I learned a lot about him on one of those long nights we spent together, hiding out; after preparing and serving each of us his favorite meal of rice mixed with eggs, I dared to ask, “El Patron, how was it that you started this life?”
“Popeye, these questions you ask me . . . come here, I’ll tell you. Everything started when, still a boy, I started a bike repair shop and bike rental in my district. With what this small business produced, I bought myself a Lambretta motorcycle. But I was not willing to use the bike to become a simple messenger; that just wasn’t for me. Instead I used it to rob different commercial establishments. This easy way of making money excited me, and soon my cousin Gustavo Gaviria Riveros and my future brother-in-law, Mario Henao, joined me. Anyway, I planned every one of the little jobs very carefully, paying attention to every detail. I did a lot of preparation work, noting times in the routines of our chosen targets, studying escape routes, and making plans. Above all, we worked with discipline. That way, things turned out well and we undertook the least risk possible. Over time I began to specialize in auto theft. We found someone who worked at a Renault car dealership that would not only make us copies of the car keys, but also give us the buyers’ addresses. Those thefts were easy and we hardly ever faced any danger.
“Then I worked for some time with a smuggler named Alberto Prieto, who taught me the ways of illegal commerce. Afterwards I was caught redhanded stealing a car and was sent to La Ladera Jail in Medellín. I was there for a little while, but it served me well because, as you know Popeye, to be a good bandit it is essential to spend a little time in the school of prison.
“When I got out of jail, I did my first important job with Gustavo and Mario. We kidnapped old Diego Echavarria Misas, a rich businessman.”
“Really, Pablo? You kidnapped him?” I interrupted, “He was my school’s benefactor.”
“Yes, Popeye. And we had to kill him.”
“I remember it was very hard for the whole town. He had a very grand funeral.”
“Please, Popeye, don’t interrupt me. After this we started some modest drug trafficking, selling only small doses of cocaine. Then I traveled by myself across the country and to Ecuador in a Renault 4 to buy five kilos of Peruvian cocaine paste to process in Medellín. Of course, there were lots of police and military checkpoints. To avoid them, I had a brilliant idea. I hired a cheap truck, explaining at the police stops that the car’s engine had broken down. We put the merchandise inside cables and toolboxes, and things went on quite nicely!
“Looking at the pile of money that this business left us, we started bringing great quantities of cocaine in from Peru to send on to the gringos. It was then that I made my first mistake. On June 16, 1976, in Itagüí, I was caught by DAS8 agents when they discovered I had hidden cocaine inside the spare tire of a truck. A retired police major, DAS Chief Carlos Gustavo Monroy Arenas had ordered the operation at the Ecuadorian border. The man had information that some paisas9 were taking not only cocaine paste, but also pure cocaine into the country. The detectives Luis Fernando Vasco Urquijo and Jesus Hernández Patiño had found us out. Even though we offered them a large sum of money to let us go, they turned down the bribe and seized our twenty-nine kilos of cocaine. We were imprisoned along with Gustavo Gaviria and the other three men who had accompanied us. Because we were bringing drugs in from Ecuador and the seizure was ordered by an attorney in Pasto,10 we were transferred there and detained.
“Almost three months later, on September 10, 1976, after giving our judge a tidy sum of money, he revoked the detention order. We returned to Medellín fully convinced that our life’s calling had to be drug trafficking. I started to see the big picture. No more small cargos—instead, we began using small aircrafts to bring the cocaine paste from Ecuador and Peru to process in laboratories set up by Gustavo and Mario. In the laboratories we turned the paste into pure cocaine and made it ready to be sent to the United States.
“But those despicable detectives Vasco and Hernández kept bothering us. One night, in Envigado, they detained Gustavo and me. They took us away to a hill far away from the populated town of El Pajarito. There they made us get down on our knees and place our hands on the back of our necks. Aiming Smith & Wessons at our heads, they announced they were going to kill us. I, playing along with them, put my arms down and held them to my sides, and tried to convince Detective Vasco that in killing us he would gain very little, but would lose the opportunity to get rich.
“I assure you, Popeye, that smelling death so close gives you an impressive eloquence. It took about fifteen minutes to convince those sons of bitches to accept money instead of killing us. Leaving Gustavo behind as a guarantee, I went with Vasco to retrieve the money.
“That’s how we managed to save ourselves from certain death. But, once we had calmed down, I said to Gustavo, ‘Those detectives die tomorrow.’ Gustavo, upset, replied, ‘Wait, we can’t kill agents of the State.’ I answered him, ‘Look, if we don’t kill them, those bastards will blackmail us for the rest of our lives.’
“And that was it. I remember that around 11:30 on the night of March 30, 1977, Jairo Mejia, who I called JM, informed me that the detectives were drinking aguardiente11 at his place, Toscana. We waited for them in a Simca car driven by Gustavo until they left and got into their blue Dodge Dart. We followed until they got to the turn of the Pan de Queso Bridge. There they slowed down. Accelerating, Gustavo put us right next to their vehicle, and I discharged my whole gun at the two detectives. I got my revenge for what they had done to me, especially for the kneeling. And I had taken my first two DAS agents! That’s how the thing got started.”
Chapter III
The Golden Bull
That night, March 30, 1977, when Pablo Escobar murdered Detectives Vasco and Hernández, he was not only getting his revenge; he was also showing the world that he was willing to sell his soul to the devil in order to become the most feared and wealthiest gangster in Colombia, and someday the world. Destiny delivered his attackers on a silver platter, and destiny had given him the money to bribe them and, if necessary, murder them. Furthermore, he had learned his lesson. He would never again transport merchandise by himself on the road. It was stupid to take that risk when you could hire mules and grunt laborers to do the dirty work for you. He vowed to never again step inside a prison. He would never again allow anybody to make him get down on his knees, and never again would anybody threaten him with a weapon. From that moment on, the size of the criminal structure in Colombia and the power of Escobar would reach unimaginable dimensions.
The organization had its own fleet of planes to fly the drug routes and simply be available for Pablo’s personal use. Heading up the fleet was a Lear Jet-25, piloted by captains Flavio Alarcon and Roberto Striedinger. This aircraft happened to be the most technologically advanced plane of the time. Three helicopters complemented the fleet. With his eyes set on the Magdalena Medio Antioqueño,12 Pablo acquired the Nápoles Hacienda,13 an estate nestled in a moisture-rich semi-jungle zone, perfect for setting up and concealing laboratories. The first thing he had to do was build a paved runway for his air operations, along with a maintenance hangar. Over the main entrance to the hacienda a Piper PA18 stood as a monument to Pablo’s difficult beginnings. He built the necessary roads and, among other structures, a great mansion. He also established a zoo with elephants, lions, tigers, giraffes, hippopotami, kangaroos, and every kind of exotic bird.
The