Devil's Bargain: A Former Medellin Cartel Official Has Been A DEA Informant For 27 Years. Now He Wan

Devil's Bargain: A Former Medellin Cartel Official Has Been A DEA Informant For 27 Years. Now He Wants Out.
Posted: 04/09/2015 12:34 pm EDT Updated: 04/09/2015 12:59 pm EDT



Carlos Toro, seen at his Miami home in 1982, has been on both sides of the drug war, first as a Medellín cartel member and later as a confidential DEA informant. (Photo courtesy of Carlos Toro)

“You're lying to me," the man said. Carlos Toro took a gulp of wine and tried to maintain his composure. For years, he had dreaded hearing those words.

It was February 2011, and Toro, who was then 61, had come to this upscale steakhouse in Madrid expecting a casual meal between two friends with business to discuss. His companion was a South American diplomat and high-level cocaine trafficker eager to break into the European drug market, where a kilo purchased for less than $1,000 wholesale back home could sell for more than $40,000 on the street. Toro was a onetime top official in the Colombia-based Medellín cartel, which dominated the global cocaine market in the 1970s and '80s.

In his sharply tailored blazer and slacks, a shock of thinning, gray hair atop his head, Toro certainly looked the part of a high-rolling cartel boss. He made up for his short and slightly sagging frame with a confident, easygoing charm. He had offered to facilitate a partnership with a Spanish airline employee who could supposedly transport drugs between South America and Europe aboard commercial planes.

Over the previous two years, Toro and the diplomat had shared many dinners like this one. They had exchanged intimate details about their personal lives, and Toro had even met the man's young son. Everything Toro told him, though, had been a lie.

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