Drug lord Guzman's sons deny Twitter activity

Two sons of imprisoned drug kingpin Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman said today that Twitter accounts bearing their names and messages about their father are fake.

There are several accounts on the social media website with the names of Jesus Alfredo and Archivaldo Ivan Guzman, though two are often attributed to them by some local media: @lvanArchivaIdo and @_AlfredoGuzman_.

But their father's lawyer delivered a letter to the Televisa network in which the brothers deny using Twitter.

"We don't use and we have never used social media. The Twitter accounts in our name are completely FAKE," says the letter, dated October 2 and issued by the brothers mainly to deny that they ordered a deadly ambush on a military convoy last month.
 

The Guzman siblings urged the media and the followers of the accounts to "not fall for the game of whoever is" managing the account.

"To believe that these accounts would be ours would be mocking the Mexican and foreign intelligence institutions since electronic media are easily traceable," they wrote.

The account of @lvanArchivaIdo has more than 334,000 followers while @_AlfredoGuzman_ has some 319,000.

Those accounts gained more notoriety after Joaquin Guzman escaped from prison on July 11, 2015, through a 1.5-kilometer (one-mile) tunnel that opened into his cell's shower.

On May 8, 2015, @lvanArchivaIdo had tweeted: "I promise that the general will be back soon." The same account tweeted on July 6, 2015, five days before the prison break: "Everything comes to those who know how to wait."

Five days after the escape, the Tweeter user said: "While the government is going after the cow, my dad is already coming back with the cheese."

A day after the escape, @_AlfredoGuzman_ boasted in a tweet that was taken down after some websites published it: "My dad just has to feel like it and he escapes from prison."

The US Treasury Department has imposed sanctions of Guzman's sons as suspected members of their father's Sinaloa drug cartel.

In August, Jesus Alfredo was kidnapped by a rival cartel along with five other men in the Pacific resort of Puerto Vallarta, only to be released days later.

Separately, a general accused Guzman's sons of being behind the September 30 attack that left five soldiers dead in Culiacan, the capital of Sinaloa state.