Alfonso Lara says the only person who could keep him safe from crime was the most notorious drug lord in the world.

Masked men robbed Lara, a 38-year-old grocer, at gunpoint three times, hijacking his farm truck laden with brooms and toilet paper for his store in Badiraguato, the scorched-brown Sierra Madre hometown he shared with Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, head of the Sinaloa Cartel. Lara said Guzman ordered the bandits rounded up, a gesture that earned him loyalty.

Word of Guzman's capture at a Pacific resort Saturday drew a starkly different reaction 2,591 km away in Chicago, where he was branded "Public Enemy No. 1" for controlling 80 percent of the narcotics trade and fueling street-gang violence in the city.