Sean Penn's lawyers have warned Netflix against releasing a documentary about Mexican druglord El Chapo, which suggests the Hollywood star helped the US Department of Justice (DoJ) capture the drug kingpin.
The series "The Day I Met El Chapo: The Kate del Castillo Story" details the episode when del Castillo, a Mexican actress, and Penn secretly met one of the world's most wanted men in October 2015.
Penn wrote an article about the meeting for Rolling Stone that was published just a day after Joaquin Guzman Loera, also known as El Chapo, was captured.
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"It is reprehensible that, in their ongoing, relentless efforts to gain additional attention and publicity, Ms del Castillo and her team (who have zero firsthand knowledge) have sought to create this profoundly false, foolish, and reckless narrative," Mark Fabiani, a spokesman for Penn, said.
"The notion that Mr Penn or anyone on his behalf alerted D.O.J. to the trip is a complete fabrication and baldfaced lie. It never happened, nor would there have been any reason for it to have happened."
David Broome, who produced the series, said, "We never say in this documentary that Sean Penn is in cahoots with the D.O.J."
In a statement, Netflix said: "Penn was given the opportunity on multiple occasions to participate in 'The Day I Met El Chapo' and did not do so. The events surrounding the now-infamous meeting have been well covered, including by Penn himself in Rolling Stone and his many public comments since. The only new ground we're breaking with this series is to give Kate a chance to finally tell her side of this stranger-than- fiction story.
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