By
The Associated Press
MEXICO CITY - The tale of how one of Mexico's top suspected drug bosses slipped out of a maximum-security prison has yet to be told in its entirety, but already it has all the makings of a Hollywood blockbuster.
Officials, describing the intricate plot for the first time late Monday night, said Joaquin Guzman spent months corrupting prison guards, then persuaded them to help him sneak out a stash of gold - only to smuggle himself out instead.
So far, authorities have implicated 78 people in the Jan. 19 escape, with at least 59 of them in custody, including the director of the Puente Grande prison in western Jalisco state. Prosecutors said others could still be implicated. Guzman remains at large.
Investigators have been able to reconstruct the 43-year-old Guzman's escape route, attorney general inspector Carlos Javier Vega said Monday evening. He illustrated it with computer-animated videos that looked like a new level of the game Doom.
"Everything points toward the escape being the product of a perfectly planned operation," Vega said.
Such planning allegedly is nothing new for Guzman: He is wanted in the United States on charges that he supervised the building of a tunnel 1,416 feet long and 65 feet deep beneath the border to smuggle drugs into the United States.
At Puente Grande, Guzman was serving more than 20 years for criminal association and bribery, and was linked to a 1993 shootout in which a Roman Catholic cardinal was killed in the crossfire.
Guzman, along with two other alleged drug lords, "practically became the owners" of the prison, Vega said. He said the men put guards on their payroll, smuggling in alcohol, drugs, prostitutes - "and even Viagra."
Guzman, he said, would order his food from a menu, which the prison's head cook would then prepare for him.
"A group known as 'the batters' has been identified, whose mission was to beat with bats any security officers or guards who didn't obey the decisions" of the three men, he said.
The only thing Guzman couldn't buy, Vega said, was his freedom.
And so he began to plot. Investigators say he enlisted the help of a maintenance worker, Francisco Javier Camberos, 35, who had complete access to the entire prison. Guzman buttered up the guards by circulating rumors that he was about to be freed and offering them high-paid jobs in a security firm he said he would form.
On Jan. 13, Vega said, Guzman set his plot in motion. He summoned two high-level guards and asked for help in smuggling out a couple pounds of gold he said had been collected in the prison. Camberos, he said, would carry out the gold, and they would get a cut.
Three days later, Guzman discussed with prison supervisors who would be on duty Jan. 19, and made staffing changes he said were necessary to get the gold out without being detected, Vega said.
But the plot was nearly foiled the afternoon of Jan. 19, Vega said. After an inspection, federal officials ordered additional security measures, including moving Guzman to a higher-security area. The prison director ignored their orders, Vega said.
That night, Guzman slipped under a sheet into a cushioned laundry cart, and Camberos wheeled it down the prison corridors. Several doors had been propped open with garbage cans, and footage from the security cameras was missing.
When they reached the parking lot, Vega said, Camberos told the guard: "It's the master's gold," and slipped Guzman into his car. The guards let Camberos drive out without checking his vehicle, Vega said, under orders from the area commanders. The computer disk keeping record of vehicles coming in and out was later found to have been erased.
When guards showed up late that night to move Guzman to another area of the prison, he was missing. The prison director ordered a search, but the prisoner was nowhere to be found.
A month later, Guzman remains missing. Judges have ordered 78 people held while the investigation continues, although 19 of them have been released. Vega conceded that "some" of those ordered held have yet to be detained.
"All lines of investigation will continue until their final consequences," Vega said.
Mexico's new president, Vicente Fox, has pledged "a war without mercy" on drug smugglers. He has said he will root out corruption throughout the judicial and prison system, although he said it "may be a bitter fight because of the perverse influence of dirty money."
Jorge Campos Murillo, a deputy attorney general, conceded that the escape revealed fundamental problems with Mexico's prisons, saying, "I think it's necessary to reflect on the penitentiary system."
With the low salaries they receive, Mexican prison workers are easily susceptible to bribes, he said.
And he added that Mexico's prison system is "one of the most humanitarian" in the world.
