Alleged Mexican kingpin 'El Mayo' pleads not guilty to US drug charges

By Jack Queen and Luc Cohen

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The accused Mexican kingpin Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada pleaded not guilty to drug trafficking charges on Friday in the same New York courthouse where fellow Sinaloa cartel co-founder Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman was convicted five years earlier.

Zambada entered the plea to the 17 felony counts he faces, which also include money laundering and weapons charges, at a hearing before U.S. Magistrate Judge James Cho in Brooklyn.

Cho ordered that Zambada, who is in his 70s, be jailed pending trial.

"The defendant has devoted his efforts over decades to growing, increasing, and enhancing the power of the Cartel — and his individual power and position in the Cartel after his partner El Chapo was captured," the U.S. Attorney's office in Brooklyn wrote in a Thursday court filing.

Zambada was taken into custody on July 25 at a New Mexico airfield, along with one of Guzman's sons, Joaquin Guzman Lopez, in a major coup for U.S. law enforcement.

He was then taken to El Paso, Texas, where he pleaded not guilty in federal court to separate drug trafficking charges.

U.S. District Judge Kathleen Cardone last week had him transferred to Brooklyn after the U.S. Department of Justice asked that he face trial there first.

The Brooklyn case began in 2009, and includes allegations related to the trafficking of fentanyl, a synthetic opioid fueling an epidemic in the United States.

"El Chapo" Guzman is serving a life sentence at a maximum security prison in Colorado. His son has pleaded not guilty to drug trafficking charges in Chicago.

Shootouts this week in the western Mexican state of Sinaloa kindled fears that an intra-cartel war is about to break out in the wake of Zambada's arrest.

(Writing by Luc Cohen; Editing by Daniel Wallis)