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Colombia re-arrests Pablo Escobar's hitman for extortion
Updated 1:24 pm, Friday, May 25, 2018
BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Colombian police have re-arrested a former hit man for the late drug lord Pablo Escobar as part of an investigation into extortion.
The chief prosecutor's office said Friday that Jhon Jairo Velasquez was arrested in Medellin. It has yet to provide details about the investigation.
Velasquez, known by his nickname Popeye, was paroled in 2014 after confessing to hundreds of murders and spending 22 years in jail for plotting the assassination of a former Colombian presidential candidate.
He has since gained notoriety as a YouTube star who espouses conservative political views and hate-filled diatribes against leftist rebels and Venezuela's socialist government. Last week he took aim at Colombia's leftist presidential candidate Gustavo Petro, warning that his "rifle will speak for me."
More:
https://www.chron.com/news/crime/article/Colombia-re-arrests-Pablo-Escobar-s-hitman-for-12944146.php
Jhon Jairo Velasquez
Biography of Pablo Escobar
Colombia's Drug Kingpin
by Christopher Minster
Updated April 17, 2018
Pablo Emilio Escobar Gaviria was a Colombian drug lord and leader of one of the most powerful criminal organizations ever assembled. During the height of his power in the 1980s, he controlled a vast empire of drugs and murder that covered the globe. He made billions of dollars, ordered the murder of hundreds, if not thousands of people, and ruled over a personal empire of mansions, airplanes, a private zoo and even his own army of soldiers and hardened criminals.
. . .
The Height of Power
By the mid-1980s, Pablo Escobar was one of the most powerful men in the world. Forbes magazine listed him as the seventh-richest man in the world. His empire included an army of soldiers and criminals, a private zoo, mansions, and apartments all over Colombia, private airstrips and planes for drug transport and personal wealth reported to be in the neighborhood of $24 billion. He could order the murder of anyone, anywhere, anytime.
More:
https://www.thoughtco.com/biography-of-pablo-escobar-2136126