Pablo Escobar net worth
What is Pablo Escobar’s Net Worth?
Pablo Escobar is a Colombian-born drug lord with a lifetime net worth of $30 billion. Pablo Escobar was alive running one of the most notorious and violent drug cartels in history, the Medellin Cartel. At the height of its power, the Medellin cartel distributed 80 percent of the global cocaine market. In the process, Pablo and his cartel were responsible for thousands, if not tens of thousands, of murders. Many of these murders were of innocent civilians.
early life
Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria was born on December 1, 1949 in Rionegro, Colombia. Escobar is the third of seven children, the son of farmer Abel de Jesus Dari Escobar Echeverri and teacher Hilda de Los Dolores Gaviria Berrio. He grew up in Medellín and is believed to have started his criminal career as a teenager. He allegedly sold tombstones to resell to local looters and sold fake diplomas. Escobar studied for a short time at the Unidersidad Autonoma Latinoamericana, but did not complete his degree. In the early seventies, Escobar, along with partner Oscar Benel Aguirre, ramped up his criminal activities, running petty scams and selling contraband from fake cigarettes to fake lottery tickets. During this time, he made $100,000 for kidnapping and holding Medellin executives for ransom.
criminal career
1975 was the year Pablo began his massive cocaine operation called the Medellin Cartel. He owns two dozen planes, including a Learjet and six helicopters, which he uses to smuggle drugs between routes in Colombia, Panama and across the United States. Escobar would buy cocaine paste in Peru, send it to a lab for refining, and then smuggle it into aircraft tires. A pilot can earn up to $500,000 in drug smuggling fees per flight. By the mid-1980s, demand for cocaine was high in the United States, and the Medellin cartel controlled 80 percent of smuggled drugs; netting about $420 million per week. Cartels smuggle more than 15 tons per day.
Escobar himself already has a net worth of $30 billion and is one of the ten richest people on the planet. At the height of his criminal career, he was regarded as a hero by the people of Medellín, especially the poor, but by this time he was being hunted by the US and Colombian governments. With his “superhero” appearance, he managed to win the support of the citizens of Medellin: building sports fields and sponsoring children’s football teams, building houses and distributing funds through civic activities. Many citizens helped avoid Pablo’s arrest by acting as lookouts and lying to authorities.
Reign of Terror
Pablo’s fame eventually turned into a reign of terror in his native Colombia. Escobar was elected to Congress of Colombia in 1982, but he could not keep his insane wealth and the reason for it a secret. He was forced to resign two years later, and the judge who exposed his background was later murdered. Pablo Escobar unleashed his anger on his political enemies when he realized his dream of becoming Colombia’s president would not come true. He is responsible for the murders of thousands of politicians, journalists, civil servants and many innocent bystanders.
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Prison and Death
After Escobar’s cartel assassinated two-time liberal politician and journalist Luis Carlos Garland and posed a major threat to an ongoing drug cartel, the government has finally taken serious action to arrest Escobar. He negotiated a deal with the government to surrender and cease all criminal activity in exchange for a reduced sentence. Escobar turned himself in to the authorities in 1991. At this time, he cannot be extradited to the United States for a crime, as the new Colombian constitution of 1991 prohibits it. Escobar was “imprisoned” in his own private luxury prison called the Cathedral. The space is the height of luxury, with a football field, bar, jacuzzi, and even a waterfall. He continued to manage the Medellin cartel from within, which prompted the government to transfer him to a traditional prison in July 1992. Pablo escaped quickly and went on to flee a small army of Special Forces soldiers made up of Colombian drug cops, DEA agents, and Americans. In 1993, he was shot on the roof of an apartment building. About 25,000 people attended his funeral in Medellin, but Escobar’s death was a huge relief for his country and the world.
money/wealth
When Pablo was alive, his cartel was thriving, and he hired ten accountants to help launder hundreds of millions of dollars in illicit currency. He reportedly spends $2,500 a month on rubber bands alone to wrap up all his money. That’s enough to buy 250,000 rubber bands a month. With most of the money stored in basements and walls, Pablo is said to be forced to write off $500 million in cash each year due to corruption. Damage can include water damage and fires, but more commonly starved mice ate money thinking it was food. At one point, while Pablo was on the run, he offered to pay off Colombia’s entire national debt, totaling more than $10 billion, if they passed a law that would make extradition illegal.
In 1987, Forbes magazine placed Pablo’s fortune at more than $1 billion for the first time as part of its inaugural list of international billionaires. In the dossier, Pablo’s personal income is estimated at $3 billion. That’s the same as about $8 billion today, adjusted for inflation. For the next seven years, he made the list of the world’s billionaires every year.
In the early 1980s, Pablo paid Panamanian leader/General Manuel Noriega about $350 million to deposit billions of dollars in the country’s banks. When the relationship soured and Pablo’s money was frozen, the cartel reportedly offered a $1 million contract for Noriega’s life.
personal life
Escobar married 15-year-old Maria Victoria Henao in March 1976, when he was 26. Naturally, this relationship was opposed by the family, and the two eloped secretly. They have two children: son Juan Pablo (later renamed Sebastian Marocun) and daughter Manuela. Pablo reportedly had multiple extramarital affairs throughout his marriage.
Pop Culture
Pablo Escobar’s life has spawned numerous books, films and TV shows documenting his career in cocaine. Perhaps most notably, Netflix’s Narcos was released in August 2015 and documented the hunt for Escobar. Big-budget films like 2001’s Blow, Escobar, and American Made also hit the big screen. Pablo died with four hippos, and by 2007 the animals had bred to 16. National Geographic made a documentary about them called “Cocaine Hippos.”
