Mexican officials confirmed on Thursday that they had issued an arrest warrant for the prominent boxer Julio César Chávez Jr. on charges of involvement in organized crime and arms trafficking, a day after he was detained by U.S. immigration authorities in California.
Mr. Chávez had been detained by federal U.S. agents in Studio City, Calif., the Department of Homeland Security said on Thursday, citing the arrest warrant in Mexico and saying that Mr. Chávez was in the United States illegally.
A spokesman for Mexico’s Attorney General’s Office said that the U.S. authorities had informed Mexican officials about the detention, and said “they have started the corresponding procedure for his extradition to Mexico.” The warrant for him was issued in March 2023, the spokesman said.
A lawyer representing Mr. Chávez, Michael A. Goldstein, told The New York Times his client was picked up by a group of 25 or more immigration and law enforcement agents outside of his home.
“The current allegations are outrageous and appear to be designed as a headline to terrorize the community,” Mr. Goldstein said, adding that Mr. Chávez was not a threat to the community and was in full compliance with his court obligations. “He has not been convicted of any gun charges and we fully expect his only pending case to be dismissed.”
A former World Boxing Council middleweight champion, Mr. Chávez, 39, was detained just days after he lost a high-profile boxing match in Anaheim, Calif., against the former YouTuber Jake Paul. He is also the son of a Mexican boxing legend, Julio César Chávez Sr., who appeared with Mexico’s president twice in recent months, at a news conference and a government event in Mexico City that drew tens of thousands of people.
The Department of Homeland Security said in its statement that Mr. Chávez was “also believed to be an affiliate of the Sinaloa Cartel,” referring to the powerful crime syndicate that the U.S. and Mexican authorities have targeted in an aggressive crackdown.
The U.S. authorities said that Mr. Chávez had entered the United States legally in 2023 with a B2 tourist visa, but that it had expired in 2024. He then filed for lawful permanent resident status based on his marriage to a U.S. citizen, who U.S. officials said was “connected to the Sinaloa Cartel through a prior relationship” with a son of the cartel leader Joaquín Guzmán Loera, known as El Chapo.
“Following multiple fraudulent statements on his application to become a lawful permanent resident, he was determined to be in the country illegally and removable on June 27, 2025,” the department said.
Mr. Chávez’s wife, Frida Muñoz, was El Chapo’s daughter-in-law through her previous marriage to Edgar Guzmán López, who was killed in a 2008 gun battle in Sinaloa State.
After El Chapo escaped prison through a tunnel in 2015, the Mexican authorities froze bank accounts belonging to Ms. Muñoz in 2015, arguing that the accounts could help operations of the Sinaloa Cartel, according to Mexican news outlets. The authorities unblocked the accounts again in 2018, after the drug lord was recaptured and extradited to the United States, where he is now serving a life sentence.
Ms. Muñoz has since become an internet personality in her own right, with more than 80,000 followers on Instagram.
Through live broadcasts on Instagram, Mr. Chávez has also described relationships with at least one other member of El Chapo’s family. “I get along with Ovidio, to tell you the truth,” he said in 2022, referring to Ovidio Guzmán López, one of the drug lord’s sons, who is now in U.S. custody facing federal drug charges. “I’m very fond of him, and I don’t want to know about the things they say about him, that doesn’t interest me,” Mr. Chávez said at the time.
The Department of Homeland Security added that Mr. Chávez had been convicted in California in 2012 on charges of driving under the influence of alcohol, and convicted in 2024 on weapons charges. It also said that a U.S. judge had issued an arrest warrant for him on a charge of “organized crime for the purpose of committing crimes of weapons trafficking and manufacturing crimes.”
Emiliano Rodríguez Mega is a reporter and researcher for The Times based in Mexico City, covering Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean.
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