Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria, Colombian drug lord, trafficker, and narco-terrorist, was born on December 1, 1949, and killed on December 2, 1993. At the height of his power, his cartel reportedly supplied 80% of the cocaine that entered the U.S. market, earning him an annual revenue of 21.9 billion dollars. Often called the “King of Cocaine,” he is considered the richest criminal in history, with an estimated wealth of 30 billion dollars annually until the early 1990s.
Early beginnings
Escobar was born in Rionegro and grew up in nearby Medellín. He briefly studied at the local university but quickly dropped out and began his path into the criminal world by selling smuggled cigarettes, fake lottery tickets, and stealing cars. In the 1970s, he worked for various smugglers, often kidnapping people and demanding large ransoms for their release. After that, he started independently distributing cocaine and established the first smuggling routes to the U.S. in 1975. His penetration of the American drug market grew alongside the rising demand for cocaine, and by the 1980s it was estimated that 70-80 tons of cocaine were sent from Colombia to the U.S. monthly.
His criminal and smuggling network became known as the Medellín Cartel, which often clashed with rival cartels domestically and abroad, resulting in numerous massacres and murders of police officers, judges, and prominent local politicians. In 1982, he was elected to the Colombian Parliament (he even attended the inauguration of the Spanish Prime Minister as an official delegate). Thanks to this, he built many hospitals, churches, and schools in western Colombia, which earned him popularity among the local population as well as with the Catholic Church.
During Escobar’s time, Colombia became the murder capital, and both the U.S. and Colombian governments invested significant resources to capture or kill Pablo Escobar. Ultimately, Escobar was killed the day after his birthday in his hometown by Colombian federal police.
Initially, Escobar engaged in various criminal activities together with Oscar Beneló Aguirre. In the 1970s, before entering the drug trade, Escobar worked as a bodyguard and thief. He began working for Álvaro Prieto, a smuggler operating around Medellín, driven by the boyhood ambition to earn one million Colombian pesos by the age of 22. Escobar became known for depositing 100 million Colombian pesos (then about 3 million U.S. dollars) in the bank at the age of 26.
Cocaine smuggling
In the documentary Accounting Story: Inside the Violent World of the Medellín Cartel, Pablo Escobar’s brother, Roberto, talks about how Pablo transformed from an ordinary, simple man of the lower class into one of the richest men. In 1975, Escobar began developing his cocaine operations by flying several times between Colombia and Panama, and then on to the U.S.
In 1976, Escobar and some of his men were arrested with 18 kilograms of cocaine while trying to transport it from Ecuador to Medellín. Failing to bribe the judges, Pablo ordered the murders of the two police officers who arrested him, after which the case was dropped. Roberto Escobar claims this incident established Pablo’s pattern of dealing with authorities either through bribery or killings.
Roberto Escobar concludes that Pablo began smuggling cocaine because other goods were too dangerous to smuggle. At the time, there were no drug cartels but only a few drug “lords,” so Pablo decided to exploit the empty space and take territory for himself. In Peru, Escobar bought cocaine paste, which he then refined and processed in his laboratory in a two-story house in Medellín. At first, he smuggled cocaine in old airplane tires, and the pilot could return with about $500 per flight, depending on the quantity transported.
Documentary about Escobar and Medellin cartel
Rise of Pablo Escobar
After establishing the smuggling corridor to the U.S., the demand for cocaine suddenly surged, and Escobar soon organized larger shipments via planes and ships to southern Florida, California, and other parts of the U.S. He and his cartel co-founder and main transport coordinator, Carlos Ledher, soon created a new point and port for smuggling on the Bahamas, specifically Norman’s Cay island, about 350 km southeast of Florida. From 1978 to 1982, the island served as the central route for smuggling used by the Medellín cartel.
According to some sources, at one point, the Medellín cartel was smuggling 70-80 tons of cocaine per month to the U.S. In the mid-1980s, at the peak of their power, the Medellín cartel transported about 11 tons per flight on small commercial planes to the U.S. Besides ships and planes, Escobar, according to his brother Roberto, also used two small submarines for transporting the goods. The plane with which he first successfully transported cargo to the U.S. was placed at the entrance of his estate, Hacienda Nápoles.
Establishing the drug network
In 1982, Escobar was elected to the Colombian parliament as a representative. He soon became internationally famous as his drug network grew. The Medellín cartel controlled most of the drugs entering the U.S., as well as Mexico, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, Venezuela, and Spain. Cocaine production evolved, with coca from Peru and Bolivia replaced by Colombian coca, although the Colombian product was of lower quality than that of neighboring countries. As the demand for coca grew, Escobar began working with Roberto Suarez Gomez to ship drugs to other countries in the Americas and Europe; it was even said he established drug routes all the way to Asia.
Corruption and intimidation were the methods Escobar used to deal with Colombian authorities. He worked to establish an efficient and unavoidable policy of dealing with police and government officials, often using the phrase plata o plomo (literally “silver or lead”), meaning if the money was not accepted, the bullet would follow. His men executed over a hundred people, including civilians, police officers, and government officials, while he bribed hundreds of government officials, local judges, and politicians.
He was allegedly responsible for the assassination of Colombian presidential candidate Luis Carlos Galán in 1989, who had strong chances of becoming president. Escobar was also responsible for placing a bomb on Avianca Flight 203 and planting a car bomb near the presidential palace in Bogotá. The crash, which killed all 107 passengers, was likely the trigger for a stronger U.S. involvement in the hunt for Escobar, as among the passengers were another Colombian presidential candidate, César Gaviria Trujillo, and high-ranking U.S. diplomats. The Medellín cartel was involved in an ongoing war against the rival Cali cartel.
Escobar’s role in the Palace of Justice siege
Escobar supported the 1985 siege of the Colombian Palace of Justice by the leftist guerrilla group M-19. The siege was revenge against the Supreme Court for reviewing the constitutionality of an extradition treaty between the U.S. and Colombia, which threatened to send Escobar to trial in the U.S. The siege resulted in the deaths of half the Supreme Court judges. M-19 was paid to break into the Palace and burn all documents related to the group Los Extraditables, a group of drug traffickers threatened with extradition to the U.S., among whom was Escobar. The group also took hostages to prevent extradition.
La Catedral prison (“The Cathedral”)
After the assassination of Galán, the new administration under Luis Gaviria intensified the fight against Escobar and the drug cartels. Eventually, the government negotiated with Escobar, convincing him to surrender and cease all criminal activity in exchange for a reduced sentence and special treatment during his imprisonment. Announcing a halt to a series of violent actions aimed at pressuring the authorities and creating a positive public image for Escobar, he surrendered to Colombian authorities in 1991, but only after the extradition treaty with the U.S. was abolished by the new Colombian Constitution in 1991.
The new Constitution caused controversy, as it was suspected that Escobar and other drug lords influenced the constituent assembly to pass this provision. Escobar was placed in a prison that became known as his private and luxurious jail, La Catedral, where he and his associates had everything — from a Jacuzzi to a soccer field. Information about Escobar’s criminal activities began to surface during his stay in prison, prompting the government to plan his transfer to a regular prison. Escobar’s influence and delaying tactics helped him escape from prison, and he spent the rest of his life on the run from the police.
Author: Ivan Toth
Featured image: AI
