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Book Drug Lords

    Book Details:
  • Author : Ron Chepesiuk
  • Publisher :
  • Release : 2005
  • ISBN : 9781903854389
  • Pages : 0 pages

Download or read book Drug Lords written by Ron Chepesiuk and published by . This book was released on 2005 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Cali drug cartel changed the face of organised crime. For over twenty years it pumped thousands of tons of cocaine across the world, laundered billions of pounds in illegal profits and was responsible for untold murders and assassinations. Based in the city of Cali, the three founders brought an unprecedented degree of organisation and planning to the drugs trade and through violence, terrorism, intimidation and bribery they became a major threat to society. For the first time the gang's founders are scrutinised and the efforts that brought them to justice are recreated.

Book Coming Clean

Download or read book Coming Clean written by Jorge L. Valdés and published by Xlibris Corporation. This book was released on 2008-05-13 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "I was a walking bankroll, wearing $150,000 worth of jewelry and carrying as much as $40,000 cash in my pockets. Yet my friends asked: "how are you doing?" I'd sometimes reply, "miserable. I hate every second of my life, and I do not know why." Jorge ValdesAll his dreams for wealth and power came true. Then the nightmare began.As a young man in his twenties with an insatiable thirst for money and power, Jorge Valdes worked his way up inside Colombia's powerful Medellin drug cartel. His key position as head of U.S. Operations brought him into direct contact with presidents, generals, Hollywood celebrities, hired killers and kidnappers. This Cuban immigrant, raised in poverty, was living the high life in more ways than one. His deeds took him from the lap of luxury to the depths of prison and back again.Then an incredible thing happened: Jorge Valdes encountered a person much more powerful than the strongest drug lord, someone who offered something more satisfying than women, drugs, money, prestige and power.Reading more like a fast paced novel of intrigue than a traditional biography, coming clean: the true story of a cocaine drug lord and his unexpected encounter offers an insider's view of the drug industry and the greed that drives it. Told that he would never be anything but a twice convicted drug dealer; today, dr. Jorge l. Valdes, who holds a master degree from Wheaton college and a PhD. In new testament studies from Loyola University in Chicago, is a renowned national speaker who brings a message of hope, forgiveness and the power to change. He has been featured in numerous magazine covers and appeared in many national and international television and radio programs.

Book Drug Lord

    Book Details:
  • Author : Terrence E. Poppa
  • Publisher : ReadHowYouWant.com
  • Release : 2011-04
  • ISBN : 1459617509
  • Pages : 514 pages

Download or read book Drug Lord written by Terrence E. Poppa and published by ReadHowYouWant.com. This book was released on 2011-04 with total page 514 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Twenty years after writing Drug Lord, Terrence Poppa decided the information in his book was more important than ever. In an important interview with the Texas Tribune, Poppa explains that ''the Mexico that I wrote about in the book describes the old order of things: Mexico under the PRI. In that sense, the book was out of date, because how drug trafficking operated under the PRI is completely different than how it works today in a new Mexico, under the democratically transformed Mexico...There has been a decoupling of the highest levels of power from drug trafficking now. It's important for people to understand that, so I had to bring the book up to date.''

Book Narcoland

    Book Details:
  • Author : Anabel Hernández
  • Publisher : Verso Books
  • Release : 2013-09-10
  • ISBN : 1781682488
  • Pages : 408 pages

Download or read book Narcoland written by Anabel Hernández and published by Verso Books. This book was released on 2013-09-10 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This “investigative magnum opus” offers a jaw-dropping history of Mexican drug cartels as it transports readers to the frontlines of the ‘war on drugs’ in Latin America (Los Angeles Times). “A riveting story . . . [from] an incredibly brave journalist.” —NPR The “war on drugs” has so far cost more than 60,000 lives. Hernández explains in riveting detail how Mexico became a base for the mega-cartels of Latin America and one of the most violent places on the planet. At every turn, Hernández names not just the narcos, but also the politicians, functionaries, judges, and entrepreneurs who have collaborated with them. In doing so, she reveals the mind-boggling depth of corruption in Mexico’s government and business elite. Hernández became a journalist after her father was kidnapped and killed and the police refused to investigate without a bribe. She gained national prominence in 2001 with her exposure of excess and misconduct at the presidential palace, and previous books have focused on criminality at the summit of power, under presidents Vicente Fox and Felipe Calderón. The product of 5 years’ investigative reporting—and the subject of intense national controversy—Narcoland is a publishing and political sensation in Mexico.

Book Drug Lord

    Book Details:
  • Author : Douglas R. Casey
  • Publisher : Highground Books, LLC
  • Release : 2017-08-30
  • ISBN : 9781947449077
  • Pages : 437 pages

Download or read book Drug Lord written by Douglas R. Casey and published by Highground Books, LLC. This book was released on 2017-08-30 with total page 437 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Famed international man and #1 bestselling author Doug Casey-in collaboration with John Hunt-releases DRUG LORD, Book 2 of the High Ground Novels. Charles Knight returns to the United States after seven years traveling the world. He embarks on two concurrent professions: one as a major investor in a small pharmaceutical company, and the other as the head of a black market drug-smuggling and -distribution operation. Charles has to sort through the legal and illegal, moral and immoral, and right and wrong as he navigates the War on Drugs and the crony pharmaceutical industry. Meet Tristana Dubocher-CEO of Charles's company (Visioryme Pharmaceuticals)-and her sniveling husband, Donald, an FDA minion. Meet Seth Fowler of the DEA, whose criminality is exceeded only by his quest for power. Get to know Rainbow, a teenage girl living on the street who runs drugs for the Alphabet Men. Their careers in the drug world are forever altered when they meet Charles. Most importantly, meet Naked Emperor, a street drug that doesn't cloud minds, but clears them. Naked Emperor prevents people from being able to lie to themselves. Anyone dependent on deception knows that this new drug will turn the world against them. Mobs of politicians, environmentalists, academics, tele-evangelists, jihadists, journalists, central bankers, Deep State actors, and crony parasites join forces to wipe Naked Emperor off the face of the planet. They all want him dead. But Charles Knight intends to start a revolution.

Book I Am a Drug Lord

    Book Details:
  • Author : Anonymous
  • Publisher : Hachette UK
  • Release : 2021-09-16
  • ISBN : 1787398218
  • Pages : 218 pages

Download or read book I Am a Drug Lord written by Anonymous and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2021-09-16 with total page 218 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A unique and unbelievable first-hand account of how one man fought his way to the top of the criminal underworld... and what he needed to do to stay there. As you read this, someone somewhere is buying drugs. Across the globe, millions of people are involved in the brutal, cold-blooded world of drug dealing, but only a small number make life-changing money. Only a few get to the top, make the calls, know how it all works and truly become drugs lords. And even fewer survive. I know because I am one of those drug lords. After thirty years, I've decided to retire and tell the story of how I got to the top of this tainted profession, what's involved in being a serious criminal, the tricks of the trade, the art of the deal and what it really takes to stay alive for so long. This will be my last confession. And I hope you learn something.

Book The Last Narco

Download or read book The Last Narco written by Malcolm Beith and published by Open Road + Grove/Atlantic. This book was released on 2010-09-07 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Malcolm Beith risked life and limb to tell the inside story of Joaquín ‘El Chapo’ Guzmán Loera, Mexico’s notorious drug capo.” —George W. Grayson, author of Mexico: Narco-Violence and a Failed State? The dense hills of Sinaloa, Mexico, were home to the most powerful drug lord since Pablo Escobar: Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman. Guzman was among the world’s ten most wanted men and also appeared on Forbes magazine’s 2009 billionaire list. With his massive wealth, his army of professional killers, and a network of informants that reached into the highest levels of government, catching Guzman was once considered impossible Newly isolated by infighting amongst the cartels, and with Mexican and DEA authorities closing in, El Chapo was vulnerable as never before. Newsweek correspondent Malcolm Beith had spent years reporting on the drug wars and followed the chase with full access to senior officials and exclusive interviews with soldiers and drug traffickers in the region, including members of Guzman’s cartel. The Last Narco combines fearless reporting with the story of El Chapo’s legendary rise from a poor farming family to the “capo” of the world’s largest drug empire. “The Last Narco gracefully captures the heroic struggle of those who dare to stand up to the cartels, and the ways those cartels have tragically corrupted every aspect of Mexican law enforcement.” —Laura Bickford, producer, Traffic

Book El Chapo

Download or read book El Chapo written by Noah Hurowitz and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2023-10-31 with total page 464 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A stunning investigation of the life and legend of Mexican kingpin Joaquín Archivaldo “El Chapo” Guzmán Loera, building on Noah Hurowitz’s revelatory coverage for Rolling Stone of El Chapo’s federal drug-trafficking trial. This is the true story of how El Chapo built the world’s wealthiest and most powerful drug-trafficking operation, based on months’ worth of trial testimony and dozens of interviews with cartel gunmen, Mexican journalists and political figures, Chapo’s family members, and the DEA agents who brought him down. Over the course of three decades, El Chapo was responsible for smuggling hundreds of tons of cocaine, marijuana, heroin, meth, and fentanyl around the world, becoming in the process the most celebrated and reviled drug lord since Pablo Escobar. El Chapo waged ruthless wars against his rivals and former allies, plunging vast areas of Mexico into unprecedented levels of violence, even as many in his home state of Sinaloa continued to view him as a hero. This unputdownable book, written by a great new talent, brings El Chapo’s exploits into a focus that previous profiles have failed to capture. Hurowitz digs in deep beyond the legends and delves into El Chapo’s life and legacy—not just the hunt for him, revealing some of the most dramatic and often horrifying moments of his notorious career, including the infamous prison escapes, brutal murders, multi-million-dollar government payoffs, and the paranoia and narcissism that led to his downfall. From the evolution of organized crime in Mexico to the militarization of the drug war to the devastation wrought on both sides of the border by the introduction of synthetic opioids like fentanyl, this book is a gripping and comprehensive work of investigative, on-the-ground reporting.

Book Narconomics

    Book Details:
  • Author : Tom Wainwright
  • Publisher : PublicAffairs
  • Release : 2016-02-23
  • ISBN : 1610395840
  • Pages : 289 pages

Download or read book Narconomics written by Tom Wainwright and published by PublicAffairs. This book was released on 2016-02-23 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Picking his way through Andean cocaine fields, Central American prisons, Colorado pot shops, and the online drug dens of the Dark Web, Tom Wainwright provides a fresh, innovative look into the drug trade and its 250 million customers. More than just an investigation of how drug cartels do business, Narconomics is also a blueprint for how to defeat them. How does a budding cartel boss succeed (and survive) in the 300 billion illegal drug business? By learning from the best, of course. From creating brand value to fine-tuning customer service, the folks running cartels have been attentive students of the strategy and tactics used by corporations such as Walmart, McDonald's, and Coca-Cola. And what can government learn to combat this scourge? By analyzing the cartels as companies, law enforcers might better understand how they work -- and stop throwing away 100 billion a year in a futile effort to win the "war" against this global, highly organized business. Your intrepid guide to the most exotic and brutal industry on earth is Tom Wainwright. Picking his way through Andean cocaine fields, Central American prisons, Colorado pot shops, and the online drug dens of the Dark Web, Wainwright provides a fresh, innovative look into the drug trade and its 250 million customers. The cast of characters includes "Bin Laden," the Bolivian coca guide; Old Lin," the Salvadoran gang leader; "Starboy," the millionaire New Zealand pill maker; and a cozy Mexican grandmother who cooks blueberry pancakes while plotting murder. Along with presidents, cops, and teenage hitmen, they explain such matters as the business purpose for head-to-toe tattoos, how gangs decide whether to compete or collude, and why cartels care a surprising amount about corporate social responsibility. More than just an investigation of how drug cartels do business, Narconomics is also a blueprint for how to defeat them.

Book Speculator

    Book Details:
  • Author : John Hunt
  • Publisher : Highground Books
  • Release : 2016-09-27
  • ISBN : 9780985933258
  • Pages : pages

Download or read book Speculator written by John Hunt and published by Highground Books. This book was released on 2016-09-27 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Halfway between Frederick Forsyth's Dogs of War and Ayn Rand's Fountainhead. The gold mine in the jungle, the mercenaries, and the child soldiers keep you turning the pages. A morality tale with modern twists." -John Mackey (Founder, Whole Foods Market and author of Conscious Capitalism) The greatest gold discovery in history draws a young Charles Knight to West Africa, where he unearths deception, violence, and romance. Xander Winn-a Dutchman on his own mission-mentors Charles on his voyage into the world of speculation and African politics. But a psychopathic rebel leader, the purveyors of a six-billion-dollar fraud, a team of mercenaries bent on early retirement, and the US government all get in his way. Everyone wants him dead. But Charles plans to strike it rich. ADVANCE PRAISE FOR SPECULATOR "Speculator uses the cover of a thrilling tale of international intrigue to provide an economic and moral defense of the much-maligned speculator and an economic and moral condemnation of those who profit via force and fraud. Doug Casey and John Hunt have provided an invaluable service to those looking for unique ways to spread the ideas of liberty." -Dr. Ron Paul "Speculator may prove to be the first in a new genre of fiction. Give this book to all your friends and enemies." -John Hart (Author of Redemption Road) "Adventure... intrigue... philosophy... politics... you'll find it all in this fast-paced novel from Doug Casey and John Hunt. Most important, you'll find thoughts - the kind of thoughts that will make you think too." -Bill Bonner (Author of Empire of Debt and Mobs, Messiahs, and Markets) "Speculator will keep you thinking long past the conclusion and for years to come."-Robert Ringer (Author of Looking Out for #1 and Winning Through Intimidation) "Speculator is a roller-coaster lesson on the arcane world of gold-mine investing. An African revolution, massive fraud with massive profits and losses-the novel is such fun you don't notice how much you are learning. But, mostly, it is a good read with a unique protagonist." -Wendy McElroy (Author of Liberty for Women) "Move over John Galt and Humphrey Bogart, Speculator has created an old-fashioned hero with contemporary style and sex appeal. Expert cicerones lead us through the dark world of African mining and international finance. It is a riveting tale, perfect for a day at the beach or a long-winter's-night read. Pure gold." -Richard Harteis (Author of Marathon and Publishing Director of Poets-Choice.com) "Passionately pointed and provocative."-David Brin (Author of Earth and The Postman) "Speculator combines the fast-paced action of a Dirk Pitt adventure story with the cerebral message of an Ayn Rand novel. The authors' knowledge of how markets, mining, and governments work is impressive, yet the book reads like a day at the beach. Crisp, intelligent, and witty, this new adventure series might even out-Rand Rand." -Jo Ann Skousen (Professor of English Literature, Chapman University)

Book Lessons From a Drug Lord

Download or read book Lessons From a Drug Lord written by Shaun Attwood and published by HBG. This book was released on 2014-04-15 with total page 103 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A self-help book like no other. From the author of the best-selling Hard Time, and seen on Locked Up Abroad, Shaun Attwood took his business degree to Phoenix, Arizona, where he became an award winning stockbroker and then a millionaire day trader during the dot-com bubble. But Shaun became greedy and lost sight of what was important. He threw raves and distributed Ecstacy grossing $25 million. Before being convicted of money laundering and drug dealing, he served 26 months in the infamous jail system run by the notorious Sheriff Joe Arpaio. Lessons From a Drug Lord is his account of the time Shaun spent submerged in a nightmarish world of drugs and gangs, insect infested cells with food unfit for animas and the lessons he learned from his choices. His teachings will force you to re-examine your life and what is truly important.

Book Rayful Edmond

    Book Details:
  • Author : Seth Ferranti
  • Publisher :
  • Release : 2013
  • ISBN : 9780988976009
  • Pages : 0 pages

Download or read book Rayful Edmond written by Seth Ferranti and published by . This book was released on 2013 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: They called Rayful Edmond the 300 million dollar man. He was the king of cocaine in our nation's capital in the mid to late 80s and he ushered in the crack era in Washington DC, turning the streets of the Chocolate City into a much deadlier place. Instead of remaining a street star forever and elevating to a place in the pantheon of gangster legends Rayful tarnished his legacy by turning government informant after he was incarcerated at USP Lewisburg. By continuing to flood the capital's streets with cocaine, even after he was put in prison, his epitaph was written and on the headstone it read Rat. Still in the chronicles of gangster lore he holds a place as one of the most notorious and infamous to ever do it in Washington DC. Read his story of extravagance, drug dealing escapades, unlimited cash flow and unbridled gangsterism. This is the Rayful Edmond story as told by members of his crew and others that were there in the era.

Book Hunting El Chapo

    Book Details:
  • Author : Andrew Hogan
  • Publisher : HarperCollins
  • Release : 2018-04-03
  • ISBN : 0062663097
  • Pages : 378 pages

Download or read book Hunting El Chapo written by Andrew Hogan and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2018-04-03 with total page 378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The DEA agent who caught El Chapo recounts the high-stakes, seven-year manhunt in this “cinematic . . . captivating first-person account” (USA Today). Once a smalltown Kansas deputy sheriff, Andrew Hogan landed a job with the Drug Enforcement Administration, never imagining that he would eventually be put on the trail of Joaquín Archivaldo Guzmán Loera a.k.a. El Chapo: the leader of Mexico’s Sinaloa Cartel and Public Enemy Number One in the United States. Six years later, Hogan links up with agents from Homeland Security Investigations to infiltrate Chapo’s intricate and sophisticated underworld network . . . But who can they trust with their intel? Will the details of their top secret operation leak back to Chapo before the hunt even begins? Hunting El Chapo follows Special Agent Hogan from the investigation’s beginnings to leading a white-knuckle manhunt through the cartel’s stronghold of Sinaloa. Andrew Hogan and Douglas Century’s cinematic crime story follows every beat of the relentless search, taking the reader behind the scenes on one of the most dangerous counter-narcotics operations in the history of the United States and Mexico.

Book The Mastermind

    Book Details:
  • Author : Evan Ratliff
  • Publisher : Random House
  • Release : 2019-01-29
  • ISBN : 0399590420
  • Pages : 480 pages

Download or read book The Mastermind written by Evan Ratliff and published by Random House. This book was released on 2019-01-29 with total page 480 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The incredible true story of the decade-long quest to bring down Paul Le Roux—the creator of a frighteningly powerful Internet-enabled cartel who merged the ruthlessness of a drug lord with the technological savvy of a Silicon Valley entrepreneur. “A tour de force of shoe-leather reporting—undertaken, amid threats and menacing, at considerable personal risk.”—Los Angeles Times NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The New York Times Book Review • NPR • Evening Standard • Kirkus Reviews It all started as an online prescription drug network, supplying hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of painkillers to American customers. It would not stop there. Before long, the business had turned into a sprawling multinational conglomerate engaged in almost every conceivable aspect of criminal mayhem. Yachts carrying $100 million in cocaine. Safe houses in Hong Kong filled with gold bars. Shipments of methamphetamine from North Korea. Weapons deals with Iran. Mercenary armies in Somalia. Teams of hit men in the Philippines. Encryption programs so advanced that the government could not break them. The man behind it all, pulling the strings from a laptop in Manila, was Paul Calder Le Roux—a reclusive programmer turned criminal genius who could only exist in the networked world of the twenty-first century, and the kind of self-made crime boss that American law enforcement had never imagined. For half a decade, DEA agents played a global game of cat-and-mouse with Le Roux as he left terror and chaos in his wake. Each time they came close, he would slip away. It would take relentless investigative work, and a shocking betrayal from within his organization, to catch him. And when he was finally caught, the story turned again, as Le Roux struck a deal to bring down his own organization and the people he had once employed. Award-winning investigative journalist Evan Ratliff spent four years piecing together this intricate puzzle, chasing Le Roux’s empire and his shadowy henchmen around the world, conducting hundreds of interviews and uncovering thousands of documents. The result is a riveting, unprecedented account of a crime boss built by and for the digital age. Praise for The Mastermind “The Mastermind is true crime at its most stark and vivid depiction. Evan Ratliff’s work is well done from beginning to end, paralleling his investigative work with the work of the many federal agents developing the case against LeRoux.”—San Francisco Book Review (five stars) “A wholly engrossing story that joins the worlds of El Chapo and Edward Snowden; both disturbing and memorable.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

Book El Chapo

    Book Details:
  • Author : Terry Burrows
  • Publisher : Arcturus Publishing
  • Release : 2020-10-09
  • ISBN : 1839405244
  • Pages : 297 pages

Download or read book El Chapo written by Terry Burrows and published by Arcturus Publishing. This book was released on 2020-10-09 with total page 297 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The diminutive Joaquín Guzmán Loera, known universally by his nickname of 'El Chapo' ('Shorty' in Spanish), is the highest-profile narco-terrorist since the demise of Pablo Escobar in the 1990s. Loera began work at the age of nine as a gomero - a farmhand harvesting opium - and as he grew up he shot and murdered his way to the top. In 2009, he made the Forbes annual billionaires list and, before his capture by Mexican marines in 2016, the Sinaloa cartel which he commanded was turning over more than $11 billion in annual sales to North America, supplying more than 10 per cent of all illegal narcotics used on that continent. This made him Public Enemy Number One in the USA. El Chapo was among the most powerful individuals in the world. In Sinaloa, he was a folk hero and the subject of popular songs known as 'narcocorridos'. Meanwhile, America's Drug Enforcement Agency (the DEA) had sworn to hunt him down. Featuring the remarkable tale of El Chapo's arrest in Guatemala in 1993, how he continued to run his cartel from his cell in a Mexican jail and his subsequent escape in a prison laundry cart, along with his recapture in 2014, and ultimate extradition to the US for the Trial of the Century, this book gives you the inside track on the dog-eat-dog world of international drugs trafficking.

Book Gangster Warlords

    Book Details:
  • Author : Ioan Grillo
  • Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing USA
  • Release : 2016-01-19
  • ISBN : 1620403803
  • Pages : 384 pages

Download or read book Gangster Warlords written by Ioan Grillo and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2016-01-19 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Without this testimony, we simply cannot grasp what is going on . . . Americans would do well to read [Gangster Warlords]." --The New York Times Book Review, Editor's Choice From the author of El Narco, the shocking story of the men at the heads of cartels throughout Latin America: what drives them, what sustains their power, and how they might be brought down. In a ranch south of Texas, the man known as The Executioner dumps five hundred body parts in metal barrels. In Brazil's biggest city, a mysterious prisoner orders hit-men to gun down forty-one police officers and prison guards in two days. In southern Mexico, a meth maker is venerated as a saint while enforcing Old Testament justice on his enemies. A new kind of criminal kingpin has arisen: part CEO, part terrorist, and part rock star, unleashing guerrilla attacks, strong-arming governments, and taking over much of the world's trade in narcotics, guns, and humans. What they do affects you now--from the gas in your car, to the gold in your jewelry, to the tens of thousands of Latin Americans calling for refugee status in the U.S. Gangster Warlords is the first definitive account of the crime wars now wracking Central and South America and the Caribbean, regions largely abandoned by the U.S. after the Cold War. Author of the critically acclaimed El Narco, Ioan Grillo has covered Latin America since 2001 and gained access to every level of the cartel chain of command in what he calls the new battlefields of the Americas. Moving between militia-controlled ghettos and the halls of top policy-makers, Grillo provides a disturbing new understanding of a war that has spiraled out of control--one that people across the political spectrum need to confront now.

Book The Dope  The Real History of the Mexican Drug Trade

Download or read book The Dope The Real History of the Mexican Drug Trade written by Benjamin T. Smith and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2021-08-10 with total page 562 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A myth-busting, 100-year history of the Mexican drug trade that reveals how an industry founded by farmers and village healers became dominated by cartels and kingpins. The Mexican drug trade has inspired prejudiced narratives of a war between north and south, white and brown; between noble cops and vicious kingpins, corrupt politicians and powerful cartels. In this first comprehensive history of the trade, historian Benjamin T. Smith tells the real story of how and why this one-peaceful industry turned violent. He uncovers its origins and explains how this illicit business essentially built modern Mexico, affecting everything from agriculture to medicine to economics—and the country’s all-important relationship with the United States. Drawing on unprecedented archival research; leaked DEA, Mexican law enforcement, and cartel documents; and dozens of harrowing interviews, Smith tells a thrilling story brimming with vivid characters—from Ignacia “La Nacha” Jasso, “queen pin” of Ciudad Juárez, to Dr. Leopoldo Salazar Viniegra, the crusading physician who argued that marijuana was harmless and tried to decriminalize morphine, to Harry Anslinger, the Machiavellian founder of the American Federal Bureau of Narcotics, who drummed up racist drug panics to increase his budget. Smith also profiles everyday agricultural workers, whose stories reveal both the economic benefits and the human cost of the trade. The Dope contains many surprising conclusions about drug use and the failure of drug enforcement, all backed by new research and data. Smith explains the complicated dynamics that drive the current drug war violence, probes the U.S.-backed policies that have inflamed the carnage, and explores corruption on both sides of the border. A dark morality tale about the American hunger for intoxication and the necessities of human survival, The Dope is essential for understanding the violence in the drug war and how decades-old myths shape Mexico in the American imagination today.