Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada

Before he assumed leadership of the entire cartel, he allegedly served as the logistical coordinator for its Zambada García faction, which has overseen the trafficking of cocaine and heroin into Chicago and other US cities by aircraft, narcosubs, container ships, go-fast boats, fishing vessels, buses, rail cars, tractor trailers, and automobiles.

[6][7] Zambada has historically worked closely with the Juárez Cartel and the Carrillo Fuentes family, while maintaining independent ties to Colombian cocaine suppliers.

[8] In 1989, when Mexican drug lord Miguel Ángel Félix Gallardo was arrested, his organization split into two opposing factions: the Tijuana Cartel whose leadership was inherited by his nephews and heirs, the Arellano Félix brothers and the Sinaloa Cartel whose leadership fell to former lieutenants Héctor Luis Palma Salazar, Adrián Gómez González, Ismael Zambada García, Ignacio Coronel Villarreal, and Joaquín Guzmán Loera (El Chapo).

Taking advantage of the pressure being placed on the Tijuana Cartel, other drug bosses, most notably Ismael Zambada and Joaquín Guzmán, began to encroach on strongholds in northwestern Mexico, leading to full-scale war.

[14] Zambada has been operating primarily in the states of Sinaloa and Durango, with influence along a large portion of Mexico's Pacific coast, as well as in Cancún, Quintana Roo, Sonora, and Nuevo León.

[28] On 18 June 2014, his son-in-law, Juan Gabriel González Ibarra, husband of Midiam Patricia, died after suffering an electric shock at his home in Culiacán.