Pieter Tritton, a former cocaine smuggler, speaks with Business Insider about trafficking cocaine from Ecuador to Europe through a cartel connection. Tritton was arrested in Ecuador and sentenced to 12 years in one of the world's most violent and corrupt prisons.
David McMillan is a British Australian former drug smuggler. He trafficked heroin through Southeast and Central Asia. He was arrested numerous times between the '80s and 2012, and he estimates he trafficked over $17 million worth of heroin internationally. He is now an author and speaker on drug-policy reform.
Adi Jaffe was a crystal meth dealer in Los Angeles, purchasing his supply from local meth labs and making his way up to dealing with Mexican cartels. After leaving prison, Jaffe attained his doctorate degree in psychology. He now lectures at the University of California, Los Angeles, and runs a practice called IGNTD, which takes a unique approach to addiction recovery.
Shaun Attwood is a former drug smuggler who ran a successful ring trafficking MDMA pills in the US in the '90s. He was arrested in 2002 and served six years in US jails. Attwood published his life story as the "English Shaun Trilogy" and talks to audiences around the UK and Europe about prison reform.
Neil Woods spent 14 years as an undercover police officer infiltrating some of the most dangerous organized-crime groups in the UK. He speaks with BI about his experience with drug-dealing gangs and how the drug market works. Woods is now a board member of the Law Enforcement Action Partnership, an American nonprofit.
David McMillan is a British Australian former drug smuggler. He trafficked heroin through Southeast and Central Asia. He was arrested numerous times between the '80s and 2012, and he estimates he trafficked over $17 million worth of heroin internationally. He is now an author and speaker on drug-policy reform.
Adi Jaffe was a crystal meth dealer in Los Angeles, purchasing his supply from local meth labs and making his way up to dealing with Mexican cartels. After leaving prison, Jaffe attained his doctorate degree in psychology. He now lectures at the University of California, Los Angeles, and runs a practice called IGNTD, which takes a unique approach to addiction recovery.
Shaun Attwood is a former drug smuggler who ran a successful ring trafficking MDMA pills in the US in the '90s. He was arrested in 2002 and served six years in US jails. Attwood published his life story as the "English Shaun Trilogy" and talks to audiences around the UK and Europe about prison reform.
Neil Woods spent 14 years as an undercover police officer infiltrating some of the most dangerous organized-crime groups in the UK. He speaks with BI about his experience with drug-dealing gangs and how the drug market works. Woods is now a board member of the Law Enforcement Action Partnership, an American nonprofit.
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00:00:00 My name is Dr. Adit Jaffee and I'm an ex-meth distributor who sold hundreds of pounds of meth. This is how crime works
00:00:06 Being a meth dealer sleeping in bed with the meth pipe next to you and a gun right to your right and
00:00:15 With hundreds of thousands of drugs in your closet is an insane endpoint. It's not normal
00:00:21 It was like my life got a hard reset. I mean I had to go right to the beginning
00:00:26 I
00:00:28 Started selling meth because clients of mine wanted access to meth and so I started out buying very small amounts from street dealers that I
00:00:39 Knew personally so an eight ball, which is three and a half grams at a time the labs
00:00:44 I saw in Southern, California were a joke
00:00:46 Compared to even the makeshift labs that Walter had in the RV and breaking bad. They were using pots and pans
00:00:54 They were using cups and glasses
00:00:56 It looked like a more typical idea of a messy kitchen that you would see in somebody who was addicted to meth than an actual
00:01:04 lab, you know, they rarely had
00:01:06 glass beakers or flasks or anything of the sort the easiest way to describe the smell of a
00:01:12 Meth lab is an incredibly strong ammonia smell that will literally feel like it can burn the hairs
00:01:20 Inside of your nose, right so you could tell the moment you walked into a room or somebody was making meth
00:01:24 Sometimes you would cough right away if you didn't have a mask on you or you know
00:01:29 It would make your eyes water even the smaller labs really took care to put these small kind of hoods or fans right above
00:01:36 their main reactions in order to port out the gases and you'd have the cook and
00:01:42 Then the one or two people were helping and make sure that this was done. So air B&Bs and short-term rentals are
00:01:49 Incredibly easy places to set this stuff up because really all we need is a day or two of setup
00:01:54 manufacturing and breakdown and you can leave you wouldn't really leave much of a mark as
00:01:58 Long as somebody had enough time to air out the space and the smell wasn't there anymore
00:02:02 The other thing that is incredible about using things like air B&Bs is you get to move from place to place
00:02:07 Which is then really hard to detect because even if a neighbor does notice
00:02:11 That there's a pipe out of a window or something like that. You know if it's only there for a day or two and then
00:02:16 it leaves
00:02:17 Nobody would know all the labs that I saw were locally here in Los Angeles for a very long time
00:02:22 But when drug busts started happening in earnest in the late 90s and early 2000s of drug labs everywhere in Southern, California
00:02:29 People started moving them outside of the city and they gradually moved closer and closer to some of the supply sources
00:02:36 They had for some of the ingredients, right? And so it was well known in farming communities for a while that you had to guard your
00:02:42 nitrogen rich
00:02:44 fertilizer supplies because meth dealers and manufacturers would go and steal
00:02:49 kilos and kilos if not
00:02:52 You know truck fulls
00:02:53 Worth of the stuff and then bring it back in order to be able to go manufacture their meth the people that I knew that
00:02:58 Manufactured had at least one
00:03:00 I'll call the lab or what it really was was either a van that was hollowed out in the back or a full RV
00:03:06 The idea in a way being that if you drive that nobody can detect the fuse
00:03:10 The only thing that a lot of them forgot was that when you're driving nothing is stable a handful of them actually to experience
00:03:16 flare-ups and one actual explosion that I know
00:03:19 Everybody that I saw manufacturing meth was using the ephedrine method
00:03:27 One of the first things you have to do is you have to get the ephedrine out of the pseudofed pills, right?
00:03:32 And so then that ephedrine is put progressively into additional
00:03:36 chemical
00:03:38 interactions in the end where you end up with is
00:03:40 Essentially a large pot in most of these of a clear liquid that has the solvents in it
00:03:46 And then the next step is really drying that product in order to get the end powder. That is what everybody consumes
00:03:52 These were highly detailed very protected recipes that were
00:03:58 Guarded by this cook with the same sort of zeal you hear about coca-cola guarding their original
00:04:05 Recipe right because this was their leverage the secrets were in limiting people's knowledge about how to do what was otherwise
00:04:12 Replicable in a world of drug addiction and crime and sort of the underbelly of society
00:04:19 these cooks had
00:04:21 Standing a smurf was the name given essentially to a meth manufacturing
00:04:26 Runner the most small-time dealers that I knew would employ 10 15 even 20 smurfs
00:04:32 So they would go out to the stores and buy the lie
00:04:34 They would go steal whatever it is. That was required for the manufacturing
00:04:39 especially going to pharmacy after pharmacy after pharmacy to secure
00:04:44 individual packages of
00:04:46 pseudofed the idea of being able to go run around get some ingredients work for a couple of days and make ten or fifteen thousand
00:04:52 Dollars was highly attractive. And so
00:04:54 Everybody was always trying to get their hand on a good recipe
00:04:57 there's absolutely a connection between the method of cooking the meth itself the impurities that exist in it after and
00:05:05 actually the quality of the meth itself, so
00:05:07 When I was starting out in the meth game in the late 1990s
00:05:12 There was this some lore about p2p meth at the time
00:05:15 That was the stuff everybody wanted that meth had a blue tint to it
00:05:19 So everybody was always looking for blue meth, which was what was so ironic about breaking bad when they started, you know
00:05:25 Introducing this story of blue meth
00:05:27 Supposedly created by Walter. That was what I knew as the best meth you could get from the stories in my dealing days
00:05:32 The demand among my customers grew my dealer couldn't really supply me anymore
00:05:42 So what ended up happening is we would go on together on deals
00:05:45 We ended up going together to meet his dealer a woman named who lived in
00:05:51 Downtown LA and a massive warehouse with about 12 other people, you know at the time a pound went for about ten thousand dollars or so
00:05:58 So they were pretty expensive pounds. I would come in to buy as much product as they could I would leave there with you know
00:06:04 a pound a pound and a half if they had really done a great job of
00:06:08 Manufacturing and so they would be left with about fifteen thousand dollars for me. There was a hierarchy
00:06:13 He always got paid in money and it was always cash
00:06:16 Once got paid you could tell that there were a couple of other people who actually got money and the rest of people literally
00:06:21 relied on free meth supplies
00:06:24 To do the work, you know
00:06:26 the labs that I knew didn't get robbed the drugs came in quickly and they left quickly because
00:06:30 There was the need to distribute them as in the moment that they were made
00:06:34 What did happen much more often was when drug dealers would actually get robbed. So after the drugs would get delivered
00:06:40 Because they're gonna have a supply on them. So the risk of being robbed actually happened much more often
00:06:45 Obviously the dark web is a huge part of this to make it so much more difficult to identify
00:06:51 Track let alone apprehend and stop it to source any of this manufacturing or distribution
00:06:58 The supply was really really unreliable and what that would mean is one month there would be all the meth I wanted and then other
00:07:11 times it would either be incredibly dirty and
00:07:13 impure or they just wouldn't have any back in the day where they were making this with a fedrin pills when they were starting to
00:07:18 Crack down on a fedrin pills in the US as restrictions started coming up about
00:07:22 Being able to buy eight packs and then four packs and then two packs eventually one pack of Sudafed at a time
00:07:28 Which really choked the supply and so like any good
00:07:31 Salesperson trying to sell any product, you know legal or otherwise. I started looking for other suppliers and
00:07:39 Through a person who was selling me cocaine at the time. I got introduced to another contact
00:07:45 So I had to drive down to Orange County to go to a strip club and then somebody walks up to you
00:07:50 Make sure that you are who you say you are check your ID
00:07:53 He gives me an address and he tells me to get back in my car and eventually you find ourselves on a dirt road
00:07:57 This was my first meeting with the actual cartel people and it was the classic meeting
00:08:02 You've seen in every single movie in your life, which was I got out with the money
00:08:06 They got out on the other side, but that they had three guys
00:08:08 Obviously with weapons on them and we walked into the middle. I gave him the bag of money
00:08:14 They gave me the bag of drugs one of the big things about
00:08:17 Dealing with the cartels directly is they were really reliable every single time that I contacted them letting him know that I needed product
00:08:25 It wasn't a problem. I never needed another one because they could always supply what I needed
00:08:35 At this point over 90% of the methamphetamine sold and used in the United States has been manufactured in
00:08:42 Mexican super labs, I believe that given the incredible proliferation of these super labs south of the border
00:08:48 It's become almost redundant to have local labs. The manufacturing is easier. It's more reliable
00:08:54 The product is cheaper at scale
00:08:57 They can absolutely employ real talent so they can hire real chemists and people who really know what to do at the higher levels
00:09:04 But as you go downstream, they're offering sometimes pretty well-paying jobs
00:09:09 Given what else is available in the surroundings you need a lot more money in the US
00:09:13 To buy your way out of law enforcement regulation. We all know it's doable. It's just a lot more expensive in
00:09:21 Mexico, it's much much cheaper to buy enough police power in your pockets. So
00:09:27 these meth
00:09:29 Super labs the relative super labs, right? They're making thousands or maybe tens of thousands of pounds a year
00:09:35 So there's been a huge shift back to P2P meth in the United States and in Mexico P2P meth
00:09:41 Actually ends up being stronger than a fedrin based meth
00:09:45 creating massive problems mental health issues
00:09:48 larger
00:09:50 Incidents of things like psychosis from meth etc. And that's creating a bigger crisis around meth use right now than we've seen in a long time
00:09:58 The
00:10:00 Honest answer as to why I stopped selling drugs is I didn't see a way where I could keep doing it and
00:10:09 Still live a life that was outside of gates
00:10:14 Everybody that I knew who sold drugs ended up either dead or in prison at some point
00:10:20 I never saw anybody get out of that world
00:10:23 Intact I got in my motorcycle accident in 2001 and I got found with it was cocaine
00:10:30 but I got found with a half a pound of cocaine on me and police knew that
00:10:34 somebody with a half a pound of cocaine in their
00:10:37 jacket knows somebody who sells drugs a quantity they obviously searched the entire place right and
00:10:43 started looking through the walls looking through the
00:10:46 ducts the AC ducts and they found toxic chemicals because one of my friends who was
00:10:51 Manufacturing meth actually left some of the chemicals in my house
00:10:53 I had a lock pick kit and that was illegal to carry
00:10:56 I had a gun that was loaded by my bed and you get a violation for every single substance
00:11:03 You have an I she even on top of that picked up two chargers for the manufacturing of methamphetamine and MDMA
00:11:09 We had a pill press at my place where we were pressing MDMA pills
00:11:13 so initially I was looking about 15 to 18 years and
00:11:17 My lawyer immediately that day told me one thing it's clear
00:11:21 You're addicted to these drugs, right?
00:11:23 Everybody can see it on you if this judge doesn't see that you're serious about changing the direction your life is going in
00:11:28 You're gonna get the full thing. You're gonna get 15 to 18 years in prison. I
00:11:33 Think that was the only way to sell me on treatment honestly at the time
00:11:37 And so I listened to the judge and I went to a rehab in Pasadena here in Southern, California
00:11:43 So we did something called an open plea which actually meant I had to plead guilty to all nine felonies
00:11:48 But if I pled guilty to the nine felonies that were still on my record
00:11:53 The judge could make whatever decision he felt like was right given my situation
00:11:58 And he came out and he gave me this very creative sentence in my opinion and the sentence was
00:12:02 364 days one day less than a year if when you get out you start selling drugs again, or I see you here again
00:12:09 whatever you do next is gonna have seven years added to it and
00:12:13 in a way, I felt there's this biblical story about a king with a
00:12:16 Sword sort of hanging over his head just right above his head
00:12:19 It felt like I had this hanging sword
00:12:21 That actually was kind of my guardian for a couple of years while I was trying to figure out how to get my life
00:12:26 On track. I just want to say publicly
00:12:29 I also recognize mass privilege in who I am right and so I may be from the Middle East and I may be
00:12:35 Actually a first-generation immigrant to the United States, but nobody can tell that when I speak so standing in front of that court
00:12:41 I was a relatively young adult white male. And so I think there was a lot of privilege
00:12:46 Afforded me by that reality in that moment as well when I got out of jail
00:12:52 I tried to get a job. I couldn't get hired for anything. I
00:12:54 Tried for mall jobs. I tried I tried to become a pizza delivery man, and I couldn't get hired
00:13:01 The only next thing I had available other than a job was to go back to school
00:13:05 So I got to get into Cal State Long Beach, which was the first place
00:13:09 I got my master's in then I went back to UCLA to get my PhD where I ended up teaching and
00:13:13 So I ended up taking this route that seems blessed at the end of the road
00:13:19 But it was in no way shape or form guaranteed and there were many
00:13:23 many times along the way
00:13:26 That the idea of going back and having that access to money and power was really really charming
00:13:32 The
00:13:34 Million-dollar question is how to stop meth production and meth use from occurring. The problem is that the government
00:13:45 has been known to try to use prohibition and
00:13:49 Interdiction right ways that stop the supply or make it illegal to use
00:13:54 When it comes to every drug including methamphetamine what we've seen over and over is that these methods don't work. And so they became
00:14:02 this very deeply ingrained
00:14:05 Public campaign to make kids young adults, etc
00:14:09 Aware of the meth problems
00:14:10 He would see the faces of meth pictures and what meth does to you and all that kind of stuff
00:14:14 That's when we started seeing the opioid problem explode in this country
00:14:17 And it was as if we looked in one direction and then all of a sudden, you know a whack-a-moe
00:14:22 Game occurred and everybody had to turn their attention to opioids for a while. But in the interim while everybody was focusing on opioids
00:14:30 The supply and demand for meth started increasing again and again and again and over the last decade
00:14:35 We've seen a massive resurgence once again in the use of methamphetamine. They are going to meet the need
00:14:43 They're gonna meet the supply that is required and they're gonna find any way to do it
00:14:46 You know, I think they're focusing on ways to stop the supply of chemicals is just the wrong approach and it's not something
00:14:53 We need to think too hard about and the real game is to ask ourselves a question of why is methamphetamine use going up?
00:15:00 About 85% of the incarcerated population in the United States
00:15:04 He either have an active drug addiction problem or were arrested for drug crimes add to the cost of interdiction
00:15:10 Prohibition etc
00:15:12 which is in the trillions of dollars add to that the cost of lives and on top of that the cost of
00:15:17 Incarceration that we don't consider part of the war on drugs because it's actually part of our overall crime-fighting measures
00:15:23 When you add all of those statistics together, I think it's pretty safe to say that the war on drugs
00:15:29 can be considered one of the most
00:15:31 dismal failures of the law enforcement
00:15:33 community here in the United States 10% of the population in the US struggles with addiction as
00:15:39 diagnosed by the
00:15:41 DSM even that number has gone up
00:15:44 So the substance abuse and mental health services administration
00:15:46 SAMHSA has just raised its own estimate of the people who struggle with addiction in the US from 24 to about 40 million
00:15:53 So this is a problem that affects all of us and yet somehow we bought into the narrative that
00:15:58 Those people are addicts and alcoholics, but we're here. We're normal and we're safe
00:16:03 Addiction as we all know does not discriminate based on socio-economic status
00:16:07 and we need to get it out our heads that the people who struggle are other than us because they are all of us and
00:16:13 So the war on drugs has been a war on those people and that is us
00:16:19 I
00:16:26 Was selling to my friends when it started out
00:16:28 So the idea of having to be secretive a then dawn on me and B was relatively impossible because they all knew me
00:16:34 I was a student at UCLA. They were all my friends. They lived around me everybody in the drug game goes by monikers
00:16:39 so I would meet people like bullet and murder and
00:16:41 Termite but just you come up with a name and that becomes kind of the moniker that you go by when you're selling
00:16:48 I used to drive when I started out. I'll drive 250 or 300 miles a day in Los Angeles delivering
00:16:53 But really the moment I moved out of that everybody came to me and everybody was screened
00:16:57 And so even though it was never my intention
00:17:00 Tend of being a guy with a gun walking into a cartel deal outside of San Diego
00:17:06 There were these incremental small progressions that got me there and what it taught me
00:17:10 Is that if I put my attention and my efforts on the right things and I just give it enough time five six seven eight
00:17:16 Years, just like my drug dealing career grew I could actually achieve some pretty incredible things
00:17:22 But now doing them on the right side
00:17:24 I
00:17:30 Was really scared of telling people that I'd been to jail that I used to be a drug dealer that I used to be addicted
00:17:34 To meth it felt big and so some of my friends knew my really really close friends
00:17:39 But what I did instead is this is 2008
00:17:42 I started blogging about it and I started speaking publicly but the people I didn't know right blogging is kind of safe
00:17:48 It's people out there. I then ended up running groups and seeing clients in a treatment center here locally in Los Angeles
00:17:54 Eventually, I opened up my own treatment center and I've pretty much dedicated my life now to helping people with addiction problems
00:18:01 And so in ignited which is what I do now, which is an online addiction help platform
00:18:05 I've also written a book called the abstinence myth
00:18:08 relying on the fact that
00:18:10 You don't have to be ready to quit in order to get your life in order if you're ready to do something
00:18:15 You should start acting now, even if you're not ready to quit. This is my life's purpose. This is what I do now and I'm
00:18:21 incredibly
00:18:23 Motivated and grateful and humbled that I get to help people every day. My name is David McMillan
00:18:28 I have smuggled over 17 million dollars worth of heroin internationally. This is how crime works
00:18:34 The heroin world is very dark and full of secrets
00:18:42 involves hundreds of thousands of people mostly down at a very low level and
00:18:47 Passing by heroin traffickers without even thinking about it
00:18:52 I was a smuggler for over 35 years been arrested around about 12 times
00:18:57 The three main producers around the world of heroin have become Mexico mostly to serve the
00:19:11 market in the United States in South Asia, it's
00:19:14 Vietnam and Laos the remnants of the old Golden Triangle and of course
00:19:20 Afghanistan which tops all of them in sheer volume and that comes from different provinces
00:19:27 Which over the years have had sometimes droughts and sometimes interference the Taliban actually stopped almost all of the heroin
00:19:35 Production, but they changed their mind when they saw the money one of my first trips to Afghanistan was back in
00:19:42 79 when finding and making a reliable contact for heroin is best not relied upon through introduction
00:19:50 because the person who's introduced you he could be an agent for the
00:19:54 DEA so it's better to go from the ground up and that might mean going out to the farmlands
00:20:01 meeting the farmers I've traveled out into the heartlands of Afghanistan and
00:20:07 Lived with the farmers for a few days perhaps a week got involved in something local
00:20:12 Helped with a well come to know something about their lives
00:20:16 and they make their own judgments people in the village would come to trust me because I
00:20:23 Wasn't in a hurry
00:20:31 You don't need an awful lot of opium to
00:20:33 Do quite well if you're a farmer they get at least
00:20:38 $50 a kilo now for a farmer that's quite good. The opium poppy has a big bulb underneath it and
00:20:45 That's about the size of a golf ball the farmers when it's mature
00:20:50 Scrape the sides of it and overnight little beads of white sap are produced
00:20:56 That's scraped off to form a kind of sticky brick now
00:21:00 That is the opium base that contains a very very high yield of morphine
00:21:06 15 20 percent sometimes beyond the farmers
00:21:10 every part of the heroin
00:21:13 Cultivation processing and handling is done separately none of the people connected with the supply side
00:21:21 Are really connected in any group way that you might expect with crime
00:21:25 They are simple people in the countryside you would buy perhaps
00:21:30 Say 10 kilos of opium base will call them chemists, but they're really just like
00:21:36 Skilled artisans who would take that and do the processing now don't imagine some
00:21:43 Fancy laboratory or anything when it comes to that you'll see a couple of old tin pots five or six plastic buckets
00:21:51 some cloth for filtering
00:21:53 Some drums of chemicals. Oh, and maybe an old branch for stirring things the opium base is mixed with ammonia
00:22:01 then washed out to
00:22:04 extract that morphine dried out into kind of a black gunk and
00:22:10 Then it is cooked with acetic anhydride. It smells like a really
00:22:17 Incredibly strong vinegar the rest is clean up because it first comes out of that
00:22:22 Completely brown there are really only two types white and brown
00:22:27 The brown is the half processed and only half a strong version
00:22:32 The white has been purified cleaned the brown is smoked whereas the white
00:22:37 Is traditionally been injected or snorted that there's been almost no white heroin
00:22:45 sold around Europe for years and
00:22:47 people who inject have been injecting brown heroin a
00:22:51 Dangerous thing to do and a corrosive thing to do on their own arteries and veins
00:22:55 The police agencies have their own way of determining the purity of heroin really
00:23:01 There's no better test than experience and I can tell within seconds from the smell
00:23:07 the texture and the taste of heroin where it came from and
00:23:11 Very close to how strong it is
00:23:14 I
00:23:16 Would first have to get it out of Afghanistan
00:23:23 It's a landlocked country and shipped through to Pakistan that had its own
00:23:28 Complications across the border because any kind of commerce there whether it's smuggling or not involves a certain amount of
00:23:35 lubrication of the border area
00:23:38 bribery everything has a price whether it's
00:23:42 refrigerators or television sets the smuggling of heroin is limited by the fact that it can't really be disguised into
00:23:49 Looking like something else it can be packed flat into many different objects. In fact books
00:23:56 Were often used the hardback covers front and back
00:24:00 I suppose I'd have to look back upon my time smuggling out of Thailand as the most successful
00:24:06 operation the quality was right it was
00:24:10 the big bags that come from the Golden Triangle where they're in plastic and the stamp with the brand name of
00:24:17 the local
00:24:20 warlord or chieftain who guarantees safe passage I would press it down and
00:24:25 conceal it within the wooden surrounds of radio amplifiers or
00:24:31 piece of electrical equipment in your
00:24:33 In hold baggage without it being interfered with I would make it pressed
00:24:39 within the
00:24:41 sides of the wood and
00:24:43 Veneered around the outside almost all of the heroin that's transported by air
00:24:48 very rarely goes above
00:24:51 half a kilo slabs that get concealed in luggage or body packed or
00:24:57 even made into the handles of suitcases I
00:25:07 Used to carry it around by myself you know and but at least I knew if I did it myself
00:25:11 I'd be in control of my own destiny, but I relented I
00:25:16 found
00:25:19 Couriers couriers were chosen by their look that had to pass the first test
00:25:24 their stability and reliability
00:25:27 And also their ability to keep quiet after the event and that was very important. I had one guy that was a
00:25:36 Kind of recruiter for me down in Patia and another one in London
00:25:40 My recruiter in London was being kicked out of Southeast Asia ended up at a hostel
00:25:46 here that the government used to
00:25:49 Try and resettle people have been kicked out of other countries. It was a gold mine of couriers somebody
00:25:56 Who's not relaxed and operating out of their own volition makes a very poor
00:26:03 Courier I don't think people always have completely selfish motives
00:26:08 people who
00:26:11 Families to support sometimes considerate
00:26:14 Poverty might make that final little push to pass through airport security
00:26:20 It was important to know the airport systems very well
00:26:22 I would spend quite a bit of time traveling through those airports knowing what kind of x-ray machines
00:26:29 They used what the staff were trained to do where the shoes had to come off or not
00:26:35 How sensitive the metal detectors were as years went on customs teams would be trained
00:26:41 Particularly well in detecting certain kinds of things they have some for cigarettes. They have some for drugs
00:26:48 They would move those teams around different times of the day. It was important to know when that team was on I would use
00:26:57 Multiple passports in ensuring the safety of the couriers so that when they left a source country
00:27:03 They would arrive in
00:27:06 Europe and be able to take out of their pocket another passport
00:27:10 Which showed only travel in Europe and they would have tickets to match. I got birth certificates for
00:27:16 people who
00:27:18 Had died either an infancy or very young pre-traveling age and then built up the identity around that
00:27:25 I wouldn't get them legitimately issues arriving passengers
00:27:29 were told
00:27:31 To go to some arranged point perhaps a hotel in town or a restaurant
00:27:36 I would watch them and to see if they had any problems because it's always possible that they'd been intercepted
00:27:42 Then they would be paid off
00:27:44 Immediately and the bags would be taken away then it would be put into storage for safety
00:27:50 I like to think of it sometimes as looking at one of those
00:27:54 Phone apps which shows you all the flights in the world that are going on you see thousands of them and in a way
00:28:00 You can say that every one of those little planes has got somebody maybe four or five people on board
00:28:06 Who carrying some amount of heroin?
00:28:09 During my smuggling criminal career, I've been arrested
00:28:21 Right about 12 times and he resulted in four convictions the first one that was
00:28:26 back in 1981 in Australia resulted in a 10-year sentence, I've been under investigation by
00:28:33 Australian police and
00:28:36 I was running couriers at the time my own lawyer told me to get out of town, but I stuck around
00:28:42 No, I can deal with that
00:28:44 Then never catch me with anything. I was sentenced to 15 years of which I would ultimately serve 10
00:28:50 There's no law in the trial anything can go
00:28:53 It seems everything's fair. I would say this one of the reasons that I think
00:28:58 The deterrent sentences don't work often the super harsh treatment
00:29:04 My wife at the time play Liu was arrested my business partner wife Marie was arrested
00:29:10 they were put in the women's prison they put an
00:29:13 Informer in with the girls in the women's prison to try and get some information out of them
00:29:18 Unfortunately little Danielle was an arsonist. That's what she was in for. She set fire to the prison and
00:29:24 five women were killed including Clalia and
00:29:27 Marie that was a
00:29:30 Or I don't have to say it was a major low point
00:29:34 - I felt
00:29:36 Guilty and so I should the police had moved into my house and trashed it every possession
00:29:42 I had was gone. My wife was dead
00:29:45 after that next came my time in Thailand where I was arrested on a drug case and
00:29:52 Escape from there that took two years doing to get out of that place found myself arrested in
00:29:57 Pakistan and that took almost two years again to get a not guilty plea from there
00:30:04 I found myself arrested in Copenhagen and then
00:30:08 lastly a
00:30:10 Stretch in the UK in my early 50s around 2004. I walked away from the last deal
00:30:17 I'd been giving bits of advice and being tipped for it. But even that was too close for comfort
00:30:24 I'd run out of time. I was getting simply too old the price for this is jail time and
00:30:30 I'd promised family not to use anymore and also based on
00:30:35 Looking back and realizing that the reward was never enough
00:30:40 [sound of a machine]
00:30:42 When it comes to the larger amounts then it's all by shipping
00:30:50 I've known people to take hundreds of kilos of heroin and
00:30:54 Pack them into oil drums or even in the pallets of other goods that are going so a technique would be to
00:31:00 Order some goods through an existing and reputable firm that had agents all around the world
00:31:07 table lamps or
00:31:09 Even carved doors or cabinets so that when it arrives back in the West
00:31:14 That's being cleared as their cargo not yours. Sometimes
00:31:19 customs will
00:31:21 Intercept quite large shipments people have asked me would this make a dent in the in the market the supplies
00:31:29 built up at least
00:31:32 three months in advance, so
00:31:34 besides which
00:31:37 The intercepted cargo never amounts to the total flow going through so those seizures though. They might make the news a
00:31:44 ton lost here or even
00:31:47 5,000 kilos there won't substantially make any difference the shipment routes for illegal and legal heroin
00:31:55 Never overlap there the approach is different and the mechanisms entirely different
00:32:02 After
00:32:04 Shipment comes in then it's unpacked
00:32:10 Bagged up into whatever form it's going out whether it's in bulk and kilos or smaller amounts ounces
00:32:16 It gets taken out to customers within a month or would be gone in the early days
00:32:22 It was so profitable a kilo of heroin back in
00:32:27 1980 just personally I could get back a million dollars from that and this was in Australia
00:32:33 Which is of course got inflated prices there expected purity was only at about 15%
00:32:38 So if I took it down to 18% it would still be considered good
00:32:43 I used only dextrose to do this
00:32:45 But that still meant one kilo became four in the beginning even put in place a street network
00:32:50 Because there were a couple of streets in Melbourne
00:32:53 Which were a notorious for it then come back to base four or five times a night and reload as it were
00:32:58 There's been some changes between say
00:33:01 2002 and
00:33:02 2022 the retail price of heroin has dropped considerably
00:33:06 It's now at about its most base level purity is not great, but price-wise
00:33:10 I can't imagine any factors that would make it any cheaper or possibly take it up
00:33:16 Is it more available it is but there is no market beyond a certain point
00:33:22 the popularity of heroin goes in waves of
00:33:25 different fads and fashions this a solid core of people who are fully addicted and
00:33:32 They don't change much
00:33:34 Street level heroin is of course not pure. It would be dangerous if it were it's usually at about
00:33:40 15 to 20 percent and that's considered strong the cutting agents for brown heroin usually menatol it's
00:33:49 Really a baby laxative in recent years
00:33:52 Heroin has been cut the drug called fentanyl. It's a synthetic opioid
00:33:57 But it's a very dangerous drug. It's at least as strong as even heroin
00:34:03 so how would anybody measure it out a very tiny amount of fentanyl is
00:34:08 often mixed with heroin to keep the strength up, but that can quite often be misjudged and
00:34:16 End up with fatalities, but when there's a shortage or when somebody's simply greedy the retailer can cut it again
00:34:24 and this can be potentially dangerous because it will seem weaker and
00:34:30 People will adjust to using weaker and they'll use more so that when they get what used to be the standard batch
00:34:37 It'll be quite a bit stronger and there's a potential for overdose
00:34:42 But it has to be kept in mind very few people die directly from an overdose of heroin. It's usually when mixed with
00:34:49 Alcohol or sleeping pills it's it almost never happens when it's the heroin alone that finishes
00:34:56 Somebody off and takes them over the top
00:34:58 There were political elements to opium and
00:35:09 Heroin manufacturing distribution until 1911 heroin and morphine were available from your local pharmacy or druggist
00:35:17 Over the counter just by asking for it
00:35:20 In fact heroin was promoted as a kind of cure-all little heroin pills were made by Bayer in Germany
00:35:27 But after 1911 the Harrison Act
00:35:29 was passed in the United States, which turned attention to
00:35:35 Addictive drugs when the Vietnam War took hold heroin became something the US troops tried during their downtime
00:35:43 They took those habits home with them. So we
00:35:46 Have a legacy from the Vietnam War
00:35:49 It's called a war on drugs
00:35:51 But is it really a war a war suggests that one side has got hopes of winning
00:35:58 Drug traffickers and smugglers know that they won't win every break. But then again, they don't have to win to be
00:36:05 Successful, they've just got to keep out of jail most of the time
00:36:08 But still a high price to pay from the authorities point of view
00:36:12 There would never be a situation where they could walk out say right we've done our job
00:36:16 There is no more smuggling. How can that possibly happen?
00:36:19 when the nature of business is ongoing rolling and
00:36:23 It replaces the fallen soldiers the authorities could
00:36:27 Catch more smugglers by acting on their intelligence or the tips they get
00:36:34 But they're kept by the amount of money the resources they're given in
00:36:39 40 years
00:36:42 I've only been taught one thing that the only solution is to legalize all drugs
00:36:48 legalization would require of course some control measures that
00:36:53 somebody wouldn't be
00:36:56 Going into a shop and without any sensible reason buying 10 kilos of heroin on the other hand
00:37:04 To take away that black market the control has to be very light and of course
00:37:10 Spend some money on offering services for people who can't manage their drugs
00:37:15 Different countries offer different but generally all poor
00:37:19 Alternatives to heroin and also not very effective treatment programs, for example in the United Kingdom
00:37:29 There is virtually none somebody reporting or presenting with a heroin addiction has to take a place on the list and
00:37:36 to get a substitute has to
00:37:39 Wait several weeks that will force them back into that world. It might reduce the harm
00:37:46 They'll save them some money because they've got a fallback position of say taking methadone and instead of using heroin
00:37:53 there are programs for harm reduction that are good welcome and
00:37:58 Have some effect such as needle exchange programs or offer safe places to take drugs
00:38:05 Of course that doesn't get them off the drugs, but any of that assistance is all a good thing
00:38:10 There's very little that can be done
00:38:12 Because you were hoping to
00:38:15 make a consistent
00:38:17 Standard product that won't risk overdoses yet won't be so
00:38:22 Rubbishy that people will move on to
00:38:26 Unsafe supplies, but I don't see any way of doing that other than legalization also in a world of legal drugs
00:38:33 There'd be fewer prison inmates on
00:38:36 Mino or any drug charges at all and that would have the effect of
00:38:40 allowing more police time to be spent on violent crime and
00:38:45 Crimes that affect people in a more direct way to help source countries
00:38:50 We would have to do more than simple crop substitution which so far hasn't worked
00:38:56 It's not much better than the deadly crop eradication, which has left a lot of farmers destitute
00:39:02 I
00:39:09 Was 18 years old when I first became involved in the drug trade and not much older when I began
00:39:16 Smuggling I can never say that in any way that I've ever been a victim of anything. I've walked headfirst
00:39:21 Even even as a teenager. I was up to some kind of mischief selling bits of
00:39:27 hash at school whenever from an early age, so
00:39:32 When I met some safe crackers and they were retired from that. Well, they were already a little bit in the local
00:39:39 Drug distribution network with
00:39:45 Local marijuana, but they didn't know anything about importing and
00:39:49 it involved travel I get to see the world it seemed good for me and I went out and
00:39:57 Did it on purpose?
00:39:59 something we don't realize when we're young is it a
00:40:02 Regular human life is a short one and you haven't got so many years only looking back on
00:40:08 Smuggling business drug trade
00:40:13 from an older man's perspective
00:40:15 How plain and clear it is?
00:40:17 that it is a
00:40:20 not just the danger, but it's the pointlessness and the
00:40:24 Futility of the undertaking since I've been out of the smuggling game these days
00:40:30 I put up CCTV cameras, which involves a certain amount of trust. I've also
00:40:36 Written a couple of books one that seemed to take for years because it was involving that most complex world in
00:40:43 Afghanistan and Pakistan and the troubles there and the involvement of the DEA that took about 10 years to write
00:40:50 That's unforgiving destiny. Of course, I regret
00:40:53 kind of everything about
00:40:56 The life I walked into people asked me why I didn't walk away from that world after my first major arrest and
00:41:04 The answer is that I couldn't imagine a world where I wasn't
00:41:08 Running around underground. It didn't seem to me at the time. There was any real choice
00:41:13 My name is Peter Tritton aka posh Pete. I smuggled over 5 million pounds worth of cocaine
00:41:20 internationally
00:41:22 This is how crime works
00:41:24 I've been in prison with people there capos from the Sinaloa cartel
00:41:32 bosses from the the Colombian cartels and
00:41:35 Even when they were that in their heyday making millions
00:41:39 the amount of fear and paranoia that they had to
00:41:43 Contend with you know people trying to kill them people trying to take their business from them
00:41:48 You know and in the end what did they end up with they ended up going to prison for a long time and losing all
00:41:54 Of it pretty much. I am extremely lucky to be alive in my opinion. The risk is not worth the reward
00:42:01 Cocaine is found in well found and produced in Peru Bolivia and
00:42:07 Colombia the farms will generally be in rural locations out in the countryside
00:42:13 Where they will grow the coca bushes they will crop the coca leaves. They will then be taken to another location
00:42:21 Which is the laboratory where they will process the leaves the?
00:42:27 Cocaine once it's been processed in the lab will be transported to probably down to the coast
00:42:33 Normally or to the the ports but also the capital should be safe for sale
00:42:38 The farmers themselves are paid quite poorly. They have to farm an acre of
00:42:44 bushes
00:42:47 For one kilo of cocaine once the cocaine is processed. I know in Peru you can buy it for as little as
00:42:54 Should we say seven hundred dollars up to twelve hundred dollars per kilo?
00:42:58 The chemicals that we needed to buy in order to process the cocaine were quite difficult to get
00:43:03 Because they were controlled things like methanol which is a pure alcohol
00:43:07 hydrochloric acid sulfuric acids activated carbon acetone
00:43:12 we had to
00:43:15 basically
00:43:17 Make a fake company a fake profile have a number of people
00:43:21 In order just in order to be able to go to these big chemical companies
00:43:25 To then buy the chemicals from them because they wouldn't sell to just anyone from the public you had to be from a business
00:43:31 Ether is one that's very highly controlled
00:43:34 Acetone as well in South America ether is the big one because the ether washes it used to be the best type of wash
00:43:41 To make cocaine the sourcing tanker loads of ether to produce the cocaine is virtually impossible
00:43:49 There now so they're having to use other chemicals which aren't quite as good or
00:43:53 Now that's one reason cocaine if anyone out there has been doing cocaine for a long time. They will now be
00:44:01 Able to tell that the cocaine these days is not the same as cocaine 20 years ago
00:44:06 Because i've been around cocaine so much I can without even taking it
00:44:10 I can just rub it between my fingers look at the the color
00:44:12 Smell it and I can tell you pretty much which one is which
00:44:17 And I can tell you pretty much which country is from by the chemicals that have been used in it
00:44:22 My most successful method of smuggling
00:44:28 was a
00:44:30 form of impregnating the cocaine into
00:44:33 rubber
00:44:34 Through a colombian connection. We would someone in cali would buy the cocaine
00:44:39 They would then give it to a
00:44:43 Like a basic chemist over there. So the cocaine would be
00:44:46 Put into liquid and then into liquid latex
00:44:49 Which would then be set in sheets very thin sheets. We would then put those
00:44:55 Latex sheets into the ground sheets of tents
00:44:58 So we would employ passengers basically to go and collect the tent after it had been impregnated with the cocaine
00:45:06 to then bring that back through customs I
00:45:10 Kind of set some ground rules when it came to recruiting passengers. I would try and find people that had obviously no criminal record or
00:45:18 fairly collected
00:45:21 You know reasonably well presented and you know, just people that were fairly sensible
00:45:26 Preferably someone that was working already
00:45:29 And then we would pay them between ten and twelve thousand pounds on their return to britain
00:45:35 Once the drugs have been extracted or sometimes if there was enough fund enough cash available
00:45:40 We'd pay them as soon as they came off the plane and handed the tent over
00:45:44 first
00:45:46 Tent that we brought in I flew to Quito in Ecuador. The tent had already been manufactured
00:45:51 And the cocaine impregnated into it. I managed to get through
00:45:56 Unscathed got back to britain landed at sunset fully expecting to be stopped by the police there
00:46:02 So yeah, I mean I arrived and just collected the tent and walked straight through and that was it
00:46:07 I mean I was I was to be honest. I was in shock that nothing happened
00:46:11 There was nearly five kilos of cocaine in that
00:46:14 And having gone through that experience
00:46:17 I realized that this method that we were using of impregnating the cocaine into rubber was definitely a good method because
00:46:23 You know i've just been stopped by customs
00:46:26 And got through three customs checks one in Ecuador one in
00:46:30 In Holland and one in Britain
00:46:32 And come through with it fine
00:46:34 During the time that we were trafficking trafficking
00:46:37 We never actually lost a single shipment. The great thing about that method was that it wasn't detectable by x-ray
00:46:44 You can't detect it by scanner. The dogs couldn't detect it because obviously the cocaine has been changed into rubber
00:46:51 And we used to counteract the reactive test the liquid test that they do
00:46:56 By putting in another chemical. I mean that
00:47:00 Pretty much nullifies all the checks that they can do
00:47:02 on you
00:47:04 There were definitely countries that we avoided
00:47:06 going through or trafficking in
00:47:09 a lot of the south americans that i've spoken to
00:47:12 Try to avoid trafficking in america the
00:47:17 Dea have got powers to come down to colombia or ecuador or wherever basically and and arrest you and then take you back to the states
00:47:25 And try you there
00:47:27 Places like thailand indonesia where they have the death sentence
00:47:30 Always big no-nos saudi arabia anywhere that's got the death sentence of drugs also countries with you know
00:47:38 really harsh laws
00:47:40 high sentences
00:47:41 as far as other forms of
00:47:43 smuggling cocaine obviously
00:47:45 The cartels use containers shipping containers to bring in the larger shipments of cocaine i.e
00:47:51 tons at a time
00:47:53 This is normally done using corrupt port officials at both ends
00:47:58 Who facilitate the movement of the cocaine?
00:48:01 I didn't like the idea personally because i'd realized or having seen other people do it
00:48:07 And when it went wrong the police officer or the customs agent involved would always roll over
00:48:14 And inform on all of the other people involved
00:48:17 recently i've seen
00:48:20 newer methods of smuggling cocaine
00:48:23 Across borders. I had a russian friend when I was in ecuador when I was in prison in ecuador who was captured with
00:48:29 42 tons of cocaine
00:48:32 Uh, which was in barrels of molasses. It had been liquidized and put into mixed into the molasses
00:48:39 I mean, there is just a multitude of things that can be impregnated into
00:48:43 Once we
00:48:49 Managed to get the tents back through customs and into britain safely. We would then have to extract the cocaine using chemical processes
00:48:55 Any cut that was in there wouldn't come through in the process. So we were only left with the pure cocaine
00:49:02 Once it was completely dry, we would cut it
00:49:05 Using finessatine which is what people call magic. We'd normally cut it about 60
00:49:11 %cocaine 40%
00:49:14 finessatine
00:49:15 And then we repackage it and sell it
00:49:18 a
00:49:20 An earlier associate with whom I traffic drugs
00:49:25 within the uk
00:49:28 So he put me in contact with the columbian in london
00:49:30 Who was already importing cocaine into britain?
00:49:34 Via a contact of his in cali columbia who was operating with the cali cartel
00:49:40 That became our source of cocaine in south america
00:49:45 All of the cocaine we pay for upfront using various different money transfer agencies like western union moneygram
00:49:52 We would always try and keep the transfers under a thousand pounds at a time
00:49:57 we would use various people to
00:50:00 facilitate the transfers because obviously we could
00:50:03 Really can't use one person more than two or three times in a month. We had some underground
00:50:08 money transfer agencies that were a bit corrupt
00:50:12 should we say that was
00:50:15 Allow us to send more than was registered
00:50:17 I did some workings out on the train on the train journey down here today to london
00:50:27 So from every hundred dollars or hundred pounds worth of cocaine that you buy
00:50:30 I would estimate that about two percent one and a half to two percent goes to the farmer who's growing the coca leaf
00:50:37 Probably 35 to 40 percent goes to the cartel
00:50:44 But the the cartels were really they're controlling the lab
00:50:47 And then the the shipping out of south america the the remainder was to say around 60 percent
00:50:55 Uh would probably go to the dealers
00:51:00 You know, you know on the street
00:51:02 Much the same as opec
00:51:04 Controls the supply of oil the cartels control the supply and flow of of cocaine
00:51:10 So
00:51:12 The problem with drug trafficking is you're only going to be able to do it for so long before you get caught
00:51:19 In the operation that I was carrying out. We tried to keep the number of people involved
00:51:23 To as small as possible because obviously the less people know the less chance there is that somebody's going to turn informant or betray you
00:51:31 The group that we had there was me a colombian and a chilean who were the key players
00:51:38 And then we obviously we would employ passengers to bring the tents back in
00:51:41 Well after the colombian and chilean were arrested in a laboratory that was raided in
00:51:47 crystal palace
00:51:50 The colombian was turned by the british police and became an informant
00:51:54 we then
00:51:56 Started to see police activity around us quite frequently
00:51:59 So it became very much a game of cat and mouse between them and us. I was arrested in ecuador in
00:52:07 2005
00:52:08 And ended up getting sentenced to 12 years in prison in ecuador
00:52:12 I was diagnosed with complex ptsd, which is post-traumatic stress disorder
00:52:17 After having seen so much mayhem and definite destruction in prison in ecuador
00:52:23 I would say that the levels of cocaine being produced are greater than ever these days even though there's
00:52:36 ever greater demand for cocaine
00:52:38 The purity of cocaine has also increased I think because of the increased production levels
00:52:45 We're now in the internet era encrypted technologies encrypted telephones encrypted
00:52:50 Messaging services and dozens of them nowadays. There's so many
00:52:55 ways
00:52:56 Better ways of transferring money around the world such as bitcoin ethereum
00:53:00 these are definitely being used in the drugs trade for
00:53:05 facilitating large movements of cash
00:53:07 So it's a lot harder for the authorities to keep on top of all of this
00:53:11 In order to keep up with it the cartels have realized that you're always going to be able to sell
00:53:16 Pure cocaine quicker than you are cut cocaine
00:53:20 The sort of mafias like the albanians and the russians and the chinese
00:53:25 They are now sending their own people out to South America to just
00:53:32 Buy the cocaine from the cartels there and then basically say goodbye to them and then facilitate their own shipping back
00:53:39 So then that means they then have the whole share of the profit
00:53:44 The albanian mafia is now very much in control of the whole trafficking
00:53:49 Enterprise in Britain and Europe and I think it's become very much more controlled
00:53:55 Very much more monopolized than it used to be there used to be smaller people like myself
00:54:02 those
00:54:03 smaller
00:54:04 players have been forced out of the market by the fact that the albanians and
00:54:08 And the like of the albanians have just got it stitched up
00:54:11 In my opinion the government can't win the war on drugs and they're fully aware that they can't win the war on drugs
00:54:17 And if you talk to a lot of high-ranking police
00:54:20 they will definitely tell you that the war on drugs is unwinnable and
00:54:25 In my personal opinion the only way that the war on the war on drugs
00:54:31 Will be one is in
00:54:34 Is to legalize all drugs
00:54:37 manufacture them under license and strict control
00:54:40 And then tax them heavily in order to offset the detrimental cost to society
00:54:47 Really the the key element in this is the financial gain of criminals
00:54:53 If you can take out the financial gain
00:54:55 From the whole equation then there's no
00:54:59 Incentive for criminals to traffic drugs. I don't think that
00:55:04 throwing more and more money at
00:55:07 A border force and and and trying to control it and say eradication of crops
00:55:13 I mean they've tried
00:55:15 eradicating crops and that only had a detrimental effect on the people on the ground because it destroyed other crops as well and
00:55:21 led to disease and illness and
00:55:24 Contaminated water. It's huge business it being kept illegal because it actually creates more
00:55:30 employment and more
00:55:33 Monetary gain overall for law enforcement for prisons for the judiciary
00:55:39 for health care
00:55:42 for for these drug companies making drugs that help with
00:55:45 treatments
00:55:52 I got into selling drugs at an early age. I always had a sort of an entrepreneurial streak but drugs was
00:55:59 At that time quite easy and easy to do and a lot of people seem to be doing it. There were illegal raves every weekend
00:56:07 And loads of the people that I was at school with started going to these parties. So, you know
00:56:13 Instantly there was a huge
00:56:16 marketplace
00:56:17 Until I was arrested at 18, 17 when I was at college
00:56:22 Which put a stop to everything
00:56:25 You know, I saw how upset my family were and I was worried about not getting into university and jeopardizing my future
00:56:30 Trying to survive on a student loan. I realized that you know, they don't go very far
00:56:35 That's when I first came into contact with cocaine
00:56:38 Started selling cocaine to a couple of students
00:56:40 Before I knew it I was then selling cocaine to the locals in Cardiff
00:56:46 And then I was selling to their dealers and then I was selling to their dealers in turn
00:56:50 And before I know it i'm supplying half of south wales
00:56:53 and then ended up
00:56:56 You know fanning out and spreading out into the Bristol party scene and supplying loads of people there
00:57:01 The first time that I went to prison
00:57:04 in England, I
00:57:05 Yeah, I mean, yeah, I did make contacts in prison. But yeah, I suppose you do make contacts in prison
00:57:11 I mean they are the finishing
00:57:13 school of crime
00:57:15 Anywhere you go into prison anywhere on the planet you all end up making contacts because that's the nature of the places that they are
00:57:22 I'm now going into schools colleges and universities
00:57:26 Trying to educate people on the harm that cocaine and drugs in general do
00:57:32 It'll only end up with you being captured or killed
00:57:36 And the effect that that will have on your family and friends is devastating
00:57:42 Since getting released from prison. I wrote a book called el infierno, which is published by ebri penguin
00:57:49 Which is all about my time in prison in ecuador
00:57:52 I'm currently writing the prequel to that first book
00:57:55 And i'm hoping to get the two of them made into a screenplay
00:58:01 In order to make a netflix series or possibly a film I have set up my own company
00:58:06 with a view to
00:58:08 Making my own chocolate products chocolate drinks and bars
00:58:12 importing cacao from ecuador not cocaine cacao
00:58:16 Yeah, so yeah, we're going straight this time
00:58:19 My name is sean atwood. I smuggled over 10 million dollars worth of ecstasy into america from holland
00:58:26 This is how crime works
00:58:28 At the height of the ecstasy ring I had about 200 people working for me
00:58:36 Largest ever shipment was 40 000 pills and we were competing against an underboss for the gambino crime family
00:58:43 Sammy the bull grovano
00:58:46 When I was active the capital for ecstasy manufacture was holland
00:58:56 five of the most common ones back then were white doves mitsubishi's
00:59:01 eurodollars
00:59:04 Tubby's dollar signs a pure ecstasy pill should be 100 to 125 milligrams of mdma and clay
00:59:12 So they put the powder into the press and it comes out with a logo on it
00:59:17 The recipe for ecstasy has changed because the government has clamped down on the original ingredients for ecstasy
00:59:24 So you've got these cartels and big criminal enterprises who don't care about the purity of the product
00:59:31 Putting all kinds of mixed chemicals in people sometimes put food coloring in them
00:59:37 To make a distinct branding
00:59:40 Most of the pills that had the food coloring in them were not the pure presses the beige presses from holland
00:59:46 Every time a new pill came out people would say this is the bomb. This has got double stacked
00:59:52 mdma in it
00:59:54 But generally if it's 100 to 125 milligrams of mma you're going to get the same hit
00:59:59 At the height of the ecstasy operation we could commission a pill to be designed in a certain way
01:00:04 But we opted not to because we believed it would attract law enforcement
01:00:07 On the website dance safe. They had all of the pills photos of them and they gave the exact
01:00:14 Ingredients in the pills so, you know, we're already in very good standing for the quality of our product
01:00:25 I was there when the rave scene began in arizona. I knew everybody
01:00:29 It was all the local little cliques that came to me to invest in their parties and their e-deals the first
01:00:36 clubs I scored individually from
01:00:39 Was a little rave called chupa and the silver dollar club
01:00:45 We were getting them for like 25 30 dollars a pill. This is 1996 1997
01:00:51 So we set up a deal whereby I can't remember. It's 500 a thousand out of la
01:00:56 For just over ten dollars a pill. So that's when we realized that we needed to
01:01:02 meet demand
01:01:04 To get greater quantities and to get them at reduced prices to go through holland
01:01:09 To source pills from holland. I had to put people on flights with the testing kits and say hit the clubs
01:01:16 They would find the people selling them in the clubs and they would come home with the samples
01:01:22 And if the samples were good, then the person would go back out and we would establish a deeper connection
01:01:28 It's very covert
01:01:31 It's all done in hotel rooms people show up you do you got your testing kit?
01:01:34 They hand over the pills you hand over the bills
01:01:37 You don't know a lot of the background information as to what's going on. That's probably to protect
01:01:41 The enterprises that are running it
01:01:44 Once we started to source pills out of holland
01:01:46 We were getting tens of thousands per shipment, but we didn't have to do it as often then it might be
01:01:52 You know every month every couple of months something like that
01:01:55 Wild man, my best friend from childhood became my main bodyguard in arizona
01:02:01 When wild man was on his first stay he opened the door
01:02:06 Into a world of gangsters contacts. I wouldn't have made I got to meet all these characters and one of them in particular
01:02:15 He was in a situation with the cops and we protected him
01:02:17 And he said from now on me and my brothers have got your back and that was the new mexican mafia
01:02:22 We were schooled by the new mexican mafia, this is the most powerful dangerous mafia in arizona at the time
01:02:34 They tried to assassinate the head of the prisons
01:02:37 Head of the department of corrections. They said to me sean
01:02:40 If you get pulled over
01:02:42 Leaving our house the cops don't have a right to get in your vehicle unless they have probable cause
01:02:47 They're going to ask you can I search your vehicle?
01:02:48 You can say no i'm in a hurry and if they insist on searching the vehicle and they find something without probable cause
01:02:54 That is the fruit of the forbidden tree. We will post your bail bond right away
01:02:58 We will have a lawyer come and visit you right away and the lawyer will tell you what?
01:03:02 Realistically what kind of trouble you are in the reason?
01:03:07 I wasn't bumping heads with the cartel and I wasn't bumping heads with the new mexican mafias
01:03:11 They had harder drugs
01:03:14 Locked down. I was never in competition with them
01:03:17 So in the beginning from holland we were doing it through the mail
01:03:26 We hollowed out stock market annual reports and we used some like edible glue stuff
01:03:33 To seal them all and then they'd be put in a box
01:03:37 And fedexed to an address
01:03:39 in arizona
01:03:41 And we had various addresses. I flew people over from the uk
01:03:44 built up credit in their names
01:03:47 Rented houses in their names and bought cars in their names all for use within the criminal enterprise
01:03:53 We would go from hermosillo airport. We would fly over to mexico city
01:03:58 Then you could take air france to paris and then you get the train over to holland
01:04:03 Back then this was before 9/11
01:04:06 This may sound really lapsidaisical to some people but you could just throw them in your luggage in like pillowcases
01:04:13 Thousands and thousands of pills now it was more strategic than just them getting off the plane at hermosillo
01:04:19 And then coming over the arizona border
01:04:21 We rented properties in portopanasco rocky point
01:04:25 And the smugglers who brought them into mexico would take them to those locations
01:04:30 Then the pills would be divided up into vehicles and smugglers that had for example brand new suvs
01:04:37 university of arizona stickers on them diving tanks all kinds of tourists bric-a-brac
01:04:43 And in particular if it was spring break
01:04:47 Or one of the student holidays
01:04:50 The checkpoints were so backed up
01:04:52 They were so overwhelmed, you know, you've got so many guys stopping cars
01:04:58 We never ever got caught bringing them over the arizona border. It was flawless
01:05:02 Better call saul these people exist. They may seem like stereotypes, but they're based on
01:05:13 What's really happening in america? I mean, there's so much money in drugs
01:05:17 So I was number one
01:05:19 I was coordinating the operations
01:05:21 Wild woman was number two. She's from liverpool
01:05:24 Wild man was number three
01:05:27 Three english people at the top. The rest were all local people from america mostly
01:05:32 People that originated in arizona. You had it structured like a corporation. I divided it into factions
01:05:39 So then you've got the head of each faction
01:05:42 They've got middle people and they've got runners who are selling them at the street level in my enterprise
01:05:48 The main rules were loyalty
01:05:51 not snitching
01:05:54 Passing information up the chain if you found anything out at street level that was a threat
01:05:58 That information gets fed right back to me. I chose people primarily who did not have criminal records
01:06:05 My right hand man. Cody baits. He's dead now
01:06:08 he hired
01:06:11 cars and rented houses just for cash and pills that nobody knew about
01:06:16 I'm living in a million dollar house on a mountainside the most beautiful place i've ever lived in my life in a gated guarded community
01:06:24 as more people work for me
01:06:26 I realized it was in the best interest to spread the product out
01:06:30 Amongst various locations amongst various factions. So as soon as a shipment came in that was tens of thousands
01:06:37 We want to get that out right away spread out to the different locations because if one gets hit
01:06:42 With 2 000 pills, that's no big deal. That's the cost of doing business
01:06:46 But if we've got 40 000 in one house and that gets hit
01:06:49 That's a serious loss
01:06:52 So
01:06:54 At the height of it
01:06:59 We had people from other states coming to us even people would fly from chicago
01:07:06 And states on the other side of america to come to us. We had pages
01:07:10 Never spoke about big deals on the phone to anyone
01:07:13 Cody baits
01:07:14 He had the house rented where the product was where the cash was that nobody knew about and he would do the rounds
01:07:20 So he would drop off to the head of each faction
01:07:23 Pick up the cash
01:07:25 If everything was going smoothly, that was fine. If there were problems, that's where we're bringing wild man and g-dog
01:07:31 And you know, they would handle the enforcement side of it with the shipment that was 40 000 pills
01:07:37 Let's say i'm getting 10 at a minimum on average
01:07:40 And i'm paying two to three
01:07:42 I'm making seven or eight on 40 000
01:07:47 Which is a couple hundred grand I think profit from one mission to launder the money. I flew people from the uk
01:07:55 opened stock market bank accounts and credit accounts in their names
01:08:00 slowly
01:08:02 Built all this credit up and kept all this money in a legal
01:08:06 Kind of way whereby I hadn't done anything criminal to it yet. But once the enterprise was
01:08:12 massive
01:08:15 And I knew I had to burn through these accounts and these names
01:08:18 I just started investments in rave clothing and music stores
01:08:22 Now if you're a store that throws raves
01:08:25 Then when you've thrown a rave at the weekend, you've got tens of thousands of cash going into bank on monday
01:08:30 You add my ecstasy proceeds to that we're getting the money into the banking system
01:08:35 Before
01:08:43 Sammy the bull gravano entered the scene
01:08:45 I had a reputation for getting the white and beige presses out of holland and that was the primary source of supply to arizona
01:08:53 To the raves and to the clubs what you've got to bear in mind is people say if sammy the bull
01:08:58 Gravano was in competition with you. This is the italian mafia the gambino crime family, but that's not true
01:09:04 Sammy the bull is a formidable character in his own right. He'd murdered people conspired to murder them, but
01:09:11 He was the highest ranking member of the mafia to turn sides and testify and cooperate
01:09:18 And he went against gotti
01:09:21 I did something that was silly
01:09:23 We found a property
01:09:26 That we believe was linked to sammy the bull's people and we all got strapped up and kicked the door in and held the people
01:09:32 And took all this stuff as an act of
01:09:35 You know showing that if you do something to us something's going to happen to you guys
01:09:40 But I regretted doing that
01:09:42 I shouldn't have never put myself in that situation because kicking someone's door in and running down a hall with a gun
01:09:47 Were they could have all had guns and just shot us or the cops could have come
01:09:51 That was drug fueled insanity. We're looking back on it now
01:09:55 It made things worse. There was a hit put out on me. They were offering 10 000 for my head on a silver platter
01:10:01 in prison
01:10:03 Sammy the bull gravano's son told me
01:10:06 That someone had called it in in phoenix the crow barrett's call. I was there with g-dog wild man and some of my crew wild woman
01:10:13 A striptease woman had spotted me. There was a bounty on me
01:10:18 She called it in and they were in a car coming to take me out to the desert
01:10:22 G-dog wild man advised me to leave because they'd sensed the atmosphere had changed
01:10:28 And I got out of there just before
01:10:31 Gravano's son gerard arrived. He said that if the ransom hadn't been paid
01:10:36 They were going to kill me and that would have just wiped out their competition. Sammy the bull's enterprise came up
01:10:41 Did big numbers lit the scene up?
01:10:44 Had all the runners running around the raves and clubs saying we're the biggest drug barons in the history of the world
01:10:51 These steroid head jock characters which totally brought the heat to the scene
01:10:56 And that's why he got popped a couple years before me. I mean I was thanking the cops for his arrest
01:11:01 Basically in my mind, but all of those resources were then turned on me
01:11:04 It was may 16 2002 when the swap team came I thought once I quit the importation I got away with it
01:11:17 I thought they had to catch you with the drugs. All it takes is someone from your past within seven years
01:11:22 Statute of limitations to tell the cops they've done a deal with you and they've got you don't need the drugs
01:11:28 We used the lawyer from the new mexican mafia. He was a loophole lawyer
01:11:31 Paid him a hundred thousand and that's how we got it down from 200 years to nine and a half years without snitching
01:11:38 My first jail was towers jail
01:11:41 Where the neo-nazis come up to me to join the gang to be a member you have to murder someone for them
01:11:46 There are very few members. There are a lot of probates associates people putting work in for them that are running the system for them
01:11:52 Arizona the four
01:11:55 Major prison gangs. It's all racially divided
01:11:58 The whites is the arian brotherhood. The blacks is the maomao
01:12:02 The mexican nationals have their own gang
01:12:05 And then you've got the chicanos, which are the mexican americans
01:12:09 You've got the native americans as well
01:12:13 And then anyone who doesn't fit in haven't helped them because it's just raw survival of the fittest
01:12:18 Being deep in the arizona jail system. The absolute priority of all of the gangs is to keep the drugs business running smoothly
01:12:26 You got the staff bringing the drugs in you got the physicists bringing the drugs in they do not want anything to disrupt that
01:12:32 I've done some psa
01:12:35 Videos prison survival advice be careful what you say. Don't brag. Don't let them know you've got money
01:12:41 Don't let them know you've got resources
01:12:44 Two months after my arrest there was a story in the phoenix new times english sean's evil empire 10 pages long
01:12:50 The neo-nazis caught wind of this and then they were pressuring me
01:12:53 To ask my girlfriend to smuggle drugs in through visitation because I must have all of these drug connections
01:13:00 Fortunately, there was a race riot and those guys who were trying to pressure me
01:13:04 got moved
01:13:06 And I clicked up with the italians after that and that that pressure on me ended
01:13:10 I end up in a jail run by a famous sheriff called sheriff. Joe arpaio over time. You just saw them revolving door
01:13:18 Young people coming in lesser offenses becoming harder criminals
01:13:22 It is a college of crime the conditions in that jail the cockroaches the dead rats in the foods the guards murdering the prisoners
01:13:28 For the vast majority of the people I was housed with there was no hope
01:13:33 But that's what keeps the prisons in business
01:13:36 So
01:13:38 The illegal black market in drugs created by drug laws is so vast and now we've got hundreds of thousands of dead in mexico
01:13:49 And all this knife crime in london
01:13:51 This is what the cops are telling us revolves around young people competing for the black market profits in drugs created by drug laws
01:13:58 I was operating during a relatively innocent phase of
01:14:05 the introduction of ecstasy to america
01:14:08 Now everything is monopolized by organized crime and it doesn't matter who gets arrested in organized crime
01:14:13 They always have the resources to pay the officials off to keep the drugs flowing. I lost absolutely everything spent six years incarcerated
01:14:21 There's a clip where i'm at an airport in london. I think it's gatwick or heathrow
01:14:25 And i'm all shell-shocked looking
01:14:28 Hugging mom dad sister mom's crying in the car out of the airport stayed at my parents house for a year
01:14:35 the dole
01:14:37 Was sending me on like telesales interviews and stuff like that. I tell them, you know criminal record. Yes
01:14:42 Couldn't get a job doles telling me you gotta start lying telling them
01:14:46 You're not got a criminal record or you're not never going to get a job. But a year later I moved down to gilford
01:14:51 Live with dj mike hot wheels one of my best friends
01:14:55 I lived in his bedroom for 10 years
01:14:58 I'm, just doing my blog building my socials. We started the blog in 2004 started the youtube channel in 2007
01:15:05 It's the first prison youtube channel. I go up and down the country interviewing the most interesting people
01:15:09 i'm blessed, you know
01:15:11 so many wonderful people came into my life to give me a leg up and help me get my message out and
01:15:16 I feel it's my karmic destiny now that we've got this platform
01:15:20 To help other guys share their story
01:15:22 It was the late 1980s
01:15:30 And all of a sudden on the weekends on the news
01:15:33 There was these stories of cops chasing around young people who were wide-eyed
01:15:38 Wearing baggy jeans with like acid
01:15:42 Lsd logos on them and stuff in my economics class. I had a mate. He's like you need to come and check this out
01:15:48 And then we went to the thunderdome oldham road manchester. So he's like
01:15:52 Bear with me. I'll go and get you the stuff. So
01:15:58 I took the pill and then once I started dancing. I never wanted to stop. I never wanted the party to end
01:16:05 And I was like
01:16:06 I finally found myself
01:16:08 And that's how raving became my religion. So going back generations of my family some settled in
01:16:14 Chicago, you know some retired in
01:16:18 Arizona
01:16:21 I had two aunts
01:16:22 Two of my dad's sisters ended up in arizona
01:16:26 And one of them I would visit as a kid
01:16:28 When the airplane comes into land you look out and you see all the swimming pools in the backyards
01:16:33 So I was already
01:16:35 Thinking hmm might want some of this when I finish university
01:16:39 That's what I did
01:16:41 If I could go back and tell myself one piece of advice, it would be stay on the path of slow and steady progress in life
01:16:47 I started following the stock market when I was 16. I was worth a couple of million in the stock market in my late 20s
01:16:54 That was before
01:16:56 All this drug activity
01:16:58 I didn't need the money. It was ego. My ego was as big as the grand canyon at the top of this
01:17:03 Pablo escobar was worth billions
01:17:06 His brother said let's buy our own island and kick back and not get arrested and not get killed and not spend the rest of our
01:17:11 Lives in prison. Pablo said I put the president in power
01:17:15 I've got 10 000 people working for me. You want me to kick back on some boring old island?
01:17:19 It's not
01:17:21 money
01:17:22 It's ego and being a character in the scene
01:17:25 I'm, neil woods a former undercover police officer. I used to infiltrate drug dealing gangs in the uk and this is how crime works
01:17:33 Drug crime is entirely different from any other forms of criminality entirely different if the police catch a drug dealer
01:17:45 crime goes up
01:17:47 Because there is an unlimited number of people
01:17:51 wanting to take that up that opportunity
01:17:53 What happens over time is at every level is where police catch drug dealers?
01:17:59 They help create monopolies
01:18:02 So if you catch a dealer who controls half a city
01:18:04 The dealer is most most able to take opportunity if that is the guy that controls the other half
01:18:09 in essence, it's an extremely
01:18:11 hostile
01:18:13 environment because
01:18:15 only the most
01:18:18 controlling and hostile gangs
01:18:20 Are the ones who are the most successful policing drugs?
01:18:23 has made
01:18:26 The heroin and crack cocaine markets in the uk and around the world much more hostile, but also much more competitive
01:18:32 Because people get arrested this creates opportunities
01:18:36 And if you consider that if the police catch a gang which controls the quarter a quarter of a city
01:18:43 Then the gang that is most most capable and able to take up that opportunity and take over control of that quarter of the city
01:18:50 Is a gang that already controls another quarter of the city
01:18:54 So it makes for a very combative and competitive
01:18:58 Marketplace
01:19:02 The target customers of those organized crime groups
01:19:08 Is the most problematic?
01:19:11 Consumers of those commodities the most hardcore 10 of heroin consumers
01:19:16 consume 50 of the market value of that heroin
01:19:20 So you can see just how much money there is
01:19:24 In dominating or exploiting that hardcore 10
01:19:28 You can make an extraordinary amount of money with dealing with relatively few people
01:19:33 I realized that I had to understand the people around me which meant
01:19:40 understanding a group of people that i'd previously had a huge amount of stigma for and I had to
01:19:44 Re-address that quite quickly because I had to know about I had to function like them
01:19:49 but I quickly realized that those people were
01:19:52 In a pattern of behavior that was out of their control because of what had happened to them
01:19:57 And that was important to understand because by understanding that I could understand how organized crime was exploiting them
01:20:02 And how I could appear to be exploited myself
01:20:05 And therefore get the credibility to to climb the ladder buy increasingly large amounts of drugs and network with the right people
01:20:12 It's the most significant dealer or the most significant foot soldier I suppose in
01:20:20 The bottom rung of organized crime is the most exploited person in the whole supply chain
01:20:26 And that is the user dealer. It's somebody who is
01:20:29 supplying drugs
01:20:32 To fund their own habit more often than not they're doing that because they've been forced to do so by organized crime
01:20:38 but they're the most important person to get to know because
01:20:41 They are the person that organized crime relies on or nowadays. It's quite often children who are
01:20:47 The dealers to rely on for organized crime a user dealer
01:20:51 From wherever they're living they would
01:20:55 Go where they're told
01:20:57 In the early morning to where the next rung up dealer would be and they would be given the package
01:21:04 More often than not that package would already be weighed into specific deals and sealed up heat sealed in plastic
01:21:11 And given to that dealer and there would be an agreement that he could take a percentage of those
01:21:16 As long as he sold the number the total number
01:21:19 Now if you to ask me
01:21:24 How the day went
01:21:26 For the person running a team of user dealers that gangster running
01:21:32 A quarter of a city say for example
01:21:34 most of those people i've met have been
01:21:38 quite professional
01:21:41 They haven't used any drugs. They have been efficient. They have got up in the morning
01:21:46 Early and they have usually do it in shifts
01:21:49 They'll split a morning shift and a late shift and they'll and they'll do it in rotation as a team. They will check
01:21:56 Which sim card goes in their phone or which phone they're using for the day
01:22:00 They will have a separate sim with a different with a database of numbers which are of most use to them
01:22:06 they will check in with their companions and they will
01:22:09 Meet up with the person that they're working with for that day
01:22:12 And what that would normally mean is that they will have a driver they will sit in the back
01:22:16 Of a car quite often and they will be driven around
01:22:20 Where they will be either doing deliveries to user dealers
01:22:24 Sometimes meeting in the back of that car or sometimes meeting at remote locations
01:22:29 Which will change on a rotational basis or or on a whim
01:22:34 they will
01:22:36 um
01:22:37 Keep and keep a careful eye on
01:22:40 Locations which where there is a stash where they're stashing their next
01:22:45 Resupply of drugs
01:22:49 They will also keep tabs on people who are doing the measuring out and the heat sealing
01:22:55 To make sure that they're doing that correctly
01:22:57 they will
01:22:59 Constantly be in contact with whoever whoever is tasked
01:23:02 in
01:23:04 the policing of those people to make sure everyone is is is staying honest and
01:23:09 Working according to the team ethos shall I say and make sure that no one's ripping them off in essence. It's an extremely
01:23:18 hostile
01:23:20 Environment, but I have to reiterate
01:23:23 It's the presence of people like me in that marketplace
01:23:26 And it's general drugs policing and the use of police informants
01:23:30 which creates that
01:23:33 desperately violent marketplace
01:23:35 The gangs that are the most successful are the ones who are most able and willing to use immediate violence
01:23:44 And so that threat of violence and that intimidation is becomes one of the most important tools of the trade
01:23:50 And so they have to put time into that they have to put effort
01:23:53 they have to
01:23:55 Bring discipline into that control of people
01:23:58 So they need to give tightness to people. They need to constantly build their reputation. So if there is a
01:24:04 a group of sex workers who are
01:24:07 um
01:24:08 committed to buying their
01:24:10 Heroin or crack from from that gang then they will remind them of that and they will use violence to do so
01:24:20 I'd actually given up undercover work just before
01:24:24 the burger bar boys
01:24:27 Investigation, but I was manipulated
01:24:29 Persuaded into doing it because two other undercover operatives had tried to get close to them
01:24:35 And they and they not got close dangerously not got close
01:24:39 But it was an extraordinary amount of work and it had its really serious ups and downs
01:24:44 So I went to northampton and I picked on two vulnerable people to manipulate and I decided these were the people who were going to eventually
01:24:52 Introduce me to the burger bar boys because I knew they were connected to them
01:24:56 I knew that they'd been dealing for them at one point and after lots of work
01:25:00 I eventually persuaded them to introduce me to the burger bar boys
01:25:03 And that was a terrifying experience
01:25:09 And so I was directed to where they were holding court their little headquarters at the snooker club
01:25:14 I was directed to the washrooms the door burst open
01:25:17 and this this hooded figure went into the toilet cubicle and
01:25:21 Stood on the toilet and looked over and said what's this?
01:25:24 And he kept asking other questions and then rephrasing the questions trying to catch me out
01:25:28 And I knew the guy looking down at me from the cubicle was implicated in seven different murders in particular
01:25:34 I knew he was the person who'd sourced
01:25:36 two submachine guns for a multiple murder of two women then 400 figures came in and
01:25:42 As the door bashed open and they started walking around me
01:25:45 Every so often one would headbutt me on the side of the head on the ear and I was getting jostled around more and more
01:25:51 And then all of a sudden he said all right, then what do you want as soon as he said the words?
01:25:56 All right, then what do you want the 400 figures has walked out and I said, uh
01:26:01 I'll have one and one please which meant i'll have a 1.4 deal of heroin 1.4 deal of crack
01:26:08 and I handed over my 40 pounds and
01:26:11 He he gave him me looking down on me
01:26:13 And then I got his phone number
01:26:16 He put woody actually put my name in the phone
01:26:18 His phone and I started to buy increasing amounts from them more often and gather evidence of conspiracy against the gang
01:26:24 I was in the most important task I had to get that phone number to get that beginnings of trust
01:26:31 I've got it. That was it
01:26:33 It was just the most intense
01:26:37 Operation there was always something and there was always that always that threat of violence. It never went away
01:26:45 Never went away not for one minute
01:26:48 And anyway, seven months it lasted
01:26:51 And I was pleased to think by the end of that seven months that i'd gathered evidence against 96 people the six main gangsters
01:26:59 plus 90 other people
01:27:01 And I knew there was no one else to meet there were no new phone numbers. There was no names. I hadn't heard of already
01:27:07 I'd caught everyone
01:27:09 There were police from five different counties hundreds of people involved
01:27:13 in the arrest phase
01:27:16 loads of doors being smashed in
01:27:18 and
01:27:20 A week or so after the event. I spoke to the intel officer and he said to me
01:27:25 Yep
01:27:27 We managed to interrupt the heroin and crack cocaine supply in northampton for a full
01:27:33 two hours
01:27:35 All of the belief I had that was that had been eroding away over those years and it had been eroding away
01:27:41 I had to give in to that
01:27:44 to the evidence before my eyes really and realize that
01:27:47 This is futile. Now what this does is it increases corruption?
01:27:51 If you have allowed a dealer or a gang
01:27:56 Or a cartel to increase their share of the market
01:27:59 Then they are richer
01:28:02 Which means they have more money to invest in corruption in mexico. There used to be 20 cartels now. There are three
01:28:09 Each one of those three has are richer than those 20 used to be sweden has it's an extraordinary
01:28:16 Drug gang war going on
01:28:19 And they're not just using guns machine guns. They're using grenades. They're using
01:28:24 Ieds, they're blowing each other up
01:28:26 There's literally hundreds of bombs going off in sweden
01:28:29 Between drug gangs competing to control drug markets across northern europe. This is something that we should pay attention to
01:28:36 especially
01:28:38 As sweden takes pride in having the toughest drug laws in europe
01:28:42 cause and effect I would say
01:28:45 the most significant change in the drug markets has been the shift of
01:28:49 Online the dark web the dark markets the lack of physical contact means is less violence. So that's a good thing
01:28:55 It's moved online and also there is a way online in some regard
01:28:59 Of having self-regulation because there's reviews left so people can increase the likelihood of better quality
01:29:06 commodities claims by fbi agents or whoever it is that they can crack codes and
01:29:13 Use hackers to bring these markets down. It's not true. The dark markets will continue to become more efficient
01:29:19 As a response to policing since i've left the police i've written a memoir
01:29:24 And that's called good cop bad war. My position is the position of my organization, which is the law enforcement action partnership
01:29:31 We advocate the for the full regulation of all the drug markets
01:29:35 To take control away from organized crime and increasingly we're becoming the most important voices for reform
01:29:41 Uh
01:29:43 Foreign
01:29:45 Foreign
01:29:47 Foreign
01:29:49 Foreign
01:29:51 Foreign
01:29:53 [BLANK_AUDIO]