They explain that Pablo Escobar, the most famous drug lord to envy Chapo Guzmán and criminal whose contempt for human life was inversely proportional to his affection for hippos, made a confession that is now being recovered.
“The only man I was ever afraid of was a woman named Griselda Blanco”, a phrase said by the person who said it speaks clearly of the type of danger represented by Mrs. Blanco, also known as The Black Widow or The Godmother of drug trafficking. The bad names aren’t free either: she killed three husbands and smuggled tons of lethal drugs into the United States.
A recreation of the life of this “lady” dyed for, and not precisely for love, premieres this week on Netflix.
Sofía Vergara, who is also a producer, plays Griselda, the title of the series, who was shot and killed in 2012 when she left to shop at a butcher shop – another sarcasm in history – in Medellín (Colombia), where she took refuge after ‘gaining sympathy in the US for her ill health and being released from prison. She had been arrested in California for the betrayal of Jorge Ayala, one of the goons in her gang.
There will be a broadcast, except for some last-minute setbacks. The heirs of the deceased filed a lawsuit in a Miami court in which they claim compensation for damages and a temporary order to block the premiere, scheduled for next Thursday. The lawsuit is led by Griselda’s son, named Michael Corleone Sepúlveda Blanco, with this second name in homage to the character played by Al Pacino in the monumental film The Godfather
This other Corleone argues that they are using promotional material and images or identities of family members without any authorization. And the complaint clarifies that they use elements taken from the son’s recorded testimony without receiving any financial compensation.
Griselda Blanco cultivated criminal fame with a life journey full of bloody murders and plots to take revenge on anyone, including creatures. She was famous because if she thought someone was looking at her wrongly, that person would frown.
In the miniseries, she is portrayed glamorously, as an ambitious woman, but her trajectory was much murkier.
She was born in 1943 in the Colombian city of Santa María, although she was taken to Medellin when she was very young. During childhood he matured in the theft of wallets and at the age of 11 he is credited with the first murder. He kidnapped a rich boy and since he was not given the ransom, he shot him.
At the age of 21, in 1964, she immigrated without papers to New York, with her husband, Carlos Trujillo, and her three children (deadly victims of killings carried out by rivals). They settled in the district of Queens and she started selling marijuana, the beginning of the stage in a world dominated by men.
Six years later, Griselda is blamed for her husband’s murder. Then, in 1970, she moved to Miami, where she met her second husband, the trafficker Alberto Bravo, who introduced her to the world of drug traffickers. He got into trouble with the justice system, which caused him to run away. But in the eighties he returned to the city of Florida, one of the meccas of crime at that time.
He introduced nearly 1,500 kilos of cocaine a month and experts believe that, with the updated dollar, this would equate today to a business of around 3,000 million a year.
He climbed to the top of all power thanks to the audacity to put cocaine in the US. He created a line of underwear, made in Colombia, that incorporated secret pockets. And he is credited with a display of charm in his relationships, a fact that could also be a passage to the grave.
Bravo, who was in the country of origin controlling all affairs, killed him because he stole from him. He fired several shots at her and she got out of the situation with a bullet in her stomach. The third husband, Darío Sepúlveda, had no better luck when he wanted to take Michael, their common son, to Colombia.
This is not a spoiler, but Griselda introduced the innovation of shooting from a motorcycle because of the ease of escaping the scene. That’s how they murdered her. There were those who spoke of poetic justice for having met death in the same way in which she killed so many people.
