The wife of jailed drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, 35, is set to model at Milan Fashion Week in Italy on Sunday, a year after her release from a Los Angeles prison.
Emma Coronel Aispuro will strut down the catwalk as the main model for international designer April Black Diamond, whose show will take place in the elegant Palazzo Serbelloni, where Napoleon Bonaparte stayed for several months in 1796.
California-born Coronel was a beauty queen when she met Guzman, who is 32 years her senior. The couple married in 2007 when Coronel was 18 and had twin daughters in Los Angeles in 2011.
After the former leader of the Sinaloa Cartel was sentenced to life plus 30 years in prison in New York on July 17, 2019, Coronel himself was convicted in the United States. He was sentenced to three years in prison.
The woman, a dual U.S.-Mexican citizen, pleaded guilty to three counts of aiding her husband’s drug cartel – conspiracy to launder money, distribute illegal drugs and participating in financial transactions – and admitted to acting as a courier between Guzman, who was arrested in 2014 and incarcerated in Mexico’s Altiplano prison, and other cartel members.
The sentencing judge said Coronel promptly admitted responsibility and agreed to forfeit approximately $1.5 million in criminal proceeds to the U.S. government, after which his sentence was reduced by three years.
She served two and a half years of her sentence and was released from a low-security facility in Los Angeles on September 13, 2023.
Since then, she has reportedly focused on modelling and even appeared in a music video last year for “La Señora,” a corrido by Mariel Colón Miró inspired by Coronel’s life.
Not only are Colon and Coronel close friends, Colon was one of the lawyers. She defended Mr Guzman when he was indicted in New York and is due to appear on the catwalk in Milan.
Coronel’s Milan show, which surprised thousands of his social media followers, was announced last weekend. April Black Diamond’s Instagram postHe is often categorized as a designer whose clothes are bold, edgy, provocative and elegant at the same time.
“Emma has been chosen to not only entertain us, but to open and close the highly anticipated (show),” the designer wrote, posting a photo of Coronel in a wedding dress.
“Everyone deserves a second chance,” she wrote. Additional Posts Let me explain why I chose Coronel.
“That’s why I made the bold decision to hire as my main model an extraordinary woman who, despite a controversial past, has chosen to rewrite her future,” she wrote. “Not only does she model our dresses, she is an example of strength, courage and hope. Her journey from a difficult past to a bright future embodies the message I want to convey with this collection: it’s never too late to change your life and every woman, no matter where she comes from, deserves the chance to walk out with pride and confidence.”
Coronel has reportedly not seen her husband for five years because her sentence only allows her access to her lawyer.
But as she recently told Univision’s “Despierta América,” she still loves “El Chapo.” When asked about it, Coronel said, “Of course, of course, the love will always be there.”
Milan Fashion Week, one of the fashion industry’s flagship events, ends on Monday, followed immediately by Paris Fashion Week, which runs until October 1st.
Reportedly Infobae and El Financiero
