The Hunt for Pablo Escobar

Dan Snow's History Hit

History Hit

History

4.7 • 12.9K Ratings

🗓️ 29 January 2025

⏱️ 31 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

By the early 1990s, the Colombian city of Medellín was at the centre of the world's largest drug empire. The fearsome Medellín Cartel, led by the notorious drug lord and narcoterrorist Pablo Escobar, brought murder and mayhem to the city and the world for nearly two decades.

In this episode, Dan is joined by the men portrayed in the critically acclaimed series Narcos, ex-DEA agents Javier Peña and Steve Murphy. They tell us the true story behind the rise and fall of the infamous Pablo Escobar.

Produced by Freddy Chick and James Hickmann, and edited by Dougal Patmore.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi, I'm Dan Snow, and if you would like Dan Snow's History Hit ad-free, get early access and bonus episodes, sign up to History Hit.
0:09.7	With a History Hit subscription, you can also watch hundreds of hours of original documentaries with top history presenters and enjoy a new release every week.
0:19.4	Sign up now by visiting historyhit.com slash subscribe.
0:25.1	Hey, everyone.
0:26.1	Welcome to Dan Snow's History.
0:27.9	I'm looking at a photograph now,
0:30.2	taken on December 2nd, 1993.
0:33.2	It's taken in the beautiful city of Medellín in Colombia.
0:37.8	It's not a beautiful photo. It's a photo the beautiful city of Medellin in Colombia. It's not a beautiful photo.
0:39.2	It's a photo of men posing of the corpse of a man who's just been shot dead.
0:46.1	Medellin was the murder capital of the world in the early 1990s.
0:51.7	Hundreds of people could die in a weekend and sadly didn't even make the headlines
0:56.9	anymore. And many of their deaths were the responsibility of the man whose corpse I'm looking at in
1:02.7	this photograph. That's the body of Pablo Escobar, probably the wealthiest criminal who's ever lived, the man who turned his hometown into an
1:13.3	endless, seething bloodbath of drug war. He was thought to be responsible for thousands of deaths
1:21.6	directly and, of course, countless others indirectly. One of the men crouching over Pablo Escobar's body is joining me on
1:31.7	today's podcast. Steve Murphy was a DA agent assigned to Bogota in the 1980s and 90s. He's joining
1:39.9	him with his partner, Javier Pena or JP. He was part of the operation to hunt down Pablo Escobar,
1:47.7	but he flew out of the country the day before the final raid and flew back in that same night.
1:53.9	These two men were key characters. They were heroes of the Netflix smash hit Narcos.
1:59.2	So it's great they were talking to the real thing.
2:07.4	So here, to talk me through, the hunt for Pablo Escobar is Steve Murphy and Javier Pina.
	...

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