became too small to carry the vast quantities of cash so he bought a new and bigger plane solely for this purpose. He had a fleet of cars and aircraft, extensive estates and what amounted to a private army.Īccording to Escobar’s brother Roberto, who later wrote a memoir called “The Accountant’s Story,” the cartel spent $2,500 every month just on rubber bands for the money and even owned two submarines for transporting cocaine.Īt one point, the plane Escobar was using to fly money back from the U.S. The majority of Escobar’s business consisted of importing cocaine paste from Peru and Bolivia, processing it in Colombia to then fly it to the United States.įor much of its existence the Medellin Cartel was involved in a war with the rival Cali Cartel for control of the trade but until his last days there was no doubt who was on top.Įscobar is reported to have been making $30 billion a year at the height of his success and Forbes magazine named him as the 7th richest man in the world. He would not be arrested again for 15 years. In May of that year Escobar and some of his men were arrested coming back from Ecuador with a shipment of cocaine paste.Īfter unsuccessfully attempting to bribe the judges he succeeded in bribing the arresting officers and the case was dropped. 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. And that generation is marked by this Narco-culture,” said Uribe.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. They do it because the men like this are looking for that. “I did a study about this and the women don’t do this for themselves. Demand for augmented breasts fueled a boom in plastic surgeries. Colombian beauty queens became more voluptuous. Even the definition of beauty changed…to one that suited the drug gang. Pablo personified all that,” added Vargas.Īs you might expect, most Colombian citizens rejected the violence. “For some sectors in Medellin, Pablo is a hero, a recognized person and when he confronts the government even more, because it is a government that has always negated people access to health, education and good living conditions. He killed ministers, bombed the Colombian capital, and even called for the death of policemen who didn’t accept bribes. When the government cracked down, Pablo Escobar pushed back. They become a symbol, and a very commercialized one. It is a reference. Just like ‘Chapo’ Guzman for Mexico. Anthropologist of the Rosario University, Maria Victoria Uribe said “In terms of an identity for Colombians in the world, Pablo Escobar did leave a strong mark, because there are countries that only know of Colombia associated with Pablo Escobar. His celebrity, and cocaine, helped put Colombia on the map. His reputation spread along with his product. Pablo Escobar Mug Shot (PHOTO: Policia Nacionale)

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