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Netflix’s recently released new miniseries ‘Griselda’ which tells the story of notorious Colombian drug lord Griselda Blanco, has everything grey in it.
The series is based on the life of Griselda Blanco, a prominent Colombian drug lord during the 1970s and ’80s. She wasn’t just any drug lord, she created one of the most profitable drug cartels in history while raising a family.
Her life of crime started early; filled with extreme violence, she also became an addict and had paranoia, for which she faced ruthless actions.
Meet the real Blanco
Griselda Blanco, who was the daughter of an alcoholic sex worker and an absentee father, in Cartagena, Colombia, moved to Medellin, where she lived in the slums with her abusive mother.
At the age of 11, she kidnapped and killed a young son of wealthy parents as the parents didn’t take her ransom demand seriously.
At the age of 12, Blanco turned to prostitution and pickpocketing where she met Carlos Trujillo, a pimp, and by 13, she moved with him to New York where the couple married and before she turned 21, she had three children, however, when their relationship started going south over the business, Blanco had Trujillo whacked.
Blanco’s second husband and cocaine
In the 1960s, cocaine wasn’t all that popular until the drug was crystallized later and came in demand. Sensing this opportunity, Blanco backed off on the marijuana trade and, with her second husband Alberto Bravo, set up their smuggling operation in Queens, New York.
It was an ingenious setup, with Blanco using Bravo’s clothing import company to bring in product from the Colombian woman’s underwear factory Blanco opened, where coke was hidden in secret compartments sewn into bras and girdles through which a woman could carry seven pounds of cocaine in a single corset.
Road to success and paranoia
A golden rule among drug dealers is that they should never become addicted to their product. Blanco, however, got hooked on basuco, a raw form of smokeable cocaine that is highly addictive, and became excessively paranoid as a result.
That paranoia led to her keeping a private Learjet, fueled and crewed, on standby at all times. It paid off, with Blanco able to avoid arrest on federal drug conspiracy charges by DEA investigators during Operation Banshee by fleeing back to Colombia in 1975.
Her business had skyrocketed, with the previously cited Vice pegging her reported fortune, at the peak of her success, at $1.5 billion.
How Sofia’s reel character is different from the real ‘Griselda’?
The series aka mini series is based on her life. Apart from a few dramatic scenes, everything shown is loosely based on the real Colombian drug lord.
Griselda is streaming on Netflix!
