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Game of Crimes

143: Part 2: Mike Chavarria - DEA border rat, undercover agent, and working overseas

Game of Crimes

Game of Crimes

True Crime

4.81.5K Ratings

🗓️ 7 May 2024

⏱️ 76 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Murph interviews retired DEA Special Agent Mike Chavarria. They discuss Mike's background, his career in law enforcement, and his experiences in the field working as a “border rat” and his overseas experiences in Mexico, Bolivia, and Costa Rica. They also touch on topics such as martial arts, the challenges of being a federal agent, and the importance of mental health in law enforcement. And they discuss corruption in Mexico and their experiences with 'mordida' or bribery.

Transcript

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0:00.0

And the Oh yeah well the the Mordita experience really occurred when I was a kid.

0:22.4

My first exposure to Mexican Mordita corruption. Mordita means bite. And in Mexico it simply means that that is how people make their way, you know, taking a bite whenever they can.

0:40.9

And in this case, when it comes to law enforcement, they take a little bite of

0:45.0

money for looking the other money for you know looking the other way

0:50.9

or helping to facilitate or worse. And so when I was seven, I think I was seven,

0:57.2

maybe eight. I'm driving around Tiquana, I think we're down there to get haircuts and grab tortillas or a pinyata.

1:04.1

And my dad is just me and my dad.

1:05.4

I'm in the right front passenger seat.

1:08.3

My dad gets pulled over by a motor cop.

1:12.1

And the cop approaches the window.

1:14.9

My dad pulls this wallet out and out he pulls out just enough to see it was either

1:21.1

a 10 or 20.

1:22.1

It was in the 60s, so it must have been a 10 with the tip of his driver's license.

1:28.0

So the cop takes the wallet, takes the bill, the 10, and returns his wallet and walks back to his motorcycle and then just

1:38.8

takes off.

1:39.8

Have a good day.

1:41.8

My dad looks at me and smiles and that's the end of that.

1:46.0

And so it wasn't until I became older that I realized,

1:52.0

hey, this is corruption

1:54.5

you know dealing professionally in in Mexico so you know very conscientious of how things worked in Tiquana and reflected back on my time in

2:08.0

Mexicali and realized, hey, it's just, I feel the same way that... I want to mention you talk about the corruption down there and the

2:16.2

ten dollar bill with your dad when we were in Colombia it never happened to me quite honestly

...

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