Jeremiah
One of the few radio broadcasters to call professional hockey games in the US in Spanish embarked on his career after fleeing death threats from a notorious drug cartel in his native Mexico, he revealed in a new interview.
In a compelling conversation with the Nevada news station KSNV that was published Saturday, Jesus Lopez said the danger he endured before becoming the play-by-play narrator of Las Vegas Golden Knights games on the radio made calling the team’s Stanley Cup championship in 2023 one of the most memorable moments of his life.
“I cried, to tell you the truth,” Lopez told the outlet, adding that the Golden Knights gave him one of the championship rings that members of their organization received in celebration of the club’s first National Hockey League title. “I wasn’t expecting this.
“For me being able to do this after what I’ve been through, it’s very nice.”
Lopez previously recounted to NHL.com that he had been living in Ocotlán, Jalisco, near the Michoacán state line, and running several pizza restaurants when a regional drug cartel demanded that he pay its leaders for them to let him continue running his businesses. They threatened his life and the lives of his family members if he refused, so he sold his possessions and moved to Las Vegas to start over.
“In 2011, I was forced to leave in order to not lose my life,” Lopez said to KSNV.
Lopez told the NHL’s website that, as he understood it, La Familia Michoacana was the cartel responsible for displacing him from Mexico.
