Medellin Metamorphosis
3-19-1994
^With Cocaine King Gone, Relative Peace Returns to Medellin
^By ANDREW SELSKY
^Associated Press Writer
MEDELLIN, Colombia (AP) _ Its violent drug cartel reduced to a branch office of its one-time rivals, Medellin is breathing easier and bleeding less.
Mobsters from the city of Cali crushed much of the empire built by cocaine king Pablo Escobar and, according to a law enforcement source, have swallowed up the rest since Escobar's death in December.
While Escobar waged a bloody war with the state, using terrorist bomb attacks and assassinating hundreds of politicians, judges and police, the Cali cartel is less confrontational.
The Cali organization, now by far the world's largest cocaine trafficking group, has a reputation for being more selective in assassination and for preferring bribes to bombs.
Escobar's Dec. 2 death in a police raid on a safe house, after a lengthy manhunt that drove him deep underground and helped cripple his cartel, was hailed as a victory for the forces of law and peace.
"The city has won," said Mayor Luis Alfredo Ramos, citing a 30 percent drop in the murder rate from 1992 to 1993. He declares the dark days over.
Peace is relative in Medellin, however. Two months ago, a former senator, Alejandro Gonzalez, was killed in Medellin. The Cali cartel is suspected.
The Medellin and Cali cartels feuded for years in a steady bloodletting. The Cali gangsters took advantage of the hunt for Escobar to devastate his organization. They are suspected of having worked with police in tracking down key Escobar associates, many of whom were killed.
According to a law enforcement official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, the Cali group then assumed effective control over what remained of the Medellin cartel, which for many years reigned as the world's biggest cocaine smuggling organization.
The Medellin traffickers operate with the permission of the Cali bosses and must pay dues: sharing profits, laboratories or transportation systems, or some other tribute, the official said.
"Medellin cartel members had one choice: collaborate with the Cali cartel and become a tentacle of the Cali cartel or die," he said.
In his war with the state during the late 1980s and early 1990s, Escobar turned this delightful metropolis of broad boulevards, colonial houses and office towers into a fearful place, where bombs could tear apart buildings and cars and shred bodies in an instant.
With an average of 20 people murdered daily, few people went out at night.
"We would scurry from the office to our homes," said Chamber of Commerce President Francisco Piedrahita. "The bars and dance halls were all empty."
Hotels were also virtually empty, with luxury establishments giving away rooms at Days Inn rates.
Now the hotels - with many rooms going for $200 a night - are filling to capacity, and at least four more are being built. Revelers jam bars and discos.
But not all Medellin residents applauded Escobar's demise.
In the slums perched on the green mountain ranges along Medellin's northern end, Escobar gained a following because he broke the bonds of a lower middle- class background and forged a multibillion-dollar empire, fought the state which had ignored the poor, and built neighborhoods for the under-privileged.
The Medellin cartel recruited young slum dwellers as hit men, who grasped at bounties the cartel paid for assassinations as a way out of poverty.
The poverty remains, and so do the now-unemployed cartel assassins and would-be assassins, who lie in the slums like bullets in a revolver, waiting for the trigger to be pulled.
"Opportunities are few," said Daverson Ortiz, a former gang member from a poor neighborhood.
For Medellin resident Beatriz Suarez, the main fear is the Medellin cartel somehow resurrecting itself and bringing back the days of terror.
"We have suffered too much for that to happen again," said Ms. Suarez. She was one of several people to stop by Escobar's grave out of curiosity on a recent sunny morning.
The grave is marked by a simple white headstone and surrounded by yellow lilies. It gives an impression of peace.
^With Cocaine King Gone, Relative Peace Returns to Medellin
^By ANDREW SELSKY
^Associated Press Writer
MEDELLIN, Colombia (AP) _ Its violent drug cartel reduced to a branch office of its one-time rivals, Medellin is breathing easier and bleeding less.
Mobsters from the city of Cali crushed much of the empire built by cocaine king Pablo Escobar and, according to a law enforcement source, have swallowed up the rest since Escobar's death in December.
While Escobar waged a bloody war with the state, using terrorist bomb attacks and assassinating hundreds of politicians, judges and police, the Cali cartel is less confrontational.
The Cali organization, now by far the world's largest cocaine trafficking group, has a reputation for being more selective in assassination and for preferring bribes to bombs.
Escobar's Dec. 2 death in a police raid on a safe house, after a lengthy manhunt that drove him deep underground and helped cripple his cartel, was hailed as a victory for the forces of law and peace.
"The city has won," said Mayor Luis Alfredo Ramos, citing a 30 percent drop in the murder rate from 1992 to 1993. He declares the dark days over.
Peace is relative in Medellin, however. Two months ago, a former senator, Alejandro Gonzalez, was killed in Medellin. The Cali cartel is suspected.
The Medellin and Cali cartels feuded for years in a steady bloodletting. The Cali gangsters took advantage of the hunt for Escobar to devastate his organization. They are suspected of having worked with police in tracking down key Escobar associates, many of whom were killed.
According to a law enforcement official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, the Cali group then assumed effective control over what remained of the Medellin cartel, which for many years reigned as the world's biggest cocaine smuggling organization.
The Medellin traffickers operate with the permission of the Cali bosses and must pay dues: sharing profits, laboratories or transportation systems, or some other tribute, the official said.
"Medellin cartel members had one choice: collaborate with the Cali cartel and become a tentacle of the Cali cartel or die," he said.
In his war with the state during the late 1980s and early 1990s, Escobar turned this delightful metropolis of broad boulevards, colonial houses and office towers into a fearful place, where bombs could tear apart buildings and cars and shred bodies in an instant.
With an average of 20 people murdered daily, few people went out at night.
"We would scurry from the office to our homes," said Chamber of Commerce President Francisco Piedrahita. "The bars and dance halls were all empty."
Hotels were also virtually empty, with luxury establishments giving away rooms at Days Inn rates.
Now the hotels - with many rooms going for $200 a night - are filling to capacity, and at least four more are being built. Revelers jam bars and discos.
But not all Medellin residents applauded Escobar's demise.
In the slums perched on the green mountain ranges along Medellin's northern end, Escobar gained a following because he broke the bonds of a lower middle- class background and forged a multibillion-dollar empire, fought the state which had ignored the poor, and built neighborhoods for the under-privileged.
The Medellin cartel recruited young slum dwellers as hit men, who grasped at bounties the cartel paid for assassinations as a way out of poverty.
The poverty remains, and so do the now-unemployed cartel assassins and would-be assassins, who lie in the slums like bullets in a revolver, waiting for the trigger to be pulled.
"Opportunities are few," said Daverson Ortiz, a former gang member from a poor neighborhood.
For Medellin resident Beatriz Suarez, the main fear is the Medellin cartel somehow resurrecting itself and bringing back the days of terror.
"We have suffered too much for that to happen again," said Ms. Suarez. She was one of several people to stop by Escobar's grave out of curiosity on a recent sunny morning.
The grave is marked by a simple white headstone and surrounded by yellow lilies. It gives an impression of peace.
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