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Meanwhile, the man most wanted by Colombian authorities is Pablo Escobar, 34, a prime suspect in the Lara killing. Escobar is believed to have united the 15 or so families that control the bulk of Colombia's drug industry into a consortium. This organization, known as the Medellin Mafia, directs most of the nation's narcotics operations, from the processing of coca leaves into paste, much of which is imported from Bolivia and Peru, to the marketing of cocaine and marijuana in the U.S. According to Colombian police, Escobar's personal holdings include at least 15 airplanes, numerous ranches throughout Colombia and real estate holdings in the U.S. At his 10,000-acre spread near Puerto Triunfo, Escobar kept a private zoo of 1,500 animals, among them a five-ton elephant. He was elected to Colombia's Congress in 1982 as head of his own political party, and is still a Congressman. He is rumored to be in Australia.
Escobar allegedly paved the way in the late 1970s for the Colombians' ever growing stake in the U.S. narcotics traffic by unleashing the "Cocaine Cowboys," a squad of brutal, ruthless killers. "The Colombian mafia like to hit you where you hurt most, especially your family," explains Lucho Arango, 29, a Bogotá office worker whose family ran afoul of the mafia. According to Psychologist Gonzalo Amador, mafia enforcers will kill their enemies' wives, children, servants and family friends. They have even been known to kill the family parrot "to keep it from talking," he says.
Many Colombians doubt whether the government will be able to sustain its crackdown for very long. They fear that once the state of emergency is lifted, the drug traders will be back in business. However, John Phelps, a U.S. drug-enforcement official in Colombia, believes that if the government's war on drug traffickers continues at its present pace, the mafia's ability to mass produce and distribute narcotics will be crippled. Certainly, President Betancur has much of the population behind his efforts to stamp out the drug trade. A Colombian woman may have best expressed the attitude of many toward the mafia. A few days ago she was seen in Bogotá looking at the cover of a weekly magazine showing the dead minister's widow and two sons crying over his coffin. Said she: "Kill them, kill them! They are the excrement of our society."
—By Hunter R. Clark.
Reported by Bernard Diederich and Tom Quinn/Bogotá