Cocaine Confidential Page 4

  Back in the rundown, tin-roofed laboratory near Bocas del Toro, Steve has carefully calculated his profits. With generous allowances made for the local consumption of coca leaves and losses during the conversion process, 250 hectares planted with coca would produce at least 2–3 tons of cocaine paste each year spread out over three harvests. ‘I haven’t got to that production rate yet but I aim to make it within the next couple of years, hopefully,’ added Steve.

  Meanwhile, the Panamanian authorities, along with many others in South and Central America, continue to deny that there is any cocaine production on their territories. Steve explains: ‘It suits them all to deny it because the Americans would soon be swooping in here trying to destroy the harvests virtually overnight. Everyone knows that the Colombians squeezed billions out of the Americans in order to destroy their cocaine production, which in turn destroyed millions of people’s livelihoods. Everyone just wants to humour the Americans so they leave us all alone.’

  * * *

  Back in the steaming jungle heat, lab worker Miguel talks about his family and how he needs cocaine gangsters like Steve in order to make a living. He tells of his dream of one day leaving the Panamanian jungle and seeking an honest life in America. As Miguel continues his backbreaking work in the hot, airless shed, thunder and lightning strikes overhead and another tropical storm erupts. Soon the atmosphere is dominated by rain drops the size of golf balls rattling on the tin roof of the tiny shack.

  A heap of fresh green leaves sits atop a canvas bag on the rickety table under the tarpaulin used to protect the operation from these same tropical rainstorms, which dominate most days at this time of year. The leaves are so fresh because the fields they were picked from are so close. Steve puts a razor-sharp machete in my hand and tells me to start chopping.

  Over vigorous hacking, Steve further revealed farmer Miguel’s story. He’d learned his trade during eight years of service in a cocaine kitchen deep in the jungle in the borderlands further south between Panama and Colombia. One day Miguel happened to mention his skills to Steve when they met in a Bocas del Toro bar and eventually they set up what Steve describes as a ‘low-key’ cocaine conveyor belt together.

  After the leaves were sufficiently minced, Steve translated as Miguel told me it was time to add the binding agent. Miguel pulled out a bag of cement, sprinkled it all over the chopped leaves, and began to knead the dough by hand. Coca leaves are bulky, which is why the first stage of processing usually occurs after the leaves are dried and takes place near the growing area.

  Next came the pungent ammonia. Miguel shoved the bowl in my face and within seconds it felt like someone had poured a giant bottle of smelling salts into my brain. Miguel explained that recently there had been an attempt to do this whole process with water. But the organic cocaine market never took off because the leaves needed to soak in water for fifteen days, which was far too long. That’s why petrol was used, which cut down the waiting time substantially. With a flourish, Miguel dumped a whole bottle of super unleaded into the mix.

  Then he poured in the hydrochloric acid and sodium bicarbonate. The acid, served as an extractor, turning the cocaine hydrochloride solid. The sodium bicarbonate increased the pH. After a short break, we peeled back the frilly pillowcase Miguel had used to cover the mixing bowl to find little white rocks magically formed in the pungent liquid.

  Chemicals used in that final stage, usually ether and acetone, are expensive, scarce and, as a result of controls imposed during recent years, extremely difficult to obtain and transport without detection. But it is virtually impossible to restrict supplies of petrol, which are transported around areas like this to fuel outboard motors, generators and other equipment. In many areas where the cocaine trade has spilled over from Colombia, petrol sells at four times its official price.

  ‘It’s enough to put you off snorting a line, eh?’ says Steve. ‘This is back to basics, son. This is the reality of cocaine production. D’you know, I’ve dreamed of running my own coke factory since the first gram I sold back as a student in London in the early seventies. Yet here I am now and it’s all a bit of an anticlimax, if you know what I mean.’

  Meanwhile Miguel plucked the cocaine out, rinsed it carefully and then dropped it into some foil before holding it next to a 60-watt bulb to ensure the final toxic juices evaporated. Then he calmly produced a lethal-looking army knife and started expertly smoothing and chopping the coke into its final, pearly white, 100 per cent pure state. The drug glows with an ethereal opalescence after being pressed into a rock-like form for travelling.

  ‘Go on. Have a bash at it,’ said Steve, almost proudly. I knew I had no choice when he handed me a crisp, brand new, rolled-up hundred-dollar bill. I leaned down and snorted.

  Within moments, I was floating in a cocaine haze without a care in the world. It was easy to see how so many of the world’s citizens were now hooked on this narcotic. Unlike alcohol, it was possible to sound and act sober. My mind was suddenly filled with clarity and opinions which had remained dormant until this moment.

  ‘Makes you feel like a master of the fuckin’ universe, eh?’ said Steve.

  I agreed and we began a long-winded and intense discussion about what happened to the coke once it left this rundown shack deep in the Panamanian jungle.

  For seeing the primitive first stage of cocaine’s creation revealed little about the real underworld that delivers the drug to people across the globe.

  The first significant stage in that process was to set up its transportation out of the rain forest and into mainstream society.

  CHAPTER 4

  DONNY

  Colón, Panama’s second largest city, lies at the Caribbean end of the Panama Canal. Back in 1953, it was made into a free trade zone and is now one of the world’s biggest duty-free ports, which makes it the perfect transit point for much of the cocaine travelling up from South America.

  In the centre of this bustling city port I meet cocaine handler Donny. He and his team are responsible for making sure the ‘product’ is sold on to the traffickers, who’ve bid the top price for the cocaine produced in that tin shack in the jungle, near Bocas del Toro.

  Today, Donny’s ‘assignment’ is to ensure the mom and pop-produced coke is hidden in an oil tanker heading to Holland. ‘No one will ever find it,’ says Donny. ‘It will be like looking for an ant on a beach. Impossible.’ It’s at this point that cocaine starts to make really big money for those prepared to take the risk.

  Donny reckons his ‘job’ is a lot safer than being the street dealer he once was. ‘Listen, man, I got stabbed, beaten up and even shot at when I worked the streets here in Colón. I hated every minute. I never knew what was going to happen to me. I went crazy inside my head. I started taking more and more coca just to try and kill the fear.’

  Then he met Steve. ‘Steve had just arrived here from Spain and I sold him some big rocks, which he took back to Bocas to sell. I liked dealing with him because he was a professional, not the street vermin that I usually sold to. Anyway, Steve and I became friends. We talked a lot, especially when we were both snorting coca!

  ‘But seriously, he told me about his plans to produce his own cocaine and asked me if I would work as the handler for it. I jumped at the chance because it sounded a lot safer than dealing on the streets buying my coca from the loco Panamanian dudes, with death in their eyes.

  ‘Anyway, I had some relatives who worked at the port and I put the word around that they and their friends could make good money if they introduced me to some of the captains of the ships that come through here. Eventually, I got to know some of those captains and they agreed to let me stash the coke on their ships in exchange for a payment. We agreed that if the cops ever found the coke we would say they did not know about it.’

  Donny says that in two years working as a handler in Colón there hasn’t been one bust by the police or customs involving any of the home-produced cocaine. ‘Sure, I have to pay the customs guys money not to look on cert
ain ships. But so what? That’s part of the cost of dealing in coke. A shipment of coke the size of a small shopping bag is worth millions in Europe and the US. We make sure it is all wrapped tightly in plastic and smothered in hair conditioner to stop the dogs finding it.

  ‘Everyone here in Colón is poorly paid. Any chance to earn extra cash and they’re happy. The guys who hide the coca on the actual boats don’t care what it is. They just want to earn their money.’

  But what about renegade cocaine barons trying to steal Donny and Steve’s produce? Donny says: ‘Maybe that would be a problem in Colombia or Mexico but here in Panama, so few people are aware that cocaine is actually produced here. As far as I know, we are the only ones here in Colón using the ships to transport new raw home-produced product.

  ‘Sure, there are shipments of coca that come through here from Colombia but that’s another side of the business, which I don’t wanna get involved in. Those Colombians are loco, man. They’re killers. It’s best not to go into business with them. Anyone who’s stupid enough to steal coca from the Colombians would pay for that with their life. Those guys are dangerous. You never cross them because they will kill you without hesitation.’

  Donny rents a room in the centre of Colón to use as a ‘safe house’ for the cocaine when it arrives from Steve’s jungle coke factory. He explains: ‘You can’t just take the coca straight to a ship. You have to store it somewhere while you double-check all the arrangements. Then it is imperative you move it onto the ship very quickly just before departure, which is usually after the ship has cleared customs.

  ‘The other reason for dropping it on the ship at the last minute is that way you make sure that as few people as possible on the shore know what is going on. The captain and crew are no problem. It’s the guys working in the port, who could decide to inform the cops and then we’re in trouble.’

  Donny makes it all sound like a highly sophisticated, carefully synchronised operation. ‘I pride myself on being a professional. Steve knows that and I am sure that’s why he pays me very well and I will always be loyal to him.’

  But, I ask, what would happen if someone else came along and offered to double his money. ‘Hmmm. That is a difficult question to answer. Sure, I need to earn as much money as possible. I owe that to my family but …’ He hesitated. ‘I am not sure Steve would be very happy.’

  Would he do something to stop you? I asked.

  ‘This is the underworld, my friend, and all the rules are different to the outside world. I guess Steve might decide to do something about me if I endangered his operation. That’s the way it goes. There was a guy doing what I do here a few years ago and he tried to push a rival out by informing on him to the police. This guy ended up shot in the head. You gotta be careful here, amigo.’

  Donny believes that just as long as he stays working as a handler for Steve, he will enjoy a long and safe life. ‘It’s just Steve and me at this stage and that suits me fine. Steve is a gentleman who keeps to his word. He pays me well and I make sure that as few people as possible hear about our little business.’

  Back at his home on the edge of Colón, Donny has a wife and two children. ‘They don’t know what I do. My wife thinks I work at the port, nothing more. That is important because I don’t want to put them in a position where they have to lie for me because that is unfair on them. I am the one doing this job and I take full and sole responsibility for what I do. End of story.’

  PART TWO

  SMUGGLERS/HANDLERS/DEALERS – CARIBBEAN/BRAZIL

  The Caribbean has been turned back into one of the world’s major cocaine battlefields by the US-inspired crackdowns in Colombia and, more recently, Mexico, which have forced cocaine shipments to once again journey through the region. Coke traffic in the Caribbean is expected to increase further in the coming years, unless effective measures are implemented to curtail these latest smuggling operations.

  Many describe the Caribbean as being ‘the vortex of the Americas’ because this region provides a bridge between North and South America. Its islands are easily accessible by sea and have excellent air links to the metropolitan cocaine markets such as New York, Miami, Toronto and London. In short the Caribbean is characterised as a ‘haven for smuggling’.

  Besides Colombian and Mexican trafficking groups, other South American coke gangs from Brazil, Bolivia and Venezuela have also once again started using Caribbean countries as transit points for their cocaine in recent years.

  The majority of this cocaine flowing through the Caribbean arrives by sea via freighters, fishing vessels and yachts as well as other types of boats. In an attempt to avoid radar detection, cocaine smugglers also deploy go-fast or cigar boats. Made of lightweight fibreglass, they are extremely fast and highly manoeuvrable. Then there are the narco-subs, self-propelled semi-submarines capable of concealing 5 to 17 tons of illicit drugs. Although difficult to distinguish on the horizon, narco-subs are much more easily detectable by air patrol.

  As a result, resilient traffickers have recently financed engineers to create the Narcotorpedo, a hollowed, submersible vessel resembling a torpedo towed by boat. If the mother vessel is ever successfully detected by coast guard officials, the Narcotorpedo is cut loose and – equipped with a floatable transmitter – is relatively easy to recover later.

  The Caribbean nations of Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana are among those now functioning as major crossroads for cocaine shipments headed to Europe and Africa. Island smugglers also capitalise on the inlets and rivers leading to the Atlantic between Venezuela and the north-west region of Guyana to transport cocaine. In the Eastern Caribbean, the smaller islands are being used as stepping-stones towards the bigger markets of Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands, both designated by the America’s Drug Enforcement Agency as ‘High Density Trafficking Areas’. Corruption at the highest levels, money laundering and related drug activities are playing a big role in helping get the shipments of cocaine through the ‘official channels’.

  Cuba and the Bahamas have always been ideal drop-off points for cocaine. Over 4,000 keys spanning the 4,800 kilometres of Cuban coastline provide cover for speedboats, fishing vessels and light aircraft originating from Colombia, Venezuela and many Caribbean locations, often en route to southern Florida. Further north, local police rarely have sufficient manpower and resources to effectively patrol the vast spread of uninhabited islands and cays of the Bahamian archipelago, which are closer to the US mainland.

  Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago have also over recent years emerged as major transit points for cocaine. The South American and Mexican cartels exploit the proximity of the islands to Venezuela in order to transport coke on to other Caribbean islands, where it is then moved to North America or across the Atlantic.

  But there is a disturbing ‘spin-off’ caused by the cocaine gangs using the Caribbean as a drugs stop-off shop. Crime and gang violence have drastically increased in virtually every Caribbean country. The overall murder rate in the Caribbean stands at around 30 per 100,000 population, one of the highest homicide rates in the world. Some of the more heavily populated islands have transformed into narco war zones as local gangs expand their revenue-producing occupations to include kidnapping, human trafficking, firearms trafficking and organised crime.

  Meanwhile, the South American cartels have employed dozens of carefully located ‘representatives’ discreetly working out of the smaller islands, where they oversee the exportation of the drug. These characters are so discreet that they melt into the background of local communities, thanks to carefully nurtured cover jobs.

  However, I managed to track down one such character for a fascinating look inside this virtually unknown side of the cocaine trafficking business.

  CHAPTER 5

  JEZ

  Jez, 58, is no stranger to the inside of a prison cell. He’s served time in the UK, US and Spain for coke smuggling but insists he has no other means of making money. These days he specialises in running the white stuff up from a smal
l Caribbean island, either into Florida or across the Atlantic to southern Spain. He openly admits snorting coke every day of his life and outwardly promotes it in much the same way potheads sing the praises of cannabis.

  ‘This is my idea of paradise,’ he says. ‘Everything’s low key here. No one knows what I do for a living. They all think I’m running an upmarket bed and breakfast, which I am. But a B&B wouldn’t earn me the sort of money that coke does. In fact it helps me keep this business afloat.’

  At home on this small Caribbean island, by his pool, Jez recalls the good old days, when he used to help smuggle massive quantities of coke from the Caribbean to Europe. ‘Those days are long gone ’cos the Yanks came down in full force on the Caribbean twenty years ago. The only reason I can run this outfit from here is because the Americans have now eased up on their monitoring operations because they believe the Caribbean has been closed off. They don’t seem to realise it’s in the middle of a comeback.’

  Back in the mid-1990s, one of Jez’s’s regular ‘gigs’ was to organise a shipment over from Cali, Colombia, to Jamaica, where it would be hidden onboard a yacht and then sailed across the Atlantic and, eventually, all the way up the Thames to the middle of London.

  ‘Today, I’m just the linkman,’ he says. ‘The product comes in here usually on the same sort of yacht we used to cross the Atlantic all those years ago. But these days I simply organise the transfer of the coke to another boat or sometimes we use a quiet airstrip on the south of the island to fly the stuff up to Florida.’

  Jez sometimes keeps an ounce of coke for himself as part of the deal and says, ‘That usually keeps me going for a bit.’ He admits he is hooked on the stuff. ‘I know, I know. It’s stupid to get high on your own supply but I’ve always been rather partial to a snort. I guess in some ways that’s what got me into this game in the first place.’