The actress who reportedly brokered Sean Penn's Rolling Stone interview with fugitive drug lord Joaquin 'El Chapo' Guzmzn has a relationship with the kingpin that dates back to her once publicly declaring she trusted him more than officials of the Mexican government.

CNN reports Kate del Castillo also has a history of starring in crime boss films and once herself played the role of a drug kingpin.

"Today I believe more in El Chapo Guzman than in the governments that hide the truth from me even though it is painful," the 43-year-old del Castillo wrote in a message posted to her Spanish-language Twitter account in 2012.

She later told CNN en Español her words were meant to serve as a bigger indictment of the Mexican government than they were as a compliment to Guzman.

"Someone like that, at least we know who he is, we know what he does, we know what his profession is," she said. "The others sometimes are worse criminals, and have numbed us, and hide everything from us."

Either way, Guzman took note of the feisty actress' stance, and when he made up his mind the time had come for him to turn his life story into a feature film, she was among the first he reached out to.

In time, that all led to Guzman being interviewed by Penn and the piece that reportedly now has both of them in the cross-hairs of Mexican government officials being published by Rolling Stone.

"It perhaps should have come as no surprise that this homegrown icon of entertainment would catch the interest of a singular fan and fugitive from Sinaloa," Penn wrote.

When he was arrested in 2014 and Hollywood began expressing interest in his life story and movie idea, Guzman commenced corresponding with Castillo via handwritten notes and Blackberry messages.

That communication continued even after his prison escape this summer and soon Penn found himself privy to some of those conversations, reportedly using disposable phones and encrypted messages to set up his secret meeting with Guzman.

Thus far, del Castillo has remained silent about the recapture of one of the world's most wanted men, who is estimated to be worth upwards of a billion dollars by virtue of a cocaine and heroin empire with pipeline operations in New York, Chicago and Los Angeles.

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