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Son of ‘El Mago,’ Sinaloa cartel legend killed in L.A., seeks new family legacy
Nov 27, 2024
Eduardo Escobedo Sr., a former drug trafficker for the Sinaloa cartel known as “El Mago,” was shot to death last Thanksgiving in Los Angeles.
His eldest son, Eddie Escobedo Jr., has since taken over a chain of hibachi restaurants that his father opened after serving time in prison and vowing to quit the narco life.
As the Sinaloa cartel splinters in Mexico, new details have surfaced about the elder Escobedo’s past, which included working with Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán and his son.
Before sheriff’s deputies found his body on Thanksgiving morning last year, shot to death in a desolate stretch of warehouses and pallet yards west of Compton, Eduardo Escobedo Sr. had become rich beyond his dreams.
The impoverished child of East Los Angeles had climbed the ranks of the Sinaloa cartel, the world’s largest drug trafficking empire, working with a son of the infamous Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán.
As the cartel’s main cannabis distributor in California, Escobedo earned the nickname “El Mago” — The Magician — for his ability to make bales of it vanish by the ton.
Indicted in 2014 and later sentenced to nearly five years in prison, Escobedo swore to his family he’d left his narco ties in the past. He opened a successful chain of food trucks and hibachi grill restaurants.
But the whispers still followed him: He must be laundering money through his businesses. Selling chopped steak and fried rice couldn’t sustain his lifestyle of Lamborghinis and Richard Mille watches.
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