Emma Coronel, wife of 'El Chapo' Guzmán, sentenced to three years in prison

A U.S. federal judge sentenced Emma Coronel, the wife of jailed Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, to three years in prison Tuesday on charges of drug trafficking and money laundering with the Sinaloa Cartel.

Coronel, who was arrested in February at Dulles Airport near Washington, DC.,

admitted to conspiracy to distribute thousands of kilos of heroin, coke, meth and marijuana while working for Guzman and the Sinaloa Cartel in Mexico. Coronel also pleaded guilty to money laundering, the New York Post reported.

Judge Rudolph Contreras of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia did not sentence Coronel to the four years requested by prosecutors, noting that she was a teenager when she married Guzman and admitted her guilt upon capture.

Coronel's attorney, Jeffrey Lichtman, denied reports that she had cooperated with government investigators probing the drug business, saying “those stories were planted” in order to endanger Coronel’s family.

“The family is worried. Emma is worried,” he noted.

The Justice Department has not yet confirmed if Coronel collaborated with agents as a protected witness.

Coronel, niece of Ignacio Coronel, one of the leaders of the Sinaloa cartel, was born on July 2, 1989 in California, but spent most of her life in Mexico. She married 'El Chapo' in 2007 when she was a teenager and they had two twin daughters, Emali Guadalupe and María Joaquina.

Between her wedding and her arrest in February, Coronel profited "in multiple ways" and "knowingly" from the proceeds of her husband's trafficking, according to court documents. She was arrested on February 22 at Dulles International Airport and has since been detained near the US capital.

During the trial against 'El Chapo,’ Coronel attended the hearings almost daily. Her visibility in could have played a role in her subsequent arrest.