Gangster Warlords

In a ranch south of Texas, the man known as The Executioner dumps five hundred body parts in metal barrels. In Brazil’s biggest city, a mysterious prisoner orders hit-men to gun down forty-one police officers and prison guards in two days. In southern Mexico, a crystal meth maker is venerated as a saint while imposing Old Testament justice on his enemies.A new kind of criminal kingpin has arisen: part CEO, part terrorist, and part rock star, unleashing guerrilla attacks, strong-arming governments and taking over much of the world’s trade in narcotics, guns and humans. Who are these new masters of death? What personal qualities and life experiences have made them into such bloodthirsty leaders of men? What do they represent and stand for? What has happened in the Americas to allow them to grow and flourish?Author of the critically acclaimed El Narco: Inside Mexico's Criminal Insurgency, Ioan Grillo has covered Latin America since 2001, and gained access to every level of the cartel chain-of-command in what he calls the new battlefields of the Americas. Moving between militia-controlled ghettos and the halls of top policy-makers, Grillo provides a new and disturbing understanding of a war that has spiralled out of control – one that people across the political spectrum need to confront now.Gangster Warlords is the first definitive account of the crime wars now wracking Central and South America and the Caribbean.

Grillo’s investigations into the cokehead brokers, dealers and professional killers who manage the supply and demand of cocaine involves him in a degree of danger ... An absorbing work of reportage, Grillo is a breathtakingly intrepid reporter, diving in where police fear to tread, seeking out men who wouldn’t hesitate to kill him ... A grim, gripping book ****, Grillo has done sterling work on the front lines ... His portraits of gangster societies living beyond law or even reason are starkly persuasive, Grillo makes it clear that gang members like Montana, cartel leaders, sicarios, and powerful member soft crime organizations exist all over Latin America and the Caribbean – not just Mexico ... Gangster Warlords is a step-up for the writer, documenting a very grim reality that’s unfolding in real time, Grillo’s strength is that while he draws the broad patterns of the raging conflict, he also zooms in on the particularities of each front ... He even offers a few prescriptions for tackling what he calls this “cocaine-fuelled holocaust”: decriminalising marijuana ... Investing money in the lost-cause neighbourhoods where drug gangs are seen as heroes and police are the enemy

Ioan Grillo has reported on Latin America since 2001 for international media including TIME magazine, Reuters, CNN, the Associated Press, PBS NewsHour, the Houston Chronicle, CBC, and the Sunday Telegraph. His first book, El Narco, was translated into five languages and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Born and educated in the UK, Grillo lives in Mexico City.