured a Barbie palace, with a chandelier-lit ballroom, a massive Barbie Dreamhouse, pink Barbie-themed cakes and all-Barbie goody bags for guests. Towering arches made from pink balloons, a Barbie throne, a Barbie boutique, carnival rides, games, a photo booth, and life-size Barbie cardboard cutouts adorned the extravaganza.

5. Coronel Aispuro, Often Seen With Her Daughters, Has Been a Fixture at Her Husband’s Trial in Federal Court in Brooklyn

The wife of ‘El Chapo’, Emma Coronel Aispuro, arrives with her twin daughters at the US Federal Courthouse in Brooklyn before a hearing in the case of Mexican drug lord Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzman, on June 26, 2018, in New York.

Guzman is on trial in New York for running a sweeping drug-trafficking empire. The 61-year-old is not permitted contact with Coronel Aispuro or his daughters though prosecutors have claimed that they have been in contact via smuggled cell phones. Regardless, she’s been in court since his trial began in November. In her interview with Telemundo, she says, “I believe this is what any wife would do …be with her husband in hard times … so that he feels and sees me present and feels my support.”

“[I want] to be calm, to be somewhere in the world where we can be at ease …I don’t dream of big things …tranquility, happiness, nothing out of the ordinary.”

She continues, “I’m content with the life that I have, the life that I was given, and the husband that I have, of the daughters that I have, of the family that I have. I am very satisfied.”