Pure Narco
Luis Navia
Jesse Fink
01 October 2020
9781789463361576 pages
Synopsis
'I was a drug trafficker in the true sense of the word: a pure narco.'
For 25 years Luis Antonio Navia the Cuban-American smuggled hundreds of tons of white powder for the biggest cartels in Colombia and Mexico, including Pablo Escobar's Medellín Cartel.What made him good at his dangerous job was amassing trusted contacts, losing very few shipments of coke, and maintaining a low profile. He refused to carry a weapon.
But he was never far removed from the most brutal violence imaginable. One friend got his head cut off. Another was hit over the head, stuffed in a 55-gallon drum full of cement and dumped in a canal. Navia himself was kidnapped three times and went close to being fed alive to crocodiles. Somehow through it all he managed to survive and spent two decades fooling law-enforcement agencies until he came under the radar of Robert Harley, a tenacious US Customs special agent in Key West, Florida, who was determined to bring him to justice.
What followed was an international game of cat-and-mouse that culminated in Navia's 2000 capture in Venezuela in one of the biggest antinarcotics takedowns of all time, the 12-nation Operation Journey.
Spanning decades, continents and featuring a who's who of the drug trade, Pure Narco is a fast-paced adventure ride into the dark underworld of cocaine trafficking, written with the cooperation of a dozen law-enforcement agents from the world's top antinarcotics forces in the United States and Great Britain. Navia served his time in jail and is now free to tell his tale. His is the rare perspective of someone who has worked on both sides of that war: as a cocaine trafficker and US Government consultant. This book is a redemption story. Luis Navia, the pure narco, has gone full circle.
For 25 years Luis Antonio Navia the Cuban-American smuggled hundreds of tons of white powder for the biggest cartels in Colombia and Mexico, including Pablo Escobar's Medellín Cartel.What made him good at his dangerous job was amassing trusted contacts, losing very few shipments of coke, and maintaining a low profile. He refused to carry a weapon.
But he was never far removed from the most brutal violence imaginable. One friend got his head cut off. Another was hit over the head, stuffed in a 55-gallon drum full of cement and dumped in a canal. Navia himself was kidnapped three times and went close to being fed alive to crocodiles. Somehow through it all he managed to survive and spent two decades fooling law-enforcement agencies until he came under the radar of Robert Harley, a tenacious US Customs special agent in Key West, Florida, who was determined to bring him to justice.
What followed was an international game of cat-and-mouse that culminated in Navia's 2000 capture in Venezuela in one of the biggest antinarcotics takedowns of all time, the 12-nation Operation Journey.
Spanning decades, continents and featuring a who's who of the drug trade, Pure Narco is a fast-paced adventure ride into the dark underworld of cocaine trafficking, written with the cooperation of a dozen law-enforcement agents from the world's top antinarcotics forces in the United States and Great Britain. Navia served his time in jail and is now free to tell his tale. His is the rare perspective of someone who has worked on both sides of that war: as a cocaine trafficker and US Government consultant. This book is a redemption story. Luis Navia, the pure narco, has gone full circle.
If Howard Marks was the king of the cannabis smuggle, Luis Navia is the Howard Marks of the cocaine tradeGraham Honey, HMCE Senior Investigation Officer (Ret.)
With a cast of wild, grotesque and often deadly characters, strapped into a rollercoaster they cannot or will not get off, Pure Narco is a deliriously pleasurable ride. Luis Navia was a key trafficker for the biggest Colombian and Mexican cartels, and his insight into how they flooded the USA and Europe with drugs is unparalleled. This is the best insider account ever written of the global cocaine trade and the outrageous but precarious lives of those at the topPeter Walsh, author, Drug War: The Secret History
Pure Narco is a true story of redemption ... it offers a rare glimpse into the life of a drug smuggler from the Miami Vice era to the end of the millennium, when it all came crashing down for Luis NaviaNigel Brooks, USCS Senior Special Agent (Ret.)
