by Austin Galt
Canada pulled out after the cancellation and weren’t interested in being invited back. They were replaced by Costa Rica. Argentina was not impressed with the sudden reversal and, as several of their players had also received death threats, decided to pull out of the competition a day before it was to begin. This was a big loss as the Argentinian team was considered one of the favourites to win. Honduras was invited to take Argentina’s place. They accepted and had their team flown in by the Colombian air force, arriving only a few hours before the kick-off of their first match.
Along with Dave and Matt (an English tourist who was staying at the hostel), I went to the ticketing office to buy tickets to the game being played on Thursday night between Brazil and Mexico. Apart from catching up with Sofia, the days leading up to the game were fairly uneventful, but an afternoon beer at the tienda once the day had cooled down became a fixture. Also fixtures were the three local men who drank at one table. We began to recognise each other and I engaged in small talk with them about the football and who they fancied to win.
Thursday night came along and we headed off to the Pascual Guerrero stadium to watch the game. We had great seats at the very front of the stand and were able to enjoy the action uninterrupted by zealous fans waving flags. It wasn’t the greatest game ever played with Brazil underperforming and subsequently losing to Mexico 1–0.
Both Dave and Matt were wearing official Colombian football jerseys and a photographer took a photo of us all, arm in arm. The local media were keen to show off foreign tourists enjoying the spectacle, especially given the terrorist threats. The photo graced the front page of the El País newspaper the next day. However, they had cut me out of the frame. No jersey, no play!
The tournament may have started in chaos but it ended in bringing the country together. Colombia made it to the final and, in a tense match with Mexico, was able to go all the way with a 1–0 victory. This was Colombia’s first Copa América title and for a short moment the country was able to forget its troubles.
I returned to my routine of seeing Sofia when I could and drinking in the afternoons at the tienda. I had become more familiar with the locals who turned up there most afternoons, in particular one of them called Pedro as his English was very good. ‘Hey, what’s up?’ was his usual greeting. They seemed like good guys, but what I didn’t know at the time was that they were goodfellas – big hitting mafiosos from the old Cali Cartel.
3
CALI CARTEL
It is the mountainous regions of South America that are the traditional home of the coca plant. The ancient Inca people used to chew the leaves of this native plant to speed their breathing in order to counter the effects of the thin mountain air. Coca also acts as a stimulant and helps to suppress hunger, thirst, fatigue and pain, and when the Spanish conquistadors invaded the continent in the 16th century, they forced the indigenous people into labour while supplying them with coca leaves to increase their work output.
It wasn’t until the 1850s that cocaine was first isolated and extracted by German chemists. However, it was the Austrian psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud who first popularised the drug for medicinal purposes in the 1880s. In his 1884 article, titled Über Coca, he called it a ‘magical substance’ and promoted its benefits. Two years later, in 1886, a new drink called Coca-Cola was founded by the American pharmacist John Pemberton who included coca leaves as an ingredient. Both the drink and the drug took off.
As cocaine began to go mainstream with more and more people using it recreationally, the dangers of the drug began to surface, and by 1903, public pressure forced Coca-Cola to remove the coca from its drink. Cocaine was eventually banned by the United States government in 1922. It took another 50 years before it started to become fashionable again. And Colombia, with its access to both the Pacific Ocean and Caribbean Sea, was perfectly positioned to take advantage.
During the early 1970s, Colombia was just a transit point for cocaine. The main coca plantations were located in Peru and Bolivia, while the cocaine laboratories were found mostly in northern Chile. After Chilean president Salvador Allende was deposed by a military coup led by General Augusto Pinochet in 1973, many of the country’s cocaine chemists fled to Colombia. It was towards the end of the 1970s that the coca seed was introduced into large parts of the Colombian countryside, leading to the centralisation of production in the country. This in turn led to Colombia’s cocaine cartels surging and wielding enormous power.
Cali’s first recognised cocaine trafficker was Jaime Caicedo, known as ‘El Grillo’ or ‘The Cricket’ – Jimmy the Cricket. He was only small time, though, never getting the chance to make it really big as he was killed in early 1977. His story inspired the 2004 film El Rey (The King).
The origins of the Cali Cartel actually began with Benjamín Herrera, known as ‘El Papa Negro de la Cocaina’ or ‘The Black Pope of Cocaine’, who began exporting cocaine from his base in Cali in the early 1970s. He was arrested in 1973 after trying to enter the United States with a kilo of cocaine but was able to escape jail, only to end up in Peru where he was captured again in 1975 in possession of another load of cocaine. He was deported back to the United States and, after paying a large bond, he was granted bail the following year.
Having made his way back to Colombia, he decided to head for Medellín and set up operations there with Marta Upegui known as ‘La Reina de la Cocaina’ or ‘The Cocaine Queen’. (She wasn’t the only woman in Colombia to acquire this nickname.) Benjamín Herrera quickly became the biggest Colombian distributor of cocaine.
In 1977, with the drug-trafficking structure now already in place in Cali, Gilberto Rodríguez Orejuela, his brother Miguel, and José ‘Chepe’ Santacruz Londoño stepped in to take it over and develop it even further. The Cali Cartel was born. The three men were childhood friends and began their criminal careers together in a kidnapping gang, Los Chemas. They received a big ransom after kidnapping a couple of Swiss citizens, including a diplomat, and it was this windfall that they initially invested in cocaine.
Gilberto Rodríguez Orejuela was known as ‘El Ajedrecista’ or ‘The Chess Player’ due to his cunning and his ability to stay several steps ahead of both his enemies and the government authorities. He was always well mannered in public and known to be highly intelligent. He had a passion for poetry but still loved his football. Gilberto was known to be the brains behind the operation.
Miguel Rodríguez Orejuela, known as ‘El Señor’ or ‘The Lord’, had followed his brother into the business. Despite his menacing look, he had a friendly nature which helped him to move freely among all parts of Cali society whether it be politics, business or sports. He was generally in charge of administration and logistics and was a stickler for detail. He directed the shipments of coca paste from Bolivia and Peru to the laboratories in Colombia, while also coordinating the smuggling routes to the United States.
Chepe Santacruz spent a few semesters at university studying engineering, which led to the nickname ‘El Estudiante’ or ‘The Student’, before entering the cocaine business where he managed distribution throughout the United States. During the late 1970s, he operated in and around New York City and stories of him turning up in the middle of drug deals to pay his respects before disappearing were the stuff of legend.
Chepe was a resentful and vengeful man. He allegedly ordered the deaths of a couple of his mistresses, one of whom survived being shot but was paralysed from the waist down. His application to become a member of one of Cali’s most important social clubs, Club Colombia, was rejected so he built an exact replica of the building just for himself. And after the FARC kidnapped his sister in 1992 and demanded $12 million for her release, he responded by kidnapping the sister of an important FARC member as well as over a dozen communist activists. Chepe’s sister was released a few months later in exchange for those he had kidnapped.
Hélmer ‘Pacho’ Herrera came on board a few years later, becoming the Cali Cartel’s fourth leader. Pacho Herrera was the son of Colombia’s c
ocaine pioneer, Benjamín Herrera. After growing up just outside of Cali, he moved to New York having obtained a job there. He soon turned his attention to the burgeoning cocaine trade, initially smuggling cash back into Colombia. He went on to become the richest of all the cartel leaders.
Pacho was openly gay, which is considered one reason why he chose to join the Cali Cartel as they were only interested in making money. Business was business and sexuality was irrelevant. It is unlikely Medellín Cartel boss Pablo Escobar would have tolerated such a person high up in his organisation. Hélmer received his nickname ‘Pacho’ in 1988 as a way for the other leaders to speak to him in code, as Escobar was trying to kidnap him and had intelligence sources tracing his calls.
The Cali Cartel was less violent than its Medellín counterpart, preferring bribery to violence. They projected themselves as successful businessmen and above all gentlemen. They were dubbed ‘Los Caballeros de Cali’ or ‘The Gentlemen of Cali’. They also learnt from the mistakes of the Medellín Cartel and used a decentralised command structure so that each part of the organisation operated independently. The Medellín Cartel, on the other hand, was more centralised with Escobar calling the shots.
Both cartels did maintain an alliance for several years beginning in the early 1980s. They agreed to divide up the US market with the Cali Cartel taking New York, while the Medellín Cartel took South Florida with California up for grabs. This was perhaps another reason why Pacho Herrera chose to link up with the Cali Cartel and not take advantage of the structure his father had set up in Medellín. He had consolidated his New York contacts before coming back to Colombia, so his value lay with the Cali bosses. They realised his importance to the organisation and he was swiftly promoted to the leadership table. The alliance between the two cartels lasted only a few years and became less relevant as each cartel perfected their operations. There was certainly enough demand for their product to keep everyone happy.
The cartels went to war in the late 1980s, mainly due to a fundamental disagreement with Escobar’s terrorism campaign against the Colombian government over extradition. Cali’s ‘gentlemen’ preferred to keep their heads down and get on with business and let their vast government connections handle the problem.
The war had its origins in a quarrel between Pablo Escobar and Pacho Herrera. Escobar had asked the Cali bosses to kill one of Pacho’s men who had got involved with the wife of one of his men. Pacho refused to hand over his man and the other Cali bosses refused to get involved. Pacho and Escobar also began fighting for control of the Los Angeles market.
The Cali Cartel was known for its ingenious methods of smuggling cocaine, including hiding it in hollowed-out concrete posts, timber planks and in cylinders of chlorine. They also hid it in shipments of food and beverages such as frozen broccoli, chocolate, coffee and fruit extract. They preferred to smuggle their product on ships as opposed to go-fast boats. While it took a little longer, the chances of getting caught were much slimmer with only a miniscule percentage of shipping containers checked at US ports.
They had a massive intelligence network and tracked every call made in and out of Bogotá and Cali using software obtained through Israeli intelligence services. Their tentacles extended into all areas of the government at all levels and they even had thousands of cooperating taxi drivers who would inform on the movements of important people within the city. Their intelligence wing gained the moniker ‘the Cali KGB’ after the Russian spy agency.
Just before its downfall in the mid-1990s, the Cali Cartel was estimated to be responsible for over 80 percent of the world’s cocaine supply, bringing in about $7 billion in revenues annually. They invested in legitimate businesses such as Grupo Radial Colombiano – a chain of radio stations – and one of Colombia’s most popular pharmacy chains – Drogas La Rebaja.
They were able to launder their money through several banks, including the Banco de los Trabajadores of which Gilberto sat on the board. After buying up stock at more than double the price of the day, he controlled nearly 70 percent of the company’s shares and so effectively took control. Drug money would be deposited into bank accounts and then loaned out with no repayment ever made. After learning it was being used for money laundering purposes, the government stepped in and nationalised the bank in 1986.
The Cali Cartel had also set up the First Inter-Americas Bank de Panamá, but it was shut down by the Panamanian government in 1985 under US pressure. It was used to launder money for both the Cali Cartel and Medellín Cartel and the bank’s public registry showed the cartel leaders as majority shareholders and occupying seats on the board. With the US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) designating these people as drug barons, Panama really had no other choice but to shut it down despite its complicity in the drug business through its leader Manuel Noriega.
The DEA called the Cali Cartel, ‘The most powerful crime syndicate in history’.
By the time I had arrived in Cali, Gilberto and Miguel Rodríguez Orejuela were both in jail having been captured separately in 1995. Gilberto was released in 2002 but was recaptured the following year and extradited to the United States in 2004, while Miguel was extradited in 2005. They were both sentenced to 30 years in prison. Chepe Santacruz was imprisoned in 1995 but escaped and was subsequently killed in March 1996. Pacho Herrera had turned himself into authorities in 1996 in the hope of getting a lenient sentence but it was all for nothing. He was shot dead in November 1998 while playing football in the prison yard.
The person regarded as the fifth-in-command of the Cali Cartel was Pacho Herrera’s right-hand man, Phanor Arizabaleta. He was in charge of kidnappings and extortion, although he also smuggled cocaine in his own right. After turning himself over to authorities in 1995, he was sentenced to 28 years in prison, however, he was given home detention after eight years due to heart disease. He was accused of continuing to smuggle cocaine, and so was extradited to the United States in 2011 but deported back to Colombia less than a year later because of his age and deteriorating health. He died of a heart attack in 2016 at the age of 78.
The fall of the Cali Cartel bosses didn’t stop the trafficking of cocaine, of course. The business remained the same but the names at the top had changed. The power base shifted to the north of the Cauca Valley and the organisation became known as the Norte del Valle Cartel.
*
I sensed Pedro and his friends knew about the dark side of Cali, but they hadn’t said anything much. It was just a gut feeling. However, after becoming more familiar with each other due to drinking at the tienda several times together, I felt emboldened and asked about drug routes.
‘How do they smuggle cocaine to Australia?’ I questioned innocently.
The three of them tensed up. Pedro, seemingly taken aback by my enquiry, eyed me over suspiciously and blew off the question. One of Pedro’s friends leaned over and whispered in his ear. I was to learn later that he had said, ‘Be careful of this motherfucker’.
Not only was I naive about how the international drug smuggling business operated, I was naive to mention it here in the cocaine capital of the world. I immediately knew my curiosity had got the better of me and I didn’t broach the subject again. Plan Colombia was in full swing with spies everywhere and Pedro suspected I could be an undercover CIA agent – being paranoid goes hand in hand with working in the drug business. It took a short while to regain confidence and we soon became firm friends. It was a friendship that would last for many years to come.
Then in his 40s, of medium build and stature, and with slightly receding and slicked back hair, Pedro always dressed smartly in typical old-school Cali fashion – a white short-sleeved shirt tucked into dark-coloured pants with a nice pair of shoes. He would occasionally change the colour of his pants, sometimes even to ‘gangster white’, but the ensemble was invariably the same. While he looked the part, he also played the part and was always gentlemanly in public.
After a few weeks Pedro invited me to his residence located in one of the most exclusive
neighbourhoods in the city. His apartment occupied a whole floor of the building and it seemed too big for just one person. He had recently separated from his wife and he showed me some photos of his children who now lived with their mother.
I sensed a loneliness in him. It would be hard to make real friends in the world he had lived in as you never knew who you could really trust. I believe that is one of the reasons he befriended me. I had no agenda and I was not a gangster. He felt comfortable talking to me; I was certainly captivated by some of his stories. I also think he enjoyed hearing about my world which would have seemed far removed from the violent one he had lived in. Essentially, we both just liked hanging out and shooting the breeze.
Pedro was nearly 15 years older than I was, although we were similar in many ways. We both had a rebellious side, which was perhaps one reason why I came to Colombia. The only difference was that I had grown up in one of the safest places in the world while he had grown up in one of the most dangerous. He had been heavily involved in the Cali Cartel’s operations during the 1980s and was only a few rungs down from the top leadership. He had also had a group of sicarios or hitmen under his command.
He had been caught early on with 6 kilograms of cocaine in the boot of his car and was sent to the local jail in Cali where he spent the next two weeks until his release was arranged. At one stage he moved to California to handle distribution, owning a restaurant in Santa Barbara County which he used as a front for his operations. I gathered the reason he could speak English well was due to this time spent in the United States.
He had become involved in the business through his family connections – although the connections were of a social nature, rather than nefarious. Both his immediate and extended family were friends with the Rodríguez Orejuela brothers. His family were wealthy business owners involved in the sugar and coffee business, among other things. Sugar is one of the backbones of the Cali economy, while Colombia is well known around the world for its high-quality coffee. Pedro now spent his time working at his own leisure in the family business.
