Undercover Agent: Suarez vs. Cartels & Drug Smuggling

FBI agent Suarez infiltrated the Medellín and Cali cartels as 'Manny', smuggling drugs and laundering money. His risky undercover work exposed the North Coast Cartel and its network, facing dangers and close calls.

The Lobster Watercraft Handoff

The handoff was basic on paper. Suarez would certainly secure the lobster watercraft, prep the Mako and await the cargo airplane flying directly from Colombia. Once above, the staff would open its doors and go down securely covered packages of cocaine right into the sea. Suarez would scoop them out before the Caribbean ingested them whole.

Becoming ‘Manny’ the Smuggler

“As the War on Medications grew in scale and importance, also carrying out thousand-pound breasts had not been going to cut it any longer,” Suarez remembers. To pass as Manny, Suarez had to find out how to think, live and act like a smuggler. Suarez when sat down at a restaurant with Gustavo, a North Coastline trafficker recognized as El Loco. No one could confirm El Toro had actually gotten the hit, though Suarez never ever doubted it.

“In the eyes of the cartel, I was just one of one of the most respected medicine smugglers in South Florida,” he creates. “I had marine and aeronautics skills, a reliable crew, and the guts to obtain their dope across the border.”

Building a Fruit & Produce Company

The bureau constructed Suarez a workplace on Miami’s commercial south side, a warehouse that doubled as an import-export company. Ostensibly, it was a fruit and vegetables company, relocating dog crates of oranges and veggies via the port. Inside, it was the launchpad for among the FBI’s boldest infiltrations.

Suarez and his staff functioned hysterically as salt water poured onto the deck. “We took on so much water that the bales drifted onboard and almost washed back out to sea,” he remembers. For the following six hours, they hauled packages aboard, chasing down stragglers brushed up away by the changing currents. Missing also one would certainly increase suspicion.

Suarez returned to San Juan in 1996 and 1997 to indicate in court, not as Manny but as Special Representative Martin Suarez. “When the accuseds saw me get in the courtroom in my G-man attire– slick match, trimmed hair, clean-shaven– they understood they were in deep crap,” Suarez creates. “Manny, a federal agent? It couldn’t be!”

High-Rolling Trafficker Appearance

Suarez also required to look like a high-rolling trafficker. “I stockpiled on the finest European linen, Italian pants, top quality denim, cowboy boots, and tropical fedoras,” he writes. He expanded a thick mustache, added a diamond-studded Rolex and a heavy gold bracelet to his wrist and slid behind the wheel of FBI-bought high-end autos: a gold Porsche 928, a black Porsche 911 Carrera S, a Bentley Continental.

He understood specifically who ‘d purchased the hit: El Toro Negro, the North Shore Cartel’s ruthless money employer. Toro had when cautioned Suarez, “At any time, I can get to across the world and touch you on the shoulder.”

A common “decline” looked much less like a drug bargain than a scene from an activity thriller. His smuggling vessel was an inconspicuous 100-foot lobster watercraft, anchored at “specific works with” off Cuba’s coast. A 36-foot Mako angling boat was his jogger, darting into open water to collect the haul.

Penetrating the Cartels

Suarez had actually been penetrating the Medellín and Cali cartels because 1988. Impersonating “Manny,” a man “that had no agitations aiding Colombian cartels,” he ‘d smuggled $1 billion worth of drug right into Miami by boat and airplane (all of which government representatives would take) and laundered millions for Toro himself.

Suarez when sat down at a dining establishment with Gustavo, a North Coastline trafficker recognized as El Loco. Mid-conversation, El Loco’s other half, Ella, leaned in and whispered quickly, “We ought to obtain out of here.

El Toro Negro Vanishes

El Toro Negro vanished. “We never located him,” Suarez admits. “He slipped into the darkness of Colombia’s criminal abyss and never touched American dirt. We were never ever even able to determine his genuine name.”

Fifty-two participants of the North Coastline Cartel and its network of affiliates were billed with criminal activities from medication trafficking to money laundering. The listing was “a that’s who” of the abyss: Daniel Mayer, Julio Tamez, the Moore cousins, Toro himself.

“He’s still available. I believe that he always remembered regarding me, the lone undercover FBI agent that crumbled the ground below his feet. I sometimes wonder if he continues to plot vengeance, his long arm still laced with muscular tissue, ready to touch me on the shoulder once more.”

Suarez endured, and the capturing made local headlines, mounted as a messed up home intrusion. Agents ultimately captured the assassin, yet he rejected to chat. No one can prove El Toro had actually purchased the hit, though Suarez never ever questioned it.

By the mid-1980s, Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar had changed the Medellín Cartel into a multinational realm, replacing coffee with cocaine as his nation’s most rewarding export and flooding America with nearly 2 million extra pounds of item a year. Miami, Suarez’s home town, ended up being the cartels’ bottom line of entry.

Suarez, an FBI unique agent with 23 years on the job, had actually dealt with Colombian narco-bosses, awesomes and smugglers, however this was various. The guy pushing a gun right into the back of his head was there to murder Suarez on his own front door, while his other half and two young kids were away.

To pass as Manny, Suarez needed to learn how to assume, act and live like a smuggler. The FBI coupled him with Diego, a cooperating witness and former pilot for the Medellín Cartel, who walked him with the cultural details that could make or break a covert legend– how to do everything from spend money (” Don’t be affordable,” Diego claimed) to make use of the right vernacular. Rather than “boy of a bitch,” for instance, a real medication smuggler would certainly state “triple hijo de puta,” roughly equated as “three-way boy of a whore.”

Funding Investigation with Cartel Money

“Not a gram of those medications ever before made it to the streets,” he writes. “We channelled every payment provided to us by the cartel back into the government’s funds. Essentially, our investigation right into the cartels was being moneyed by the cartels themselves.”

Suarez returned to San Juan in 1996 and 1997 to indicate in court, not as Manny however as Special Agent Martin Suarez.

Suarez froze. The two men at the bar were indeed government agents. They were his men, running monitoring. To Ella, it was proof the walls were enclosing. To Suarez, it was a tip of exactly how slim the line was in between survival and exposure.

“As the Battle on Medicines grew in range and relevance, also carrying out thousand-pound busts had not been going to cut it any longer,” Suarez remembers. “The cartels were making so much cash that they liquid chalked up the losses to merely an overhead expense. The FBI required to penetrate the cartels.”