The wife of notorious drug cartel leader Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán says she fears for her husband's life in wake of recent reports that he is being subjected to harsh treatment in jail.

During an interview with Telemundo set to air Feb. 21, Emma Coronel Aispuro said prison guards where the Sinaloa cartel boss is being held are punishing him for escaping. The Mexican kingpin made his third successful prison break from an Altiplano maximum-security prison back in July 2015. After seven months on the run, he was finally discovered and detained on Jan. 8, and then sent back to the same prison.

Tortured with Sleep Deficiency

"They say they are not punishing him, of course they are. They are with him all day, watching him in his cell," said Aispuro, a former beauty queen who married El Chapo in 2007 when she was 18 years old and he was 47.

She went on to say that he is constantly being monitored by guards and being tortured with sleep deficiency.

"They are with him every day, looking into his cell. All day they are there ... they don't let him sleep, he doesn't have privacy [not even] to go to the bathroom," she added.

Her comments came days after it was reported that El Chapo feels like "zombie" since the guards won't let him sleep for more than two hours at a time. According to his lawyer, Juan Pablo Badillo, El Chapo feels like a victim of "physical and mental torture." The attorney added that, "He describes it as a brutal torture, it is similar to what they did to Stalin in the 40s and 50s in Russia.'

As a result, his legal team has filed multiple injunctions to improve the conditions and slow extradition proceedings.

The Changes Made to Bolster Security at Prison

To prevent El Chapo from escaping, motion sensors have been implemented to monitor his movement, while he is guarded by dogs trained to detect his scent and prison floors have been reinforced with metal rods, reports Hola Arkansas. Meanwhile, tanks and extra armed vehicles have been deployed to secure the facility and thick concrete walls are being used to prevent an outside attack.