Oct. 29, 2026Updated Oct. 30, 2026, 6:23 a.m. MT
A new Netflix documentary series chronicles the fall of one of Mexico’s most powerful drug kingpins, Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada, whose run ended with his arrest on the tarmac of a small airport outside El Paso.
“The Fall of El Mayo” (“La Caida de El Mayo”) features interviews, archive footage and reconstructions to tell the tale of one of Mexico’s most elusive and longest-surviving drug lords, now serving a life sentence in a U.S. federal prison.
More: Sinaloa leader Ismael ‘El Mayo’ Zambada claims he was ‘ambushed,’ forced to come to US
Zambada, 76, was one of the founders of the Sinaloa drug cartel and worked closely with the Juárez drug cartel in the late 1980s.
The three-episode series premiered on Netflix on Thursday, Oct. 29 and was directed by Darren Foster and Miguel Fernandez Flores. The documentary includes El Paso Times photojournalist Omar Ornelas.
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“Our challenge was to tell the story of a man about whom there are practically no records. Before his downfall, there were only a few photos of El Mayo and not a single recording of his voice,” the directors stated in a Netflix news release.
The directors added, “El Mayo’s downfall has all the elements of a Shakespearean tragedy: an aging leader who managed to evade all his adversaries for half a century, only to fall — according to some accounts — at the hands of his closest ally’s son.”
Zambada claimed he was betrayed, ambushed and kidnapped at a meeting with Joaquin Guzman Lopez, the son of imprisoned drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, outside of Culiacán, Sinaloa.
The elderly drug lord and El Chapo’s son, along with a pilot, then flew nonstop in a small twin-engine airplane out of Mexico. U.S. federal agents arrested Zambada and Joaquin Guzman Lopez on the tarmac of Doña Ana County International Jetport in Santa Teresa, New Mexico, just west of El Paso, on July 25, 2024.
As part of a partnership with the FBI El Paso office, the airplane used in the capture of “El Mayo” is now on display at the War Eagles Air Museum, 8012 Airport Road in Santa Teresa.
Zambada was sentenced to life in prison after pleading guilty to racketeering conspiracy and criminal enterprise charges last July 20 in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn, New York.
El Mayo Zambada net worth
The secretive nature of the global drug trade makes financial estimates difficult to know, but Zambada’s net worth was put at $3 billion when Bloomberg named him on its billionaires list in 2018, the Los Angeles Times reported.
During sentencing, U.S. District Court Judge Brian M. Cogan also ordered Zambada to pay $15 billion in forfeiture for his role leading one of the world’s most powerful drug cartels.
More: Netflix’s ‘The Three Deaths of Marisela Escobedo’ tells story of slain Juárez activist mom
Following Zambada’s downfall, a vicious war between Los Mayitos and Los Chapitos factions of the Sinaloa drug cartel has wracked Culiacan and Sinaloa state.
“No one wins in a war like this. To the next generation, I say, choose a different path,” Zambada said during his sentencing hearing, Reuters reported.
Daniel Borunda may be reached at dborunda@elpasotimes.com and @BorundaDaniel on X.