Following a grueling three-month trial, the Mexican crime lord, Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera, was convicted on 10 straight guilty verdicts on drug and conspiracy charges last Tuesday. The 61-year-old is famous for leading Mexico’s Sinaloa drug cartel, the world’s largest drug trafficking organization.

The cartel was responsible for shipping thousands of tons of drugs into the United States, with Guzmán smuggling at least 200 tons of cocaine into the country himself, according to prosecutors. After deliberating over the massive amounts of evidence against the crime lord, the jury’s decision came in a little over a week. Guzmán’s notorious history of smuggling and violence were a main focus, as tales of murders and escapes surfaced during the trial.

The three-month trial included testimony from 56 witnesses, 14 of whom once worked with Guzmán. The high-profile case garnered international attention, and was lauded by the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, Richard P. Donoghue, as a victory for Mexican law enforcement and families, where over 100,000 people have died from drug addiction and related violence, while several thousands grieve for relatives lost to the “black hole of addiction.”

As Guzmán was escorted out of the courtroom, he exchanged glances and flashed a thumbs-up to his wife, Emma Coronel Aispuro, shaking the hands of his defense attorneys on his way out. In a personal news conference, Guzmán’s lawyers promised an appeal, focusing on the prosecution’s attempts to restrict their questioning of witnesses and the extradition process of the crime lord to Brooklyn.

A. Eduardo Balarezo, one of Guzmán’s attorneys, spoke of the nature of trial following the announcement of the verdict. “When he came here, he was already presumed guilty by everyone, unfortunately. We weren’t just fighting evidence, we were fighting perception.”

As prosecutors heard of the bloody history of the Sinaloa drug cartel, tight security accompanied mass media coverage, with cartoonists being required to make witnesses undistinguishable, bomb-sniffing dogs and police snipers on patrol, and marshals with radiation sensors securing the premises.

Guzmán faces life in prison at his sentencing hearing, which is currently scheduled for June 25. Currently, the kingpin is expected to be sent to the United States Penitentiary Florence, a SuperMax prison in Colorado.