![]() In 1976, Escobar married the then-15-year-old Maria Victoria Henao with whom he had two children. Pablo Escobar (R) and Maria Victoria Henao He was known not only for killing rivals and opponents – and even their families – but for personally executing uncooperative subordinates. Over time he came to control over 80% of the drug trade to the United States, building his reputation for violence as he did so. All Restrepo’s men were told they were now working for Pablo Escobar.įrom this base, Escobar took over the entire drug trade in Medellin, establishing what became the Medellin Cartel. The drug lordĮscobar initially worked for other drug traffickers until 1975 when a big Medellin cocaine trafficker named Fabio Restrepo was murdered, reportedly on Escobar’s orders. His timing was perfect Demand for cocaine in the United States was about to go through the roof. He collected $100,000 in ransom money and with this in his pocket he moved on to more lucrative work in the drug-trafficking world of the early 1970s. ![]() His first big money came not from drugs but from kidnapping a wealthy businessman. Early exploits included stealing gravestones to re-sell, stealing cars and street scams.īy the 1960s he was a small-time marijuana dealer and a gunman in the drug-trafficking business.īut Escobar was a man of ambition and not content to be small-time. His criminal career is said to have begun in earnest after lack of money forced him to leave university. When he was two years old the family moved to Envigado, a town bordering Medellin to the south that was to remain home for most of his life. It’s a nice honor.Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria was born in 1949 to a poor family in Rionegro, a village outside Medellin, his father a poor farmer and his mother a schoolteacher. So, if you’ve earned the respect and gratitude of your colleagues, that’s enough for me, I’m pretty happy with that. So they said, “Well, don’t worry, we’ll take care of you guys next year.”Īnd we’re still waiting to be taken care of.īut, you know, if our colleagues are proud of us and what we were able to accomplish, most of them have stories that are unbelievable as well. So, you know, you’re starting to work on new things.īut it was a little disconcerting that your own agency and our bosses -you know, our bosses in Bogota, they submitted some paperwork, and they submitted it late. I mean, we had a lot of loose ends we had to tie up the next year, in ’94. People ask us, “What do you do after Escobar was killed?” If you are, you’re in the wrong occupation. But you don’t go into this for the glory. So how do you square those two things: Your own colleagues have great things to say about you, but your organization didn’t do much. But I’ve also heard the DEA didn’t really acknowledge your accomplishments after Colombia. It’s interesting to hear those people call you guys the “the real deal” even though they had distinguished careers as well. Q: I talk to former and current DEA agents. It’s a matter of convenience, quite honestly, for to blend in. They were in charge of everything in Atlanta.Ĭhicago and Atlanta have major Hispanic communities. When I went back in 2006, they had exploded. We didn’t realize the Mexican traffickers were a problem at that time. ![]() I was stationed there twice, the first time in ‘98 to 2001. There’s a huge, huge Hispanic population in Atlanta. But he was trying to get away from the traditional trafficking routes. Coming up from the southwest border, Chicago’s not that far away from New York. Murphy: Well, actually, his two main transshipment points in the United States were Chicago and Atlanta. Q: After El Chapo became the world’s biggest lead drug dealer in the 1990s and 2000s, he was overheard referring to Chicago as his quote-unquote “home port.” Why do you think Chicago became an important hub of drug trafficking?
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