Actress Who Met Drug Lord 'El Chapo' Tells Her Side of the Story in New Netflix Series, 'When I Met El Chapo'

Brought to you by the editors of People en Español.

October marks three years since Mexican actress Kate del Castillo, accompanied by actor Sean Penn, secretly met with international drug lord Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán at his lair in Mexico.

Del Castillo and Penn’s meeting with Guzmán, who was a fugitive at the time, ignited a media frenzy after Rolling Stone published a 10,000-word first-person narrative of the experience written by Penn a few days before Guzmán was found and captured by the authorities. Critics railed that Penn, an actor, was not a suitable person to report on such a sensitive and complicated story and that the publisher delegitimized the piece by allowing Guzmán to sign off on the final version.

Del Castillo, who commenced a relationship with Guzmán in 2012 by tweeting, “Today I believe more in El Chapo Guzmán than I do in the governments that hide truths from me, even if they are painful, who hide the cures for cancer, aids, etc., for their own benefit,” was criticized for sympathizing with a dangerous and murderous drug trafficker.

Since news of their encounter, del Castillo’s name continues to be sullied and inextricably linked to the drug kingpin with many wondering why she would get cozy with a deadly criminal. In Netflix’s new docuseries, “When I Met El Chapo,” de Castillo gets the opportunity to tell her side of the story.

Earlier this week, the actress shared a trailer of the highly anticipated show, set to be released Oct. 20, on her Instagram account.

“The light at the end of the tunnel is called, MY TRUTH,” she wrote in the caption accompanying the trailer.

Del Castillo, who was the October cover star of People en Español,spoke to the magazine about the upcoming series. “For me, [this project] is very important because I need to tell my truth. I need to clean my name. It has been bashed,” she said.

Things got ugly for del Castillo when the press revealed that she was the one who orchestrated Penn’s meeting with Guzmán: “My real nightmare started when I returned [from meeting El Chapo]. Everything went down when everything leaked. After I came back, that was my personal hell.”

Penn, who originally refused to collaborate on the Netflix production, has spoken out against the series. In a statement to Variety, his spokeswoman said: “Mr. Penn just saw it and hopes to have the opportunity to participate; there are profound inaccuracies and presumptions presented in Kate’s story.”

Guzmán was extradited from Mexico to the United States in January and is being held in a maximum security cell in New York.