This story is free to read.

Actress : I only wanted to document Mexican drug lord’s life

FILE - In this Aug. 15, 2014 file photo, actress Kate Del Castillo speaks during a news conference in City Council chambers in Los Angeles. Castillo breaks months of silence about her and Sean Penn’s controversial meeting with then-fugitive drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, saying Penn’s account of an encounter with a Mexican military checkpoint never happened. The Mexican-American actress speaks in a New Yorker article made available online Friday, March 11, 2016, after largely keeping out of the spotlight ever since Guzman’s recapture and the publication of Penn’s article about the meeting. (AP Photo/ Nick Ut, File) FILE - In this Aug. 15, 2014 file photo, actress Kate Del Castillo speaks during a news conference in City Council chambers in Los Angeles. Castillo breaks months of silence about her and Sean Penn’s controversial meeting with then-fugitive drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, saying Penn’s account of an encounter with a Mexican military checkpoint never happened. The Mexican-American actress speaks in a New Yorker article made available online Friday, March 11, 2016, after largely keeping out of the spotlight ever since Guzman’s recapture and the publication of Penn’s article about the meeting. (AP Photo/ Nick Ut, File)

By Associated Press March 13, 2016 1 min read

MEXICO CITY (AP) – Actress Kate del Castillo says she only met secretly with Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman for a project to document his life in a movie, and denies suggestions she has received any money from the drug lord.

Del Castillo wrote of the meeting in a first-person article published Sunday in the Mexican weekly newsmagazine Proceso. She explained how she was contacted by the capo’s attorneys, the discussions leading up to the encounter and ultimately her October 2015 meeting with Guzman and American actor Sean Penn in a remote area of northeastern Mexico.

The Proceso article comes just two days after The New Yorker magazine published part of an interview with the actress. It was the first she had given to any medium about the meeting with the drug lord.