'El Chapo' prison guard killed; Mexico deploys 300 troops to guard prison

MEXICO CITY, June 15 (UPI) -- A Mexican soldier who guarded drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman was recently found dead showing signs he was tortured in the Ciudad Juarez border town.

Mexico's Secretariat of National Defense announced that the body of 20-year-old Jorge Mauricio Melendez Herrera was found on Friday. A forensic expert determined he was killed from a blow to the back of the neck, but was also stabbed multiple times.

Melendez Herrera was part of a team that guarded the outside of a Ciudad Juarez prison where Guzman is currently held as he appeals a U.S. extradition.

The Mexican government deployed 300 additional soldiers to increase security at the prison. The drug lord twice escaped from Mexican maximum security prisons. At least 11 Mexican security prison guards and officials are facing charges related to Guzman's escape.

Guzman's Sinaloa Cartel is credited with dominating the illegal drug market in nearly the entire United States. "El Chapo" -- meaning "The Short One" or "shorty" -- so dubbed because of his 5-foot-6-inch frame, was detained in Guatemala in 1993 and then extradited to Mexico to face murder and drug trafficking charges.

He escaped from prison in 2001 by hiding in a laundry cart after bribing prison guards, and was re-captured in February 2014. He was captured in the city of Los Mochis in his home state of Sinaloa on Jan. 8 after escaping from Mexico's Altiplano Federal Prison on July 11.